Every Philip K. Dick Movie Adaptation, Ranked From Worst to Best
For a while, the words "based on a short story by Philip K. Dick" were the quickest way to get your trippy sci-fi movie greenlit. The American author, who died at the age of 53 following a lengthy battle with drug addiction, mental illness, and depression, has an imagination that was ripe for cinematic reinvention. But it wasn't just his far-out concepts, which often involved aliens, robots, and other realms, that resonated with filmmakers and audiences, it was his deep commitment to the more complicated aspects of humanity and his keen interest in what makes us tick. It's rare to find literary works by a science fiction author as concerned with the internal as much as he was with outer space.
12. 'Radio Free Albemuth' (2010)
"Radio Free Albemuth" stands as a shining example of the problems associated with trying to adapt material as heady as Dick's on a shoestring budget. Because no matter how sound the ideas are, if the execution is this crummy, then it doesn't really matter. This adaptation (of both "Radio Free Albemuth" and "VALIS") features the usually-wonderful Shea Wigham as a Dick surrogate and Jonathan Scarfe as a very bland man suffering from even more milquetoast visions. The screenplay (by director John Alan Simon) works itself in knots trying to cram as many loopy ideas and philosophical quandaries as possible, but the film is so murky (visually and on a narrative level) that it's hard to be engaged enough to try and follow.
11. 'Total Recall' (2012)
The only thing worse than a bad Philip K. Dick adaptation is a bad remake of a great one, and that's exactly what 2012's misbegotten "Total Recall" remake is. Very little from the original story ("We Can Remember It for You Wholesale") remains in this loose and totally pointless affair, which is set entirely on Earth (groan) and replaces wily mutants with slick, expressionless robots (nope). Instead of Martian intrigue, too, the story centers around totally banal political squabbles, attempting some "gee-whiz" moments of wonder out of a dumb transportation device that goes through the Earth's core. (Just typing that was painful.) And the one nifty new idea the producers concocted -- that two actors, Colin Farrell and Ethan Hawke, would play the same character (so that the evil corporation didn't just monkey with his mind, but changed his physically appearance, too) was ultimately left out of the theatrical cut of the film. Boo!
10. 'Impostor' (2002)
The story behind "Impostor" is much more interesting than the movie itself. Originally envisioned as one third of an anthology film, two of the sections (this and Guillermo del Toro's section, "Mimic") were expanded to a feature-length format which left the last section, Danny Boyle's "Alien Love Triangle," virtually unseen. And maybe "Impostor" was a better short film, because the movie is pretty glum and feels padded out just to make its longer running time. The film version fundamentally follows the 1953 short story of the same name, wherein a security contractor (Gary Sinise) is working on a defense against alien invaders until, one day, he's accused of being a robotic spy for them. Featuring several Dick hallmarks (the "wrong man" trope, a secret identity, artificial intelligence) but none of the joy or verve that makes them compelling narrative embroidery, this is a curio, nothing more.
9. 'Screamers' (1995)
"Screamers," an enjoyably crummy adaptation loosely based on a Dick short story called "Second Variety," features a number of the author's concerns including the unpredictability of artificial intelligence, the threat of nuclear devastation, and the nature of reality, but it's housed inside of a crummy grade-Z sci-fi snoozer. A war between a collection of miners and a united conglomerate results in a planet being blasted into oblivion and a race of "screamers" (intelligent, bloodthirsty robots that start out looking like killer Quidditch balls) evolving at an unprecedented rate. For such a threadbare production, the plot is unnecessarily convoluted and the screenplay, written by "Alien" scribe Dan O'Bannon around the same time he penned "Total Recall," had been stuck in development so long that it finally started to curdle. (It probably didn't help that it was rewritten without his say long after the fact.)
8. 'Next' (2007)
Nicholas Cage plays Cris Johnson aka Frank Cadillac, a Las Vegas magician blessed with the real-life ability to see two minutes into the future. This unique gift gets him the attention of the FBI (including a very stern Julianne Moore) and various nefarious underworld types. "Next," slickly directed by Lee Tamahori, is saddled with a staggeringly dumb script (based oh-so-loosely on a mutant-filled Dick story called "The Golden Man") that makes itself known from the get-go (why, for instance, if the FBI is looking for a stolen nuclear weapon, does Moore's superior give her a whole five days to utilize Cage's prognostication powers?) Still, there are some nifty set pieces, like an early sequence where Johnson evades casino security by being one step ahead of them, and Cage, as always, gives it his all (also his hairpiece is seriously on point). It would have been nice to see Dick's philosophical obsessions brought in, beyond some clunky narration about destiny.
7. 'Paycheck' (2003)
Infamously, "Paycheck" was the last American movie Hong Kong filmmaker John Woo made before leaving the States and returning to China. Ben Affleck, sadly at his most unlikable, plays a talented engineer at work for a corporation who, once his task was completed, erased his memory of the project. Of course, he's left himself a series of clues and has to uncover what exactly was going on in the time he worked on the project (spoiler alert: there's a nasty conspiracy). In some ways, both the story and the movie play like a Philip K. Dick greatest hits reel (even though the story was written relatively early in the author's career): there's implanted memories, visions of a former life (or past self), and corporations greedily competing without any kind of moral guidance.
