7. The Last of the Miniatures
Coming a year before Terminator 2 prompted a revolution in CGI and digital effects, Total Recall was the last big-budget Hollywood film in which the vast majority of the large-scale effects were done using miniatures. William Sandell, the production designer, drew on the expertise of NASAs space lab in Houston to create miniatures that would reflect how human civilisation could function on other planets. He oversaw the construction of everything from the exploding volcanos to the Martians power source, while Rob Bottin handled the more rubbery effects and supervised the transition from miniature to full-scale during the scenes on Mars. The only CGI effects used in the whole film are 42 seconds involving Arnie walking through an X-ray machine.