Total Recall (1990) & Open Your Eyes (1997): Mind Games | EP04
- Mar 25, 2021
- 3 min read
Updated: Mar 10
Virtual Reality and Identity.
In this episode of Journey Through Sci-Fi, we continue our exploration of the virtual reality subgenre by looking at two films that question the relationship between memory, identity and reality.
Virtual reality stories often focus on digital worlds and simulations, but these films explore a slightly different idea: what happens when technology allows us to rewrite our own memories.
First we discuss Total Recall (1990), Paul Verhoeven’s sci-fi action classic starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. The film follows Douglas Quaid, a construction worker who visits a company called Rekall that offers artificial memories of a holiday on Mars. When the procedure goes wrong, Quaid begins to suspect that his entire life may be a fabricated identity.
Then we explore Open Your Eyes (1997), the Spanish psychological sci-fi film directed by Alejandro Amenábar. The story follows César, a wealthy young man whose life begins to unravel after a car accident leaves him disfigured and trapped inside increasingly surreal experiences. Eventually he learns that his reality may actually be an artificial dream created through cryonic suspension and simulated perception.
Together these films explore a disturbing possibility:
What if your memories — and your identity — were never real in the first place?
Because here on Journey Through Sci-Fi, we explore the history of science-fiction cinema one subgenre at a time.
Listen to the full episode below:
What We Discuss In This Episode
In this episode we talk about:
Memory implantation and artificial experiences
How virtual reality could allow people to escape their own identities
Philip K. Dick’s influence on simulated-reality storytelling
Psychological sci-fi versus blockbuster action sci-fi
The question at the heart of both films: how can we know what is real?
Total Recall (1990) – Memory as Virtual Reality
Directed by Paul Verhoeven, Total Recall is based on Philip K. Dick’s short story “We Can Remember It for You Wholesale.”
The film imagines a future where companies like Rekall offer customers the chance to experience artificial memories of adventures they never actually lived.
When Douglas Quaid signs up for a memory implant about being a secret agent on Mars, the procedure uncovers suppressed memories suggesting that his ordinary life may itself be a manufactured identity.
As Quaid travels to Mars searching for answers, the film constantly raises an unsettling possibility: everything he experiences might simply be part of the implanted memory.
The result is a classic science-fiction question that echoes throughout Philip K. Dick’s work: Is Quaid living an adventure — or dreaming one?
Open Your Eyes (1997) – A Dream Inside a Simulation
While Total Recall approaches memory and identity through blockbuster action, Open Your Eyes explores the same themes through psychological science fiction.
The film follows César, a wealthy young man whose life spirals into confusion after a car accident leaves him disfigured. As reality begins to shift around him, he experiences strange distortions in memory and identity.
Eventually César learns that after his apparent death he entered a cryonic programme that allows clients to live inside artificial dream worlds generated from their own memories.
His life since the accident has been part of a simulated dream constructed by a company offering “artificial perception” experiences.
The film blends romance, psychological thriller and science fiction, raising haunting questions about whether we would choose to live inside a perfect dream rather than face reality.
Escaping Your Own Identity
Both Total Recall and Open Your Eyes explore the idea that virtual reality could allow people to escape their lives by rewriting their memories.
But these films also reveal the dangers of that idea.
If technology allows us to create artificial memories or dream worlds, then identity itself becomes unstable.
Memories can be altered
Experiences can be manufactured.
And reality may become impossible to distinguish from illusion.
Continuing Our Journey Through Virtual Reality
This episode is part of our Journey Through Virtual Reality series, where we explore how science-fiction cinema has imagined simulated worlds, digital identities and immersive technologies.
From early cyberpunk visions to philosophical explorations of simulated reality, the VR subgenre continues to challenge our understanding of memory, identity and consciousness.
Explore more Journey Through Sci-fi series
About Journey Through Sci-Fi
Journey Through Sci-Fi is a podcast exploring the strange, visionary and world-changing history of science-fiction cinema.
Each series focuses on a different sci-fi subgenre, examining the films and ideas that shaped the genre - from classic cinema to modern science-fiction storytelling
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