Terminator Series
“Come with me if you want to live” – several characters in the series
The Terminator series is an example of a successful film that is strung out for too many entries, which threatens to dilute the original product. I am glad there was never an E.T. 2; Elliot Goes to Space, or a fourth Indiana Jones film (oops, I’ll get back to that series on these days). To me the first two Terminator installments are classic films and the rest have their moments but not the power of those first two. James Cameron, who wrote and directed The Terminator and co-wrote, coproduced and directed Terminator 2; Judgment Day, allegedly had a nightmare of an endoskeleton walking through fire and developed a science fiction film around it. Cameron, a visionary director who sets a budget record on almost every film he makes (T2, True Lies, Titanic, and Avatar), filled two movies with his ideas and then stepped away from the series.
A new Terminator film only comes out every several years as each sequel since T3 is designed to launch a trilogy but often the grosses do not support an immediate investment in a new film so the rights eventually lapse. Whoever picks up the rights usually tries to launch another trilogy, which is why the Terminator films have had so many distributors (Cannon, Warner Brothers, Paramount, etc.) over the years (as opposed to say, Pirates of the Caribbean, in which all are released by Disney). There was a TV series called The Sarah Connor Chronicles that I only looked at it once or twice. I do not think it really fit into this chronology.
As always I discuss spoilers so be forewarned.
The Terminator (1984)
The Terminator was Cameron’s second film as director, though at the time he made it he was making a name for himself as a writer (he submitted a draft for Rambo; First Blood Part II and was in the midst of writing Aliens, which he would later also direct). Cameron had about a $6 million budget and spent the money well. The title figure is a cyborg from 2029, in which machines who are part of Skynet (a group mind, a bit similar to the Borg in Star Trek), have started a war between the United States and Russia, which creates a post-apocalyptic landscape that the machines now rule. Human survivors have formed a resistance, led by John Connor, who is unseen in this film. In 2029 Skynet has been just about defeated but they are able to send a terminator to 1984 to kill John Connor’s mother, Sarah, before he is conceived. Connor sends Kyle Reese to protect Sarah and ensure his existence which is essential to the humans’ success.
The cast is superbly assembled. Arnold Schwarzenegger is ideally cast as a powerful cyborg whose sole function is to kill Sarah Connor (and anyone who gets in the way). Linda Hamilton plays the unfortunate Sarah, who starts off as a good young woman who is mistreated by life and gradually develops immense courage. Michael Biehn plays Reese, who at first appears to be the villain with his scruffy appearance and the long jacket he wears to cover up his shotgun. One of the film’s strengths is these are normal looking people and Reese looks a little malnourished. Reese is uncomfortably intense in many of his early scenes and has the job of explaining the plot to Sarah and the audience. As Reese lives in a heightened existence where his life is constantly in danger and he is out of place his conduct eventually is understandable as the story develops. Lance Hendrickson and Paul Winfield play police officers and Earl Boen is a police psychologist who memorably yawns while studying Reese and deeming him to be “a loon”. The late Bill Paxton, who later appeared in several other Cameron films, has a small role as a punk who makes the mistake of cursing at the Terminator.
Once the Terminator’s agenda is established, the film moves like a shot to the finish using mostly tension and the Terminator’s relentlessness to engage the audience rather than visual effects. By using time travel to set the film in the present day Cameron came up with a good money saving technique (only a few brief scenes are set in the future, which looks pretty unpleasant).
Cameron’s protagonists usually suffer greatly in accomplishing their goals and The Terminator is no exception. Reese goes through a painful time travel device (notably he is hurting when he comes out, having been burned while the Terminator expresses no pain, which hints at his true being) and has no method of returning, meaning that he is on a suicide mission. Reese is shot and then beaten by the Terminator before eventually perishing in an explosion (that he unsuccessfully tries to escape from) designed to stop the Terminator, but only succeeding in breaking him in two. Sarah loses her best friend, her mother (it’s implied) and eventually Reese, who becomes her lover while also being forced to discover the world is about to become a far more dangerous place. At the end of the climactic scene Sarah has to crawl away from the Terminator with shrapnel in her leg but appropriately is the one to finish him off. The finale shows Sarah outsmarting a boy who tries to con her which she never could have done earlier and then driving into a storm which is a metaphor for her, and humanity’s, future.
Brad Fiedel provides an effective synthesized score, and his Terminator theme is quite memorable. During the love scene between Sarah and Reese the same theme is used but played in a higher key on the piano and the movement of the music seems to match, to put it delicately, the rhythm of the scene.
