In the year 2084, Douglas Quaid (Arnold Schwarzenegger) is a bored construction worker who dreams of traveling to the colonized planet of Mars. He visits "Rekall," a company that plants false memories into people's brains, in order to experience the thrill of Mars without having to travel there. But when something goes wrong during the procedure, Quaid discovers that his entire life is actually a false memory and that the people who implanted it in his head now want him dead. Ensuing events leave no room for doubt that his true identity is that of a highly trained secret agent. He then follows a trail of clues to gradually recover more suppressed memories and reassumes his original calling with renewed dedication.