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Total Recall | 2012 | PG-13 | - 5.7.5

A remake of the eponymous 1990 science fiction film, and based on the short story "We Can Remember It for You Wholesale" by Philip K. Dick: A man (Colin Farrell) is increasingly dissatisfied with his life, and when he goes to Rekall, an organization that promises to give him new memories, he discovers there is more to his current memories than he knew. Also with Bryan Cranston, Jessica Biel, Kate Beckinsale, Bill Nighy and John Cho. Directed by Len Wiseman. [1:49]

SEX/NUDITY 5 - A woman opens her top toward a man on a street while propositioning him for sex and we see that she has three breasts (three bare breasts are shown). Exotic dancers wearing skimpy outfit that reveal cleavage, partial bare buttocks, bare abdomens and legs dance suggestively inside and outside a club. We see a nude female statue that reveals bare breasts, abdomen, genital area and legs (no clear detail is evident). A man is shown with a bandage around his abdomen and he is bare-chested.
 A man wakes up in bed with his wife, he sits up and she caresses his bare chest; when he stands up we see that he is wearing boxer-style underwear and she is wearing underpants and a tank top that reveal bare shoulders and lower back at the hip.
 A husband and his wife kiss and he caresses her clothed back and hips (they are interrupted by a phone call). A woman kisses a man. A man and a woman caress each other's faces. A husband and his wife hug (please see the Violence/Gore category for more details). A man and a woman hug.
 A woman makes a remark that "I give good wife."