To give a little personal context to this film, I first saw Schwarzenegger in Conan the Destroyer on video and then in some of his other 80s films such as Commando and The Running Man. His persona as a not very amicable but nonetheless honorable and powerful violent action star was clear. Several friends recommended I watch The Terminator and when I put it on I was so shocked at the scene where he guns down an innocent woman in her home that I turned it off. I called one of my friends and explained how far I got and he told me that the Terminator was the villain and to keep watching. It opened my eyes to the idea that even an actor of limited range such as Schwarzenegger can play more than one type of role. In retrospect it’s surprising that Schwarzenegger and his action buddy Sylvester Stallone have not played more villains since both can portray menace well and are so imposing.
At the end of the film I thought it made for an appealingly dark adventure but that it did not lend itself to additional chapters. The terminator was destroyed and it would be hard to have a film without the title character. My assessment was incorrect. *****
T2, like Rambo First Blood Part II and The Road Warrior, was larger scale sequel to a low budget action film that turned the main character into a cultural icon. James Cameron, who had now become a well-respected filmmaker returned with a much larger budget and a canvas onto which he could put his innovative visual ideas.
Brad Fiedel returns with an orchestrated version of his Terminator score, which emphasizes the grander scale. Many of the colors are blue-grey, which draws attention to the mechanical theme of the film.
For anyone interested in screenwriting I highly recommend Cameron’s published screenplay which not only contains the script but alternate unused scenes along with annotated explanations as to why changes were made.
The story for T2 repeats a lot of the same beats as the original but some ideas are fleshed out more. In other cases they are just made bigger. As in Cameron’s Aliens, the lone female survivor of the first film’s horror is troubled and has been punished by society for trying to warn them of the danger. In both films by bravely facing up to it again and saving a child in the interim the characters are able to come to a sort of peace.
Linda Hamilton returns as Sarah Connor, now a hardened survivalist, with a much deeper voice. Sarah is physically much stronger but emotionally burdened by the knowledge of the upcoming war, represented by a horrifying recurring dream of a nuclear holocaust. Sarah’s intense focus on preparing for and, if possible, preventing the war have kept her from being a loving mother to John. Sarah protects John fiercely but does not focus on raising him which has led to him becoming a delinquent. Edward Furlong plays John Connor as street smart and cynical early on but with a humanity that eventually deepens over the two days or so that the film is set. Arnold Schwarzenegger returns as a different terminator but the same model as the original 101. This terminator, now assigned to protect John, is less ruthless but just as focused as his antecedent. As he is able to witness and to some degree adapt to human behavior Schwarzenegger gets a new angle from which to play him, infusing just enough of his specific charm. The 101 looks a little different, with a shorter haircut and a slightly leaner face.
Sarah first appears in a psychiatric facility about ten years after the end of the first film in a scene similar to one in Cameron’s draft of Rambo; First Blood Part II which introduced Rambo in a facility, albeit a much dirtier one than presented here. Sarah’s state and Rambo’s are much the same, coming across as dangerous snakes that would strike given half a chance. Sylvester Stallone rewrote the Rambo draft and placed Rambo on a chain gang which was the version used in the film. I am glad Cameron was able to rework this interesting idea into this film in which he had complete creative control.
Cameron wisely brought back Earl Boen as Dr. Silberman, the self-satisfied psychologist from the first film who is now the head of the Pescadero facility where Sarah is being held. Silberman becomes a fun first act antagonist for Sarah thanks to Boen’s committed performance.
Robert Patrick rose to the unenviable task of following Schwarzenegger as the antagonistic Terminator. Cameron was wise to not cast someone even bigger and instead with Patrick made the T-1000 more lethal with slinky movements that match the liquid nature of the effects. I do wonder how Skynet somehow built this cyborg after having supposedly been destroyed prior to the first film but it is probably better not to question some things.
