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Total Recall (1990)
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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Thu May 28, 2015 11:01 am    Post subject: Total Recall (1990) Reply with quote

__________


Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sharon Stone, Michael Ironside, Mars, an ancient alien pyramid with an instant atmosphere machine.

What's not to like? If they'd thrown in a mutant midget hooker with three boobs, this movie would be perfect.

Wait! It's got that too! Very Happy

Story wise, the best thing about this movie is the way Arnold thinks he's a good guy, then finds out he's a bad guy who's just faking it, then decides the real him is the fake him so he just keeps on being a good guy.

Who's says people can't change. You gotta love it!

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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)


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ralfy
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PostPosted: Wed Jun 03, 2015 6:03 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Not bad, and Sharon looks great in this movie. I don't know why they had to do a remake.
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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Tue Feb 21, 2017 5:43 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

__________________________________

This is a surprisingly good trailer for this very entertaining movie. I wish the picture quality was a bit better, but I still liked watching it.

Enjoy! Cool
__________________________________


_______________ TOTAL RECALL (1990) trailer


__________

_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)


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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Fri Mar 03, 2017 2:24 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

________________________________

IMDB has some very interesting trivia items for this movie. Behold! Cool
________________________________

~ This was one of the last major Hollywood blockbusters to make large-scale use of miniature effects as opposed to CGI.



[img]https://i.imgur.com/gF4MhMf.jpg
[/img]


~ It was also one of the first major Hollywood blockbusters to use CGI (mainly for the scenes involving the X-Ray scanner) and have it look "photo-real".


________


~ Paul Verhoeven signed onto the film in the Autumn of 1988. Filming began in Mexico City because of its futuristic architecture. 500 people worked on the film; they built 45 sets that tied up eight sound stages for six months. At the time, Total Recall (1990) was the second most expensive film in history, next to Rambo III (1988).

~ The miniatures used for shots showing Martian geography were based on Martian photographs.






~ After seeing Sharon Stone's performance as Lori in this movie, director Paul Verhoeven would cast her in the movie Basic Instinct (1992) due to her ability play a character that could change from a timid charming sweetheart to a diabolical person and back again at a moment's notice. He also stated that this is, basically, the way Sharon Stone is in real life.

~ In the DVD commentary, Paul Verhoeven said that for the love scene after Quaid wakes from his nightmare, he wanted Sharon Stone to show more skin, but she refused to do so. He settled for shooting the scene as it is shown, but mentions that he "got her back" while shooting Basic Instinct (1992).



________________


~ Arnold Schwarzenegger was so impressed by how much dedication Sharon Stone had in training for her character role that he even referred to her as the "Female Terminator". She was inducted into the Stunt Woman Association as an honorary member.





~ Arnold Schwarzenegger was originally going to play the title role in RoboCop (1987), but problems with the costume caused producers to drop the idea. After Schwarzenegger saw "RoboCop", he said that he loved the movie and wanted to work with director Paul Verhoeven. When he and Verhoeven heard about "Total Recall", they decided to work on that.

~ Robert Picardo was voice of and facial model for the "Johnnycab" robot. Johnnycab whistles the Norwegian national anthem






~ Composer Jerry Goldsmith considered Total Recall to be one of his best film scores.

~ Composer Jerry Goldsmith had said that he had received some criticism about the movie's score that "the movie had no theme", to which he strongly disagreed, stating that the movie did in fact have a theme, but it wasn't the kind of theme that "people left the theaters whistling after". Goldsmith had modeled some of the movie's score after the score from Conan the Barbarian (1982) composed by Basil Poledouris.

~ Arnold Schwarzenegger noticed that Michael Ironside was constantly on the phone between takes. When he broached the subject with Ironside, he was told the he was phoning his sister and that she was currently suffering from cancer. Arnold immediately brought Michael to his trailer and they had an hour-long 3-way conversation with Ironside's sister about what exercises she should do and what kinds of foods she should be eating. Ironside has never forgotten Schwarzenegger's kindness and neither has his sister.

~ Arnold Schwarzenegger took the part because he liked the idea of virtual travel; the scene where a salesman sells him the trip he never took was one of Schwarzenegger's favorite scenes in the movie.

