Verhoeven and Arnold do Dick.

Rating: 8/10 (18 March 2007)

Nobody did sci-fi excess in the 80s and 90s quite like Paul Verhoeven. Whether dealing with bug-like aliens (Starship Troopers), cyborg policemen (Robocop) or invisible maniacs (Hollow Man), the Dutch director rarely took the subtle approach, preferring to mix heavy handed satire with ultra violence. With Total Recall, he once again takes the audience on a wild ride of OTT action and gore, delivering a hugely enjoyable, if somewhat far-fetched, tale based on the Philip K. Dick short story 'We Can Remember It For You Wholesale'.
Arnold Schwarzenegger plays Douglas Quaid, a construction worker plagued with dreams about Mars, who decides to pay the red planet a 'virtual' visit through Recalla company that can implant memories.
However, when Doug chooses to receive the memories of a secret agent, he gets more than he bargained for: as a result of tampering with the old grey matter, Quaid discovers that he really has been to Mars, his wife is not who she seems to be, and he may hold vital information in his brain that can change the course of Mars' history forever. Or maybe all of this is just part of his 'virtual' holiday from Recall.
With a plot that twists and turns like a rattlesnake on a roller-coaster, it is not long before he (and the audience) is unsure of what is actually real and what is the inevitable result of messing around with the mind.
Verhoeven brings together state of the art effects (for 1990, at least), a great cast (which includes Michael Ironside, Sharon Stone, and Ronny Cox) and plenty of action to deliver one of the better movies in Arnie's curriculum vitae. Sci-fi pedants might easily be able to pick holes in the plot (and even I admit that the ending takes some swallowing!), but as far as I am concerned, any film with a machine-gun toting dwarf prostitute is OK in my book.