T2 is of course known for its groundbreaking visual effects, particularly the liquid metal morphing effects as the T-1000 morphs from one form to another, often to overcome obstacles. Also, there are several inventive action sequences, showcasing how the T-101 is able to slow down the more powerful T-1000. My favorite is the first act chase in the Los Angeles drainage canal that has two amazing jumps, represents the T-1000’s persistence and ends with an updated shot of a Terminator coming out of a fire. ****
Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines (2003)
T3 follows John Connor as a young adult, avoiding a female Terminator, called a TX, who seems like an upgrade from the T-1000. Arnold is back, still able to pull off the Terminator in his mid-50s, and Nick Stahl takes over the role of John Connor from Edward Furlong. Claire Danes plays Kate Brewster, a new character, and Linda Hamilton is absent. Stahl is probably a better actor than Furlong but seems a little slight. When I first saw this film in 2003 my initial reaction, not having seen a Terminator film in several years, was that it was better than I expected. Jonathan Mostow, who made two films I enjoyed beforehand, the southwestern thriller Breakdown (1997) and the submarine adventure U-571 (2000), knew how to create exciting and suspenseful situations and was experienced in working with large stars. Watching it again right after the first two it is obvious a different director created it because the template is similar to the first two films, but the tone is much less bleak. T3 is paced well, has two exciting chases but Sarah Connor’s absence is felt and there are some continuity lapses. For example John supposedly was 10 in T2 so why does Kate refer to his disappearing in 8th grade? Why does John live off the grid since he would have no reason to do so unless he was still in trouble with the law after the events of T2? Also why does John expect the different T-101 to remember the one from who was destroyed in T2? Kate goes through a complete loss of her life structure similar to Sarah in the first film (losing her career, fiancé and father) but it never seems to have the same effect, not because of Danes’ performance but because she is the third lead as opposed to the first and so is not given the screen time to absorb everything. The scene in which it is revealed the Terminator killed John Connor in the future does not have the impact it should. It is effective, however to finally see the machines for more than a glimpse after three films and the entire final sequence is well constructed. Earl Boen also returns for an enjoyable quick cameo as Dr. Silberman. ***
Terminator Salvation (2009)
The fourth film is set in 2019 in the environment that we have only seen snippets of in the previous films, the war on the ground between the human survivors and the machines. Salvation was directed by McG, who directed the Charlies Angels movies (which I did not see), stars Christian Bale as John Connor, Blythe Dallas Howard as Kate, Sam Worthington as Marcus, and the late Anton Yelchin as a young Kyle Reese. The atmosphere is a little reminiscent of the original Star Wars which a lot of dusty, sandy locations and old, well-worn machines. Bale feels appropriate as the hardened Connor. Worthington’s Marcus is the most interesting character as an executed convict somehow brought back to life by Skynet, representing the conflict of humanity versus the machines within a single being.
Connor does not yet lead the human resistance, which gives him obstacles in the form of his superior, played by sci-fi stalwart Michael Ironside. The guns fire bullets instead of lasers as we had seen in the brief looks at 2029 so perhaps lasers have not been fully developed yet. McG captures the relentlessness of the Terminators in the scenes in which humans are escaping from them. There are a couple of excellent extended tracking shots, particularly the first one which follows Connor through an entire helicopter flight and crash ending with the entrance of an endoskeleton.
Danny Elfman also contributes an atmospheric score of which I thought the highlight was when he used an acoustic guitar with a Western inspired motif which was used in some of the quieter scenes.
The T-101 does make an appearance in this film in an entertaining scene that makes little sense since the T-101s are not supposed to be available yet. Nonetheless, it gave me a laugh.
Overall I found this fun but not one to revisit much. ***
Terminator Genesys (2015)
This sequel, which uses an alternate timeline, finally shows us John Connor in 2029 sending Kyle Reese back to save his mother in 1984. The first act restages a lot of scenes from the first film with new actors (Sarah, Reese, John, the punks the Terminator first sees) but with a new angle since in this story the 101 (again played by Schwarzenegger) is now older and has raised Sarah. I enjoyed this portion of the film but I was bored by everything that followed which sends everyone to 2017 and has a twist designed only for shock value. Terminator films have time travel but it seems to be breaking the rules to have characters move forward in time. It is also a bit disconcerting to see Schwarzenegger interacting with new actors playing the other characters, even though John Connor has been played by a different actor from T2 onwards. The one who fares best is Emilia Clarke as Sarah Connor, who conveys some of Linda Hamilton’s determination but is playing Sarah more as a cross of the Sarah of T1 and T2. Jai Courtney, who I normally like, has none of Michael Biehn’s intensity as Reese. At the end I hope this Terminator is not back. **
There is a recurring father-son theme. In The Terminator Reese is fighting to save his unborn son. In Terminator Salvation John Connor is fighting to save his father (and his own unborn child). In T2 the 101 becomes a father figure to John, but this theme is not really carried over to T3. Part of the disappointment of Terminator Genesys is that the father and son are battling each other so that connection is lost.
In summation the series distinguishes itself with the first two entries which show tremendous innovation. Installments three and four are worth a look but not essential and I would recommend skipping the last one.
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