T.R | Title | User | Personal Name | Date | Lines |
---|
172.1 | | 6179::VALENZA | My note runneth over. | Tue May 04 1993 01:24 | 14 |
| This was based on a Philip K. Dick short story, "We Can Remember It For
You Wholesale". I was a big fan of Philip K. Dick, and he used to have
quite a cult following (some people considered him the best science
fiction writer of his time.) Most of his stories and novels focused on
the idea of being unable to distinguish between reality and illusion.
He may have taken a few hallucinogenics during the 60s, which wouldn't
have hurt as sources of inspiration.
I felt ambivalent about this film. While I enjoyed many of its special
effects, at the same time I was very disappointed that they turned a
brilliant Philip K. Dick story into an extremely violent Schwarzeneggar
bloodfest.
-- Mike
|
172.2 | ditto | 16821::VETEIKIS | | Tue May 04 1993 01:54 | 11 |
| re. .1 Bloodfest comment
I agree with you.
My wife and I went and saw this movie several months ago at the
theatre. It was so violent we walked out of the movie. It seemed liked
scenes were purposely created to have humans blown away.
Two thumbs down.
Curt
|
172.3 | | 5235::J_TOMAO | Free your mind and the rest will follow.. | Tue May 04 1993 16:10 | 9 |
| May too bloody for me too but the whole concept of the story was
fascinating to me.
I also get a kick out of the movie makers riding on Sharon Stone's
coat-tails - she did do a wonderful job playing his wife but now all
the hype is "See Sharon Stone in Total Recall"
One of my favorite Arnie movies,
Joyce
|
172.4 | It had plenty of good and bad parts | VMSDEV::HALLYB | Fish have no concept of fire | Tue May 04 1993 16:19 | 6 |
| A lot of gratuitous violence, not to mention gratuitous slams at
Big Business and the Laws of Physics (real-time terraforming, indeed!).
But I enjoyed the ambiguous ending and many of the special effects.
John
|
172.5 | | 29881::REILLY | Sean Reilly CSG/AVS DTN:293-5983 | Tue May 04 1993 20:00 | 12 |
|
Maybe on TV the effects were good, but in the theatre, I though they
were quite sub-par. The overriding thing I remember about this movie
is how bad I thought the special effects were, *especially* considering
all the hype that went into blabbing about the amount of money spent
making the movie (the $$$ must've all went to Arny). Hokey sets aka
Venusville, bad models of Mars landscapes, silly claymation cartoons
of Martian atmosphere effects, and a bad job of projecting scenery in
back of characters. In this day and age, a "special effects" movie
just should have had better "special effects" in my opinion.
- Sean
|
172.6 | it's only a flick | 16913::MEUSE_DA | | Tue May 04 1993 23:27 | 8 |
|
I enjoyed seeing this again on the tube for nuttin.
The only violence, bloodshed and inhumanity that shocks me is the 6
o'clock news. It just keeps getting worse.
|
172.7 | enough downer stuff | 16821::VETEIKIS | | Wed May 05 1993 04:21 | 11 |
| re. -1
i hope i never get "entertainment value" from the kind of bloodshed that
was in this movie.
okay, okay its just a movie i know. but like you say, after being
depressed by CNN etc every night, I've had enough.
I'll take something uplifting any day over this rot.
Curt
|
172.8 | | VAXWRK::ELKINS | Adam Elkins @MSO | Wed May 05 1993 14:46 | 24 |
|
I loved this movie. The violence didn't bother me at all - it
was all comic-book violence.
<spoiler>
What I liked most about the movie was the ambiguity about whether
the whole adventure was real or just part of the Rekall experience
that Arnold had asked for in the first place. At one point a
doctor tries to convince him that he is experiencing a Rekall
experience that had gone bad, and Arnold almost believes him
until he sees a beed of sweat on the doctor's face. Could
Arnold have hallucinated the beed of sweat to avoid having
to end the experience? Or maybe the whole episode with the
doctor been a planned part of the rekall experience.
Even at the end Arnold says "I just had a terrible thought. What
if this was all a dream?" Then right before the credits roll there
is a bright light. Was he waking up? Was he lost in his madness
because of a bad rekall experience as the doctor had originally
suggested while trying to talk him down? There's no definite answer.
Adam
|
172.9 | | 45106::ALFORD | lying Shipwrecked and comatose... | Wed May 05 1993 14:56 | 17 |
|
reply to a bit of the previous spoiler
> Even at the end Arnold says "I just had a terrible thought. What
> if this was all a dream?" Then right before the credits roll there
> is a bright light. Was he waking up? Was he lost in his madness
> because of a bad rekall experience as the doctor had originally
> suggested while trying to talk him down? There's no definite answer.
Ah well, this totally proves that we got a cut-to-pieces version in the UK...
The violence wasn't over-bad and we certainly didn't get that ending...I kept
thinking, reading the previous replies, that you lot must have been talking
about a different movie of the same name that just happened to star Arnie
|
172.10 | | 6179::VALENZA | It's flip flop season. | Mon May 17 1993 02:55 | 6 |
| If anyone is interested in reading the story on which this movie is
based, you can find it in volume 2 of "The Collected Stories of Philip
K. Dick", available in finer bookstores everywhere. It's the volume
with the artistic rendering of Arnold S. on the cover.
