TOTAL RECALL (1990), and Why It Is All a Dream.
By Jon Therkildsen
“After all, an illusion, no matter how convincing, remained nothing more than an illusion. At least objectively. But subjectively -- quite the opposite entirely” - Philip K Dick, from “We Can Remember It for You Wholesale” (1966), the short-story which inspired the movie.
Total Recall (1990) is a classic sci-fi action movie with Arnold Schwarzenegger. Straightforward and to the point.
Or is it?
The movie asks the question itself, by the very end: Was it all a dream, or is it all real?
Most agree that it is ambiguous, and meant to be an open interpretation. I do not. I think it is beyond any reasonable doubt quite clear. It was a dream. Or most of it was.
When he goes under at the Rekall lab, all we see from then on is his dream - even his brief waking up as Hauser - “you blow my cover aaarggghhh” is part of the Ego Trip dream adventure.
The travel agent makes it a point that while on one of their ego trips, “you are not you.” The perfect vacation is away from yourself too. One would need to be fooled into thinking he is not himself, for this ego trip to work genuinely. This is the foundation for his adventure. He is not Douglas Quaid anymore; he is now Carl Hauser. A secret undercover agent, capable of pretty much anything.
However, a point often missed is; it is not a well-orchestrated dream adventure vacation as planned by the Rekall Travel Agency. No, it is an ego trip gone horribly, horribly wrong. Exactly as foretold by his construction buddies early on and later supported in more detail by the Doctor at the Hilton’s.
Harry (construction buddy): “A friend of mine tried it, nearly got himself lobotomized.”
Quaid: “No shit?”
Harry (construction buddy): “Don't fuck with your brain. It ain't worth it.”
The overall plot, or framework of the adventure, was indeed designed by the Rekall engineers, just as intended. The problem is that the variations, much of the violence, and how it unfolds and unravels as we go along (like including his wife and coworkers as villains) was because his subconsciousness was slowly taking over as the chief dream-architect. In a way, the dream went out of the Rekall Travel Agency’s control.
Ultimately we are seeing a dream where his subconsciousness is the storyteller, based upon a story-frame provide by the Rekall lab. And his consciousness (him) is the ignorant player. Sort of how lucid dreams work.
There are many tell signs that it is a dream; however, the biggest are:
The whole story with “blue skies on Mars,” “alien reactor,” “double agent,” “Cohaagen,” “Venusville,” “room at the Hilton Hotel” etc. and even also our “sleazy Melina” is all set up at the Rekall lab before he goes under. Watch the monitors in the background, watch the boards they are holding - even the “secret” alien reactor appears here. Everything we later see is part of their dream adventure.
Think about Cohaagen’s plan for a moment. It is so outlandish and frankly impossible that it only makes any sense if it was randomly dreamed up as we go along - unprepared and tumbling down the rabbit hole. The rebels know who Hauser is, so why make him think he isn’t? Why try and make him believe again he is Quaid when the whole plan is up at this moment? Why send in the driver, if they know Kuato can smell out undercover agents? What was the plan, really?
The Doctor, at the Hilton’s, predicts exactly what happens from that moment on, pretty much spot on and scene by scene. He knows this because the dream still follows the overall framework originally designed by Rekall.
It is the Doctor from the TV commercials that visited him at Hilton, on Mars. Rekall was placed on Earth.
Quaid checks into Hilton (an odd choice for someone who is avoiding attention, but it is the choice advertised at the Rekall Travel Agency).
Mars is instantly turned blue, which is a stretch for even an alien reactor, and it also happens to be the title of his vacation; "Blue Skies on Mars".
The movie ends with a fading to white. Movies usually fade to black. This represents him being lobotomized, as foretold earlier by the Doctor.
After the final credits, we faintly hear the office music from the Rekall lab, which is possibly there to hint to us that this is, in fact, where we are.
I have seen it a gazillion times, and I first saw it as all real. A straightforward action movie. Clearly, I am no longer of this opinion.
The only point that speaks against it being a dream-vacation gone wrong is Melina, whom we see in his beginning dream. This is before he visits Rekall. And it is one of the more popular points often mentioned supporting this notion.
Suppressed memories can explain his dream of her, and thusly supporting it not being a dream-vacation because those memories are from his real suppressed secret-agent-life. Or it can be explained, only by her being his dream girl — end of the story. We even see how the Rekall lab lifts her image from his subconsciousness, as they design his dream vacation. We see how their software renders her face, just as he falls asleep. Are they lifting her image from his imagination?
So, in either case, Melina proves nothing. She can be explained to support both a dream and not a dream.
At its core, the movie is about this:
The movie BEGINS with him having a nightmare where he and his dream girl fall of a mountain on Mars, about to suffocate to death. He has to wake up, to avoid this catastrophe - yet he feels suffocated in his real-life still, with a woman he does not love.
The movie END with him and his dream girl falling off a mountain on Mars, about to suffocate to death. They don't - because he saved the day just a moment before. And this time he is happy and with a woman he loves.
This time, he doesn't have to wake up. Everything in between is just candy. The movie as a whole is about him making his nightmare into a wonderful fairy tale dream.
Some may mention that we see scenes that Quaid himself does not take part in, as a sure sign of it not being a dream. This is not fair as lucid dreaming, for example, is a mix of a storyteller and a participant. And the few scenes without him are thereby dreamed by his subconsciousness as it is trying to make sense of it all. Remember, he is only aware of his consciousness, not what mess his subconsciousness is cooking. But it is the subconsciousness that is the chef, and as it tries to maneuver through this predicament, it creates the story we see unfold.
In any case, many dream movies mix scenes purely for the sake of storytelling. “The Wizard of Oz” (1939) (the movie, unlike the book, has it as a dream) and also “Inception” (2010), etc. does this.
The movie is inspired by Philip K Dick’s short-story mentioned in the beginning. It is not a book adaptation, and it is not even a “based upon” kind of thing. It is attributed as mere “inspiration” to the movie. The movie has some elements from the book, and many, if not most, from elsewhere. The bigger setup and story between the two are entirely different. What they do share is the “real” vs. “not real” as a theme. The short-story have you believe layers of deception and self-delusion until the unbelievable truth is revealed in the end; it was all real, and not self-delusional. Oppositely, the movie is told as being a straight and true, only to reveal in the end that it was all a dream. In gest of the short-story, the narrative would simply have to be flipped in the end, supporting the dream adventure, rather than a real adventure.
Still, even that it agrees with me, I think it is a moot argument to invoke the source material. The work being discussed here is the movie and not the martial on which it was inspired or even based. Generally, we ought to always aim to get our experience form the work of art itself, and not the source material or even the artist. And with that argument, not even Verhoeven (the movie director) can help. Years ago, he said the movie was genuinely ambiguous even to him, and then in later interviews - in which he was advocating putting a sequel in the works - he said it was not a dream (it supported the sequel he had in mind). After his sequel was a no-go, he later outlined how he actually wanted his version to be a dream. In other words; who knows what he wanted to convey back then? Ultimately, we have the movie as the purest point of reference, and I think it speaks for itself.
Photos via Google - © 1990 CAROLCO PICTURES