~ In the featurette Imagining 'Total Recall' (2001), editor Frank J. Urioste said that most of the external shots of Mars almost didn't make it into the final cut of the movie, much to his dismay. The producers felt that those shots would be too expensive and would make the movie go over budget. Urioste then addressed his concerns about those shots to Arnold Schwarzenegger, who was able to convince the producers not to remove the external shots from the final cut.






~ Christopher Reeve was offered, but turned down, the role of Douglas Quaid.

~ Director Paul Verhoeven wanted to make the ending of the movie completely ambiguous so as the audiences would still not know even at the end of the movie if it was all a dream or if it did really happen. According to Verhoeven himself, he believed the ending was in fact a dream, but at the same time, he also said that the casting of Arnold Schwarzenegger as the lead role was also leaning towards reality, as most audiences who go to see a Schwarzenegger movie would be in favor of a 'reality' ending as opposed to a 'dream' ending.

_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)


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mach7
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PostPosted: Sun Sep 03, 2017 9:13 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I just watched this again after 26 years.

Not bad, in a kind of action flick way.

A VERY large body count!

Some issues, Mars has an atmosphere. Also the gravity is earth gravity. But with this kind of movie, who cares about a few bits of bad science?

Fast paced, well acted, and well directed with good SPX.

A fun 2 hours.
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Gord Green
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PostPosted: Mon Sep 04, 2017 12:19 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I really liked this movie!

It had touches of Heinlien's THE MOON IS A HARSH MISTRESS. Which is not surprising as Verhovean had just been involved with preparing STARSHIP TROOPERS for the screen.
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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Mon Sep 04, 2017 9:17 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

mach7 wrote:
Some issues, Mars has an atmosphere. Also the gravity is earth gravity. But with this kind of movie, who cares about a few bits of bad science?

Although it's true that Mars has 38% as much the gravity as Earth does, if this movie had depicted that (in some way), we'd just have unintentionally funny scenes of the characters bouncing around in a comic fashion! Laughing

Better to just ignore the low gravity and hope the science-minded folks like us will understand why it was done.

As for your statement, "Mars has atmosphere", I assume you meant that all those scenes with screaming people and bulging eyeballs were way overdone in terms of the effects of the low Martian air pressure.

And of course your right.

UPDATE: I removed the percent sign I'd original added to .011 when Scotpens pointed out in his post below that I'd made a mistake. Very Happy

But since Mars' air pressure is only 0.011 of Earth's atmosphere, an unprotected human body would be bad shape pretty quickly. All the saliva, tears, skin moisture and the water in the alveoli of the lungs would boil away, which would cause death within a few minutes (at most).

So, let's just say the gruesome special effects portrayed what a person would feel like under those circumstance, rather than what they would literally look like. After all, bulging eyeballs and protruding tongues are WAY more dramatic than boiling saliva and evaporating tears! Shocked

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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)


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mach7
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PostPosted: Mon Sep 04, 2017 12:10 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Thank you Gord! I was wondering why the "feel" of the movie felt familiar. It's been years since I read "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" but I'm sure that's the link.

Bud, I like your explanation of the effects of the Martian atmosphere, I was just keyed to my reaction when the movie shifts to Mars, the Public address announcements state that there is a vacuum outside of the dome.

Overall I can forgive lapses in basic science in this type of movie for dramatics.
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scotpens
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PostPosted: Mon Sep 04, 2017 1:01 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Bud Brewster wrote:
. . . But since Mars' air pressure is only 0.011% of Earth's atmosphere, an unprotected human body would be bad shape pretty quickly. All the saliva, tears, skin moisture and the water in the alveoli of the lungs would boil away, which would cause death within a few minutes (at most).

0.011% is eleven-thousandths (or just over 1/100) of one percent. The atmospheric pressure on the Martian surface is about 0.6% (six-tenths of one percent) of Earth's mean sea level pressure. I think you misplaced a decimal or two.

