'Total Recall' at Comic Con: A remake with mass appeal

The all new "Total Recall", starring Jessica Biel and Colin Farrell borrows the title from a previous Arnold Schwarzenegger movie, but that's about it. The movie is a visceral rendition of a short story by Philip K. Dick titled "We Can Remember It For You Wholesale".

Jessica Biel opened up at comic-con in San Diego, saying it was really more of a love story, something that wasn't incorporated in the previous movie. Even though she acknowledged the movie is a remake of the previous thriller, she did not mention that "Total Recall" is a remake in more ways than one.

A 1999 Canadian film named "Existenz", starring Jude Law, is the unexpected analogue to the much more appealing "Total Recall" set to debut August 3. Essentially, it's a story about video gamers who take their gaming experience to another level when they venture into an alluring virtual reality. When the provocations of the game lead to unexpected twists and turns, the lust of two gamers takes on a lurid fantasy that evokes the sublime in their experiencing of reality in the game, even providing the antithesis of an existential life, at times.

The movie focuses in and out of an entire gaming experience providing a mise en abyme--a movie device--just like “Inception” did famously with its architecture of dream space. "Existenz" masterfully unveils that which is perceived to be real with the ethereal facets of a virtual reality game that comes hauntingly close to one's own personage. After losing all notions of reality, the couple's love interest is tested in surreal ways as they traverse role-playing scenarios.

This version of the movie is expecting a major box office success with an opening month of $116.65 million, according to Hollywood Stock Exchange.  Movie buffs were bidding as high as $130 million. Comic-con will no doubt help with anticipation for box office success. The Hollywood Reporter cites Jessica Biel illustrating the movie's ultra appeal to not only the fantasy, but also the real emotional love story that it is, "It definitely is an action-thriller film, but to me, it’s an action-drama love story,” Biel said in an interview Friday in San Diego. “We really wanted to tie this movie down to the ground in an emotional way, so you could go away feeling everything, not just excited by what it looks like.”