6. 'The Adjustment Bureau' (2011)
Philip K. Dick stories are largely defined by dread-choked existential nightmares and post-apocalyptic devastation. Even stories that aren't outwardly concerned with such matters somehow manage to also be about those things. Which makes "The Adjustment Bureau," a swirling fantasy romance about the nature of destiny starring Matt Damon and Emily Blunt, such a surprising blast. Loosely based on a story called "Adjustment Team," the film follows Damon's quest to connect with Blunt, who he assumes is his soul mate; Damon keeps getting blocked by members of The Adjustment Bureau, otherworldly figures who make sure that everything goes to plan. That’s really it. The movie never gets bogged down in overly explaining anything of the potentially complicated mythology of the world; instead, it's perfectly happy to hum along on its general sweetness and some memorable set pieces, including a sequence seemingly inspired by "Monsters, Inc's" door chase.
5. 'A Scanner Darkly' (2006)
Who would have thought that Richard Linklater, the hangdog auteur behind "Dazed and Confused" and "Boyhood," would bring one of Philip K. Dick's trippiest stories to the big screen, through a kaleidescopic animation process no less? "Blade Runner" might be the most dazzling Dick adaptation, but "A Scanner Darkly" is the most devastating. Keanu Reeves stars as a druggie who is also a government informant, so he goes from getting high with his friends to ratting them out. (Thanks to the incredible, ever-shifting "scramble suits," you can never truly identify a fellow agent.) The story was autobiographical to Dick, who was a drug addict prone to hallucinations and depression, and the film is dedicated to those lost to drug addiction, which makes the film seem more dour than it is; it's not. It's frequently funny, with a fine supporting cast (that includes Robert Downey Jr., Woody Harrelson, and Winona Ryder) and some truly jaw-dropping visuals. Never has a stylistic aesthetic so brilliantly meshed with the author's sensibilities.
4. 'Total Recall' (1990)
While the original Dick story (which has a killer twist ending) served as the basis for the film, "Total Recall" is a much grander and more exciting adventure, perfectly suited for star Arnold Schwarzenegger's physicality and director Paul Verhoeven's outré sensibilities. Schwarzenegger is Quaid, a man who pays for a luxury procedure to implant false memories, only, since this is a Philip K. Dick stories, the identity the company is concocting is actually his true self. So instead of a mild-mannered construction worker, he's a secret agent with business on Mars. And while the set-up is delicious, Verhoeven really takes things to the next level, both in terms of the film's extreme sexuality (the three-breasted woman!) and violence. The film also doubles down on the knotty concepts Dick's story initially played around with. (False memories, astral projection, perception's inherent playability, artificial intelligence, ancient alien theories, and the fallibility of corporate interests are all explored.) There's also that part where Arnold pretends to be a fat woman.
3. 'Minority Report' (2002)
Steven Spielberg adapting Philip K. Dick feels like such a no brainer that it's shocking it took as long as it did. But, of course, "Minority Report" was worth the wait. Originally developed in the early 1990s as a sequel to "Total Recall" (yes, seriously), "Minority Report" went through a number of seismic shifts before Spielberg and leading man Tom Cruise would sign onto the project. The resulting film is Spielberg at his most breathlessly entertaining and Cruise at his most layered and compelling (his willingness to let his character be damaged and unlikable is amazing). In recent years, the ending of the film has developed into a "Blade Runner" style debate -- did everything work out just the way he'd planned it or is Cruise's character still incarcerated and it is all some kind of deep dream? (And what of the alternate ending, which stated that after the pre-crime program was decommissioned, the number of murders skyrocketed?) It's telling that a summer blockbuster like "Minority Report" is still inspiring heated discussion.
2. 'Blade Runner 2049' (2017)
You can argue that "Blade Runner 2049" is not only the best Dick-based film, but also better than the original. It builds on and expands upon the neo-noir, neon brooding of "Blade Runner," while exploring with significantly more emotional resonance the themes of humanity in a world where machines are more human than human. In fact, director Denis Villeneuve's visually-impressive execution of seemingly effortless world-building argues that humanity as we know it maybe isn't worth saving until we stop taking for granted that which makes us special -- something that's not lost on the machines that aspire to be more like -- and better -- than us.
1. 'Blade Runner' (1982)
Ridley Scott's immortal classic -- not just a science fiction triumph but one of the greatest cinematic accomplishments of all time -- is steeply rooted in Dickian philosophies and speculation. Even Philip K. Dick loved it. In a bleak and foggy future, Deckard (Harrison Ford, in one of his greatest roles) is a "blade runner," a bounty hunter hired to track down and terminate robot Replicants who have escaped from off-world colonies and are posing as humans on Earth. This is Scott firing on all cylinders, giving as much care and attention to its chase movie mechanics as he does to its existential contours and grooves. This is a movie about the nature of humanity that also allows room for some truly spectacular set pieces. It's saying something that "Blade Runner" is arguably the most tinkered with movie ever (the definitive home video package has no fewer than five cuts), and yet no matter how many times the chief question of whether or not Deckard is a replicant himself is seemingly answered, it still spurs debate amongst fans.