And the atmosphere on Mars is more than 95 percent carbon dioxide and just over one-tenth of one percent oxygen, so it couldn't support human life regardless of the air pressure.
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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Mon Sep 04, 2017 3:03 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

________________________________

Oops. I got that number from the wed site at the embedded link in the quote below, but I shouldn't have added the percent sign. Embarassed

I went back and removed the percent sign from my post above. Thanks! Very Happy

And since .011 (11/1000) is 1.1 percent, the figure in the quote is incorrect (a bit too high) even if I hadn't added the percent sign!

Mars has a maximum of .011 of Earth's atmospheric pressure at its the bottom of its deepest depth.

_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)


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Maurice
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PostPosted: Wed Sep 06, 2017 2:27 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

The film blew it in one key moment for me, when they cut away from Quaid to some other characters. Since the premise of the film is based on "is this real or an implanted memory" the very fact they cut away from Quaid gives away that it's all real, because Quaid could not have an implanted memory of a conversation he wasn't present for because that would tell HIM that the memory is fake.
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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Wed Sep 06, 2017 9:12 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Maurice wrote:
Since the premise of the film is based on "is this real or an implanted memory" the very fact they cut away from Quaid gives away that it's all real, because Quaid could not have an implanted memory of a conversation he wasn't present for because that would tell HIM that the memory is fake.

Actually, I've never gotten the impression that the audience was supposed to wonder if Quaid was experiencing reality. In a key scene, one of the bad guys desperately tried to convince Quaid he was dreaming, but the moment Quaid saw the man sweating he knew the claim was bogus.

As you said, the movie has many scenes that show events which were not consistent with it all being an implanted memory, so I just don't think the producers meant for the audience to wonder at any point if it was real or if it was Memorex.
Very Happy
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____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)


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Bogmeister
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PostPosted: Fri May 03, 2019 3:56 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

____________
______________ TOTAL RECALL TRAILER 1990


__________

_________

One thing about Paul Verhoeven's films — they are fast paced. It's not just the action bits; there's always something kinetic going on in a film such as this, even when it's just two characters having breakfast in their futuristic apartment, and the film never seems to slow down. There's always some splashy visual or brash movement.

In the plot, Quaid (Schwarzenegger) seems to be a construction worker living a standard life on Earth, in year 2084. His wife (Sharon Stone) is a bit on the gorgeous-exotic side, but it's a dull life — maybe that's why he has dreams about Mars and wants to check out a service which implants vacations into the minds of customers.

There are hints that all is not what it seems — a co-worker seems too eager to dissuade Quaid from trying this service.




Things get really hectic after Quaid tries this service. Suddenly he is forced to kill an assault group led by his supposed co-worker, and then he's on the run from Michael Ironside and his cronies, who are intent on killing him.

Before the audience can catch its breath, Quaid has arrived on Mars, where there's a rebellion going on. The chief baddie is played by Ronny Cox, fresh from a similar role in Verhoeven's Robocop.

Here, he's the boss of a mining operation which makes him the most powerful man in the solar system. But, of course, he's very corrupt, misusing his authority to the detriment of all the workers — hence, the rebellion. Many of the workers are mutants, deformed due to the villain's cheap methods.

Quaid tracks down the mysterious brunette Melina (Rachel Ticotin) — the woman of his dreams — and the fun goes on.



Much of the plot does not hold up well under close scrutiny — even the villain himself states in the final act that he is surprised that his master plan worked.

This is why there is a prevalent theory among those familiar with this film that the entire film after the first 10 minutes is a dream that Quaid is having. The plot is just too elaborate, too outlandish for what the villain intends, which is just a simple infiltration to eliminate key rebels.

Plus, there's that subplot about a huge alien artifact which can convert the Mars atmosphere, just waiting for Quaid to activate it. Rolling Eyes

To me, though, the telling moment is when Quaid describes his fantasy woman as he prepares to have the vacation implanted in his mind — the fantasy woman who appears on the computer screen is Melina — not a woman who looks like Melina, but Melina herself. This tells me that the rest of the film is Quaid's dream.



And, like the best dreams, this one is always interesting and thrilling. The film grabs you in the first few minutes and then has you wondering what is the next strange or exciting thing that Quaid will encounter.