-- Mike
|
172.11 | | 9006::LARY | Laughter & hope & a sock in the eye | Mon May 17 1993 07:25 | 4 |
| Or, if you find an older edition (minus Arnold) or some other collection of
Philip K. Dick's short stories, the name of the story is "We Can Remember It
For You Wholesale".
|
172.12 | | 7094::VALENZA | It's flip flop season. | Mon May 17 1993 13:30 | 10 |
| "We Can Remember It For Your Wholesale" is also the name of Volume two
of that collection Dick's stories (each volume apparently has the name
of one of the stories it contains as the volume title; there are
several volumes in the series.)
I think "We Can Remember It For You Wholesale" can also be found in the
"Science Fiction Hall of Fame", which was first published many years
ago; I don't know if that book is currently in print.
-- Mike
|
172.13 | Check Avenue Victor Hugo on Newbury St. in Boston | ASDG::GASSAWAY | Insert clever personal name here | Mon May 17 1993 16:32 | 16 |
|
There are five separate volumes to the Science Fiction Hall of Fame;
vols. 1,3,4 are short stories and vols. 2A and 2B are novellas. I
can currently locate all of my copies except vol. 1, and none of
those have the story in it.
Regardless of whether or not the story is in it or not, vol. 1
is definitely worthwhile reading, and although I can't remember
specifically off the top of my head all the stories contained
within it, I remember being fascinated by quite a few of them.
The other four volumes are not quite as good as vol. 1. They are all
out of print, but the better used book stores usually have at least
one of the volumes hanging around.
Lisa
|
172.14 | | 7094::VALENZA | It's flip flop season. | Mon May 17 1993 16:40 | 5 |
| The one I had in mind would have been volume 1; that's the copy that I
had in my possession at one time. I don't know for certain that it is
in that volume or not, but for some reason I thought that it was.
-- Mike
|
172.15 | A spoiler for the spoiler in .8! | GIDDAY::HIRSHMAN | Fimus tauri vincere ingenium | Thu Jul 08 1993 11:41 | 152 |
172.16 | Memory is all we have | TLE::JBISHOP | | Thu Jul 08 1993 14:34 | 16 |
| In the original story by Philip K. Dick, the layering of memory
and reality goes even deeper--go read it!
One of Dick's points is that all we have of the past is our memory;
even books and objects are only meaningful because we have memories
of trusting them as evidence. So if you add false memories to a
person, you are changing their past and thus their present. If large
numbers of people get memory changes, then "reality" gets a bit thin
(socially constructed reality, not physical reality, that is).
As an example, imagine that 90% of the people in Russia were
"Rekallized" to believe that the Russian Revolution had never
happened, and that the current emperor of Russia was so-and-so.
Then that person would _be_ the emperor of Russia.
-John Bishop
|
172.17 | Total Recall .NE. P. K. Dick's "WCRIFYW" | GIDDAY::HIRSHMAN | Fimus tauri vincere ingenium | Fri Jul 09 1993 08:40 | 21 |
| I have read "We Can Remember It For You Wholesale", and I agree with
you completely.
I wasn't trying to favourably compare Total Recall with WCRIFYW, nor
imply that TR is true to Dick's story in any meaningful way. I think
it would be impossible to accurately translate a complex work like
WCRIFYW to a visual medium like film. In all fairness, TR doesn't even
try - it never claimed to be anything more than "based on" (whatever
that means) the Dick story.
But I think you missed my point. The point I attempted to make (not
very successfully it appears) is that TR is actually remarkably
plausible and self consistent despite *seeming* to have woefully bad
science, comic-book plotting and cardboard characterizations.
Was this really the intention of the director and/or scriptwriters, or
just dumb luck? I'd like to think it was the former, and I currently
lean that way. Others may disagree - and as I asked in my last reply,
what do all of _you_ think?
-Bret
|
172.18 | ...or it it Memorex? | 18583::LEBEAU | Boot to the head!!! | Fri Jul 09 1993 11:54 | 21 |
|
More evidence for the "it was a Rekall experience."
When they first put him in the chair, they show him some photos of
Mars. Among them is a picture of the Martian air making machine. When
it is displayed, the woman is talking about ancient artifacts. Later
on when Quade first sees the alien complex, it's *identical* to the
picture he was shown earlier. The same thing happens with Milena - He
is shown a closeup of her face ("sleazy, yet demure") on the monitor
and then when he first sees her, it's a perfect match. They were
showing him things that he would see on his "trip."
If Quade was a secret agent, then that would mean that the whole thing
was real. Rekall would not show pictures of an underground complex
that they claimed didn't exist. Melina's picture would not be used,
she was a real person and wasn't employed by Rekall as an "actor".
I vote for it being a dream.
Don
|
172.19 | | KERNEL::HOGGAND | | Tue Oct 25 1994 12:38 | 6 |
| Reviving an old note, but does anyone know what ratio this film was
shot in? I have a copy on laserdisk in 4:3 ratio, but the new THX
certified is letterboxed..... Which is the correct format?
Thanks,
Dave
|
172.20 | "Dreamer, nothing but a dreamer"..... | HOTLNE::SHIELDS | | Wed Dec 25 1996 03:03 | 12
|