Gimme Remakes: Total Recall Recalled Back To Theaters

Earlier today, /Film's Brendon Connelly reported on a new Matt Damon movie based loosely on a short story by one of the most important and precocious authors of all time, Philip K. Dick, and now, well, THIS. Columbia Pictures and producer Neal H. Moritz (I Am Legend, The Green Hornet, The Skulls III) have tossed Paul Verhoeven's Total Recall on the remake block under the pretense that today's leaps in special effects will make it worthwhile. What, no 3D bait? No news on a director or writer. The original 1990 film starred Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sharon Stone and is regarded as an above-par and faithfully bonkers adaptation of the late sci-fi writer's short story "We Can Remember It For You Wholesale." We can still remember it pretty well via Netflix or Wikipedia, thanks anyway.

So yeah, rehashing sci-fi that was already creatively successful and provocative is just the lowest of the low, and counterproductive to the what the genre and PKD—which Hollywood usually guts for brainless action exercises—adds to society, thought and culture. But there's something dark, ironic and guiltily enjoyable about witnessing PKD's previously adapted and chaotic works getting adapted again and again and again.

Update: /Film commenter, Octoberist, points out that Moritz's production company is called Original Films. Oy vey.embedded image via the highly recommended Ragetoons Tumblr