10 Movie Remakes That Ripped Off Audiences
7. Total Recall (2012)
Two writers are credited with excising all the zingers and cartoonish mayhem from Paul Verhoeven's 1990 film, one of whom is Kurt Wimmer, who scripted Law Abiding Citizen (2009) as well as the current Point Break remake. He also wrote and directed Ultraviolet (2006), where the world is paralysed by a virus named HGV, and he manages to bring Verhoevens classic down to the level of that clunker. Based on a story by Philip K Dick, Total Recall 90 was one of the better adaptations of his work, full of endless twists and intriguing ideas, but the remake can't even remain faithful to the earlier film, never mind the spirit of Dicks story.
Boring digital trickery is substituted for the originals Oscar winning special effects, which turns out to be a bad idea when the film junks the narrative in favour of lots of shouting and running around. So much plot has been removed, and replaced by blah chase sequences, that all the wit, invention and life gets sucked out of the story.
Jessica Biel suddenly appears, and there's a chase. Bill Nighy suddenly appears, and theres a chase. Bryan Cranston (criminally underused in the Ronny Cox role) appears, and blah blah blah. We do get a 3-breasted mutant, though, so the filmmakers priorities were elsewhere.