Hello Everyone :-)
I’m not a massive fan of Colin Farrell; I’ve never been bowled over by anything in which I’ve seen him. However a few weeks ago I had access to free cinema tickets and the person in charge of those tickets wanted to go and see the remake of 'Total Recall' staring the aforementioned Mr Farrell. Here’s what I thought (please bear in mind I haven’t seen the original film).
Farrell plays Douglas Quaid, a factory worker that commutes from the 'Colony' (Australia) to United Federation of Britain (UFB) to work in a factory and comes home to his wife Lori (Kate Beckinsale) every day. After being plagued by a recurring dream featuring a mystery woman (Jessica Biel) Quaid decides to visit ‘Rekall’, a company that implants artificial memories. This visit re-awakens part of Quaid’s mind and he realises that he may not be who he thinks he is…
This all sounds brilliant. Unfortunately ‘Total Recall’ is an utterly dull film.
It looks nice, which is good, but its visual cues aren’t the most original in the world. The UFB looks like a city-scape from ‘Minority Report’ and the Colony looks like a replica of Los Angeles à la ‘Blade Runner’. It’s not always a bad thing to invoke these two films but unfortunately in this case it wasn’t a wise move. Both ‘Minority Report’ and‘Blade Runner’ are much higher concept and are a lot classier affairs than this is; borrowing their visual styles is just highlighting the fact that you aren’t watching either of those films in the worst possible way.
The whole thing is a ridiculous male wish-fulfilment fantasy. There is a sequence shortly after Colin Farrell discovers he isn’t actually a factory worker, he’s really a secret spy, that he, the beautiful Jessica Biel and the gorgeous Kate Beckinsale are in a weird traveling lift and the two women are having a massive cat fight over him. It’s ridiculous. I actually think I said aloud “Oh for God’s sake!” Is it too much to ask for a coherent plot and interesting characters?!?! Is it really?!?!
Bless him, Colin Farrell tries his best but he’s not given a great deal to do. His character discovers that he isn’t who he thinks he is and that’s about it. There’s a little bit about him wanting to learn to play the piano that pays off in quite a nice way but that’s pretty much all the character development he’s afforded.
Jessica Biel might as well not be there. To my mind she’s got the on screen charisma of a mahogany sideboard and that’s when she’s given something decent to work with (for example she’s ok in ‘The Illusionist’). In this she has next to nothing to do, in fact I can’t even remember her character’s name. Seriously aside from pulling Colin Farrell into a car and wearing combat trousers circa 1998 she does nothing. They may as well have had a cardboard cut-out of her on screen.
Kate Beckinsale has the best role. She starts off as the primary antagonist and she excels at this. It’s hardly surprising that in a film DIRECTED BY HER HUSBAND she is given the best role, but she does it well. The antagonist role gets a bit murky when Brian Cranston turns up as the big, Boss, Bad-Guy Cohaagen. Frankly, Beckinsale is a darn sight more threatening than Cranston and this makes his character weirdly redundant.
It’s not a complete failure. Like I said it looks really nice and obviously the digital effects meet the standard to which audiences have become accustomed, but I think that’s part of the problem. Audiences aren’t being challenged with this film, on any level. The story leaves A LOT to be desired but it’s not just that; visually we’ve seen it all before, we’ve seen these characters before; it’s the same story on a different day and I don’t think it’s good enough.
‘Total Recall’is fun to look at but completely unremarkable. Sci-fi, by definition, affords film-makers with endless scope with which they can dream big. Why someone would take an interesting premise and turn it into a film as boring as this is beyond me, they had a $125 million budget and all this is what we get?!?! Directors should strive to make something that challenges audiences, not churn out mindless rubbish.
After that boring parp I think I need some…
Reasons to be Cheerful :-)
1. New Hobbit Trailer! More of the Dwarves this time and I must say, in spite of my trepidations about the three film split, it looks wonderful :-)
2. James Gunn has been confirmed as Writer and Director for Marvel's ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’ in news that surprised NO ONE! I’m pleased though, Gunn’s previous film ‘Super’ was wildly misjudged in places but it’ll be interesting to see what he does with such high-profile property. It’s going to be a challenge to bring that story to the big screen so I’ll be watching developments with great interest!
3. 'Wreck-It Ralph' has some new character posters and they’re great! I think it looks fantastic; the only thing that I’m sad about is that we in the UK have to wait till the 15thFebruary 2013 to see it!!!
That’s everything for today!
Goodbye till next time :-)
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