VIOLENCE/GORE 7 - A man and a woman with guns run through a building, they are confronted by armored "synthetic" guards with guns, gunfire is exchanged, and both the man and the woman are shot through the hands (we see blood on their hands); the man is then wrapped by a taser cable and pulled against a wall as the woman drops out a window and into water below (presumably unharmed). A man shoots another man in the head (we see a bloody bullet hole as he falls back to the floor dead). Many people are shot and killed when armed guards burst into a room and open fire (no blood is shown). A man is shot in the head and falls dead (we see a bit of blood on the wound. A man is strapped into a chair; he gets a weapon from one of his captors and shoots the rest of the guards (they all lie dead on the floor). Many armed people are thrown off the floor when gravity shifts and they float around shooting at each other; when the gravity reverses again all the people are dropped to the floor and one guard is thrown over the side of a balcony. Armored and armed guards break into a room, shoot two people (we see no blood) and hold a man at gunpoint; the man fights with them, retrieves a gun and shoots all of the guards dead (no blood is obvious).
 A man and a woman fight with a man: they punch and kick each other, another woman shoots at the first woman and man, a synthetic guard joins the fight and the man punches and kicks it with little effect; the synthetic guard squeezes the man's head, and then his throat until it is pushed through an opening and it is torn in half.
 During a fight a man is stabbed in the stomach (we hear a crunch and a squish) and slumps to the ground dead (we hear a squish when the knife is removed and we see blood). A man and a woman fight: the woman stabs a guard with a medical implement and the man shoots the woman causing her to fall out the door of an ambulance and onto the ground (we see blood on the wound). A man is shot in the arm and a woman is shot in the shoulder (we see bloody scratches from the strikes).
 A man lunges toward another man and they fight: the second man slashes the first man with a knife and we see bloody cuts on his chest and back. A man fights with many guards in a crowded security checkpoint, they open fire on him and many people scream, scatter and drop to the ground. A husband and his wife hug, she squeezes his neck and he complains that he cannot breathe; they fight with punches and kicks and she shoots at him (he is not struck but we see blood on his head); the man breaks through a window and falls to the street below (unharmed) and the woman chases him. A woman punches a man in the throat and then threatens him for information while he gasps and gags. A synthetic guard grabs a man's wounded shoulder and squeezes causing the man to yell and fall to his knees.
 A man cuts open his hand using a shard of glass, we hear crunching and squishing as he pulls something out of the opening and we see a bit of blood on the hand and the mechanism. A man rips out the chest plate of a synthetic guard and it falls motionless. A man and a woman are nearly crushed by speeding elevator-type cubicles as they speed by, they jump down a shaft and into another cubicle, a synthetic guard is crushed by a similar cubicle, the man and woman jump inside a cubicle as it speeds by and a synthetic guard follows them; the man grabs the arm of the synthetic guard and its body remains outside (we see the severed arm flopping around on the floor of the cubicle).
 A man runs and jumps across rooftops while being chased by a woman who shoots at him, and the man is confronted by a synthetic guard and he throws it into water. A man in a video is taken away by guards.
 A man and a woman in a hovering vehicle are chased by guards that shoot at them, the guards ram the vehicle, another car flips several times and other cars crash into it. A car drops from high in the air toward the ground and is stopped at the last moment by a blast of air that crushes a car under it (the driver of the falling car has blood on his face but walks away and his passenger has blood on her face and is seen unconscious).
 A huge explosion destroys many synthetic guards and a man (we see the man engulfed in flames). A woman is thrown from the blast of an explosion (we see her with a bloody face and head). An explosive is set in a cubical where a man and a woman are standing, the jump onto another cubicle below them, the first cubicle explodes and the debris falls near them (they are shown with bloody hands ands faces but are otherwise unharmed). A man sets explosives in a room, they explode, he runs through the opening created, dangles high above a crowded dock, and he drops down and runs away. A man jumps onto a hovering vehicle, he is thrown off and onto the road and other vehicles speed over him; he eventually gets into a vehicle unharmed.
 A man is struck in the arm by a remote camera and we see blood on the spot where it pierced his skin; the man pulls the camera out and we hear a squish and he grunts. A woman injects a man in the arm and we see the sharp point puncture the skin (there's no blood). A man sits in a chair and has electrodes attached to his head and neck; the man thrashes and twitches when a machine is initiated.
 A man wakes up in a hospital room with blood on his head and face; he exits the room and we see two dead men propped against the wall outside (a bit of blood is shown on the head of one of the men). A man tells another man to shoot a woman, the man begins to raise his weapon and the woman points her gun at the man (they do not shoot each other).
 We see a scar on a man's hand. A woman has a scar on her hand. A man has a scar on his face. A man's hand lights up and blinks and he talks into it like a telephone. A man's face and head change appearance several times (a sort of hologram device is used).
 A huge transport vessel with human passengers is shown making its way through the center of the Earth and through the core a few times. A city is repeatedly shown to be dark and rainy and dingy with crowds of people milling around narrow streets. A city is shown in ruins and covered in what is implied to be nuclear fallout. A man and a woman walk through a train tunnel and are surrounded by armed men and a barking dog.
 A woman orders armed guards to "shoot to kill" a man. A man tells another man to be careful while building a device and that if he isn't careful a bolt could shoot straight through his hand. Two men talk about a memory replacement service and one refers to another man who had it done and ended up lobotomized. A man makes reference to "brains get blown" during a memory implantation procedure. There are several conversations about finding a "kill code." A woman says that a man's father died in a car crash and the man says that his mother died of cancer. A man yells at his friend and says, "She tried to kill me," speaking about his wife. A man says he is going to go throw up after drinking in a bar (we do not see him vomit). We hear news reports of an explosion on a commuter train and that over 144 people were killed; we see a picture of the crumpled debris. We hear a news report about a man having killed 20 people.

LANGUAGE 5 - At least 1 F-word and one not fully enunciated, 1 sexual reference, 29 scatological terms, 7 anatomical terms, 9 mild obscenities, name-calling (robo-[anatomical term deleted], loser, traitor), 4 religious profanities, 8 religious exclamations.

SUBSTANCE USE - A man is injected in the arm with a substance (it is not clear what it does). People are shown drinking beer and alcohol in a bar, a man takes a beer out of a refrigerator (we do not see him drink from it), a man talks about drinking too much and about getting drunk, and a man says he is "going to go throw up on something" after drinking in a bar (we do not see him vomit).

DISCUSSION TOPICS - Chemical warfare, mind manipulation, nightmares, freedom, equality, terrorism, resistance movements, fantasy, illusions, economic oppression, reality, truth, dreams, invasion, aspirations, perfection, disappointment, paranoia.

MESSAGE - It's hard to know what's real and what's not.

CAVEATS

Be aware that while we do our best to avoid spoilers it is impossible to disguise all details and some may reveal crucial plot elements.

We've gone through several editorial changes since we started covering films in 1992 and older reviews are not as complete & accurate as recent ones; we plan to revisit and correct older reviews as resources and time permits.

Our ratings and reviews are based on the theatrically-released versions of films; on video there are often Unrated, Special, Director's Cut or Extended versions, (usually accurately labelled but sometimes mislabeled) released that contain additional content, which we did not review.


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