The visuals are pretty good. Though most of the FX and sets were done old-school, hands on crafting. This was also the beginning of the computer FX era and a little of that is mixed in (Terminator 2 was released only a year later).

Michael Ironside has always been one of the most natural for the villain or tough henchman roles. He lives for shooting his guns in this one, to the point that it sometimes backfires on him (as when the protective glass breaks).

Ronny Cox does not do as well; he tries too hard to be a bastard in this one.

The women are great and just as involved in the action.


________________________

____ Imagining Total Recall - The making of Total Recall


__________


Total Trivia: In an early role as a mutant is Dean Norris, who got famous many years later in the TV series Breaking Bad.

~ Star Trek actor alert: also in a small role is Marc Alaimo as the captain of the Mars police force; he went on to the semi-regular role of Gul Dukat on Star Trek DS9. And, in a small role of a 3-breasted woman is Lycia Naff, who had guest-starred in the famous Star Trek TNG episode Q Who.

BoG's Score: 7.5 out of 10




BoG
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Krel
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PostPosted: Sat May 04, 2019 4:08 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Paul Verhoeven has said that everything that happens after Quaid gets the machine implant is not real. He says that everything that happens after that is in the Rekall vacation Quaid picked. Also the movie fades out like the Rekall implants.

Michael Ironside had his character dress the same as his character in "V". He said that he wasn't finished with Ham Tyler.

David.
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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Sat May 04, 2019 4:48 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

________________________________

Well frankly, that sucks. Shocked

Writing classes tell the students that ending a story with " . . . but it was all just a dream," is the Kiss of Death. The reader feels totally cheated, because nothing was real. The character's experiences were just a nightmare caused by the spicy Italian food he had for diner. Rolling Eyes

What a gip! Sad

Imagine Hitchcock making a suspenseful movie in which Jimmy Steward is the victim of a conspiracy, and all the people around him try to convince him he didn't really witness a violent murder, he's just insane.

Then the movie ends with Steward finding out . . . he's just insane. (I'd demand a refund at the box office.)

Let me put it another way.

Arnold is supposed to be this evil guy who volunteered to have his memories changed so he could go undercover as a dumb-ass construction worker and eventually help the other villains expose the rebel leader on Mars.

Great concept! We were shocked when Arnold discovered that he was part of the conspiracy, and he was a bad guy!

But when his "adjusted memories" cause him to act like a good guy instead of a villain, he discovers that being a good guy was more rewarding than being the asshole he really was. He earns the respect and the love of the brave heroine, and he changes himself into a true hero!

What a great story, right? I mean, this is the heart and soul of this great movie. Arnold gets to see what he COULD be, so reinvents himself to become an amazing hero!

Ummm . . . wait. No. That's NOT the real story. Sorry folks, but here's the truth.

Arnold is just a dumb-ass construction worker whose life is so vapid and empty he lets a machine give him a false memories of doing brave and noble deeds.

Ah-ha . . . okay . . . so we all just spent two hours watching a witless schmuck pretending to be a hero, after which he wakes up and goes home to his dull and useless life.

Seriously . . . I'm suppose to LIKE that version? Nope, sorry, it totally sucks.

Just for fun, let's reimagine a few classic heroes in this same manner and see how appealing they would be.

~ Young farm boy Luke Skywalker goes to bed one night and dreams a beautiful princess sends him a message from space, asking him to help her save the galaxy! (Next morning he wakes up and has breakfast with his aunt and uncle.)

~ Little Jimmy Kirk reads too many comic books and dreams he's the handsome captain of a starship in the distant future. (Next morning he wakes up, goes to school, gets beat up by the local bullies.)

~ Teenage Clark Kent has a dream about being a handsome and powerful visitor from another planet who flies around in a colorful costume and battles evil villains. (Next morning he wakes up and feeds the chickens before having breakfast with Ma and Pa Kent.)

See my point, folks? If a story is just a dream, it simply ain't worth bothering with. Rolling Eyes

_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)


Last edited by Bud Brewster on Wed Nov 16, 2022 1:43 pm; edited 2 times in total
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