It is a dream. I have near zero doubt.

When he goes under at the Rekall lab, all we see from then on is his dream - even his brief waking up as Hauser - "you blow my cover aaarggghhh" is part of the Ego trip.

The travel agent makes it a point that while on one of their ego trips, “you are not you”. One would need to be fooled into thinking he is not himself for this ego trip to truly work.

However, a point often missed is that it is not a well orchestrated dream adventure vacation as planned by the Rekall Travel Agency. It is an ego trip gone horrible horrible wrong. Exactly as foretold by his construction bodies early in the movie and later explained in detail by the Doc at the Hilton’s .

The overall plot of the adventure was indeed designed by the Rekall engineers as intended, but the variations and how it unfolds as we go along (like oddities of including his wife and coworkers etc. in to the mix) was because his subconsciousness was slowly taking over as the main dream architect. In a way the dream went out of Rekall Travel Agency’s control.

So ultimately what we see is a dream where his subconsciousness is the storyteller, based upon the story-frame provide by the Rekall lab (Mars, Hilton etc). And his consciousness (him) is the ignorant player. Sort of how lucid dreams work.

There are many tell signs that it is a dream, however the biggest are:

• The whole story with "blue skies on mars", "alien reactor", "double agent", "Cohaggen", "Venusville", “room at the Hilton Hotel” etc. and even also our "sleazy Melina" are all setup at the Rekall lab before he goes under (watch the monitors in the background - even the "secret" alien reactor is shown there). It is all part of their designed dream adventure.

• Think about Cohaagens plan for moment. It is so outlandish that it really only makes any sense if it was sort of thought up randomly (dreamt under the control of his subconsciousness) as we go along.

• The Doc at the Hilton spells out what happens from that moment on, pretty much spot on and scene by scene.

• Movie ends with fading to white (as he is getting lobotomized, again as foretold by the Doc). Movies usually fade to black. This is no chance.

• It is the Doc from the TV commercials that visits him at Hilton and did he just happen to be on Mars then? Rekall was placed on Earth.

• Quaid goes to Hilton (odd choice for an undercover, but it is the choice advertised at the Rekall lab)

• Mars is instantly turned blue, which is rather impossible, and also the title of his “vacation”; Blue Skies on Mars.

I have seen it a gazillion times and I was first of the believe that it was real. A straight forward action movie. Clearly, I am no longer of this opinion.

The only point that speaks against it being a dream is Melina whom we see in his beginning dream. This can be explained by previous suppressed memories or simply that she is his dream girl - which is why the Rekall lab also lift her image from his subconscious as they plan his dream vacation. So in either case, Melina proves nothing.

I think it ultimately goes to the understanding or realization of what the movie at its core is truly about:

**The movie BEGINS with him having a nightmare where he and his fantasy dream girl falls of a mountain on Mars about to suffocate to death, and then he wakes up and avoids this fatal doom of he and his dream girl, yet he feels suffocated in his real life still with a woman he does not really love

The movies ENDS with him and his fantasy dream girl falling of a mountain on Mars about to suffocate to death, except they don't as he saved the day a moment before. So he doesn't have to wake up this time and he finally feels free and happy with the women he loves**

Everything in between is just candy. The movie as a whole is about him making his nightmare into a wonderful fairy tale dream.

Some may mention that we will see scenes which he himself does not take part in, as a hint it is real. This is not fair as lucid dreaming for example is a mix of a storyteller and a participant. And the few scenes without him is then dreamt by his subconsciousness as it is trying to make sense of it all. Remember he is only aware of his consciousness, not what mess his subconsciousness is cooking . In any case many dream movies mix scenes in purely for the storytelling. Like Wizard of Oz (the movie, unlike the book, has it as a dream) and also Inception etc.