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Terminator: Salvation (2009)

Is McG’s effort the Salvation of the Terminator Franchise?

During Terminator: Salvation’s opening credits, we are transported to 2003. A death row inmate named Marcus Wright (Sam Worthington) signs his body away to science just hours before being put to death by lethal injection for an unnamed yet presumably heinous crime. After Marcus fades into the white light, we fast-forward to 2018. The nuclear holocaust known as Judgment Day hath wrought its irreparable havoc upon the world, and its survivors have formed the human resistance against the machines. The machines are led by the malevolent superintelligence known simply as Skynet. The leader of the human resistance is prophetic supersoldier John Connor (Christian Bale). He and his squad of battle-hardened commandos discover Skynet’s plans for the T-800, a Terminator who looks and acts human, and newly reborn Marcus Wright just might be the key to ending the war between the humans and the machines. Only one question remains: which side will Marcus choose?

Best damn movie trailer ever

Best damn movie trailer ever

If you’re looking to cast a leader of a human resistance against an army of machines, you can’t do much better than Christian Bale. While his on-set shoutfest during principal photography should have tainted the film, Bale’s performance reminded me of why he has top billing: he is a freaking moviestar. Bale plays John Connor as a G.I. Joe fightin’ man from head to toe, and while he may not be as dynamic as a Dark Knight or Machinist, his brand of reluctant savior just looks good on a movie screen. Keeping with Terminator tradition, Salvation has also introduced the world to a compelling new acting talent. As mysterious cybernetic drifter Marcus Wright, Aussie actor Sam Worthington matches Bale browbeat for browbeat in the intensity department, and commands the focal point of every action sequence. When Marcus bashes a Terminator’s head repeatedly with a found steel pipe, the image is definitely a throwback moment to the original Terminator. Already cast as the lead in Louis Leterrier’s remake of Clash of the Titans, Sam Worthington is an actor to watch.

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Leading the supporting cast as the boy who will grow into the man who will be sent back through time to save Sarah Connor and father the child who will grow up to be John Connor (whew!) is wunderkind thespian Anton Yelchin. He has been on a hot streak since 2007’s Charlie Bartlett, as well as stealing scenes as Chekhov in the rebooted megahit Star Trek. As Kyle Reese, Yelchin has very little to do but run from machines and look either scared or determined. His charisma, however, is undeniable, and he holds his own against Bale and Worthington in every scene. The rest of the supporting cast has potential but is ultimately underused. Bryce Dallas Howard as Connor’s wife, Kate, is an afterthought, while hip-hop star-turned-actor Common delivers his few lines with a mistrustful glare that elevates his glorified badass lackey role. Moon Bloodgood provides the sexiness factor as Resistance Pilot Blair Williams. She has solid chemistry with Worthington’s character, but their romantic subplot leads nowhere.

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Director McG has said in interviews that his vision for Salvation is a combination of Transformers and Children of Men. As far as the action goes, McG captures both films beautifully. Every action scene has equal parts excitement and urgency. The best example of this is at the film’s midpoint, during the “7-Eleven” sequence where a ginormous “Harvester” machine snatches up whole humans like a metallic King Kong. The chase that follows is a small epic in itself, rivaling the chase sequences in Terminator 2.

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In the quieter moments, Salvation will leave James Cameron purists wanting more. The fault lies with the script, which offers very little character development. With the small exception of Marcus Wright, every character speaks lines that are designed only to advance the plot. In the first two Terminator films, James Cameron uses grand action sequences to match the size and scope of the stories that he wants to tell. He also allows his films to slow down and build moments that bring the audience into the minds of the main characters and therefore fully invest themselves in the story. In Salvation, making the T-800’s origin story a sympathetic one is an inspired twist in the Terminator timeline, and the film tries in vain to open a dialogue about what it means to be human, but the script doesn’t go deep enough. This wouldn’t be as much of a problem for me if this wasn’t a Terminator film. Terminator 3 sets the creative bar very low, and Salvation clears it by miles, but it falls short when compared to the first two films. The film ends on a cliffhanger, and I hope that Terminator 5 will answer some of the questions that this installment raises, or at least delve into them deeper.

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Overall, Terminator: Salvation has amazing action sequences and solid performances across the board. Not unlike a Terminator itself, however, the film’s humanity is only skin deep.

Guest Contributor Small Potatoes can also be found on his own site: The Small Potatoes Movie Wire

Bonus Feature: McG commentary on the pivotal John Connor – Marcus Wright Scene

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