Movie Review: The Terminator
Jan. 2nd, 2020 04:02 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jedi_of_urth posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
tori_reviewsMovie Review: The Terminator
I had forgotten a lot about that movie (not too surprising as it's probably been about 20 years since I saw it) but I remembered most of the broad strokes, and feel like my final opinion of it is probably fairly similar to what it was before. It's a solid movie, I may not entirely understand why it's such a seminal classic, but it's well made with a solid story.
Actually, I already have to correct myself a bit, because I kind of do understand how it became a classic in a lot of people's eyes, just with the caveat that it was never going to have the same impact of future generations. When it hit at the time, it was a mainstream genre story that captured the attention and imagination of people who weren't commonly exposed to those genre ideas in a mainstream way. It's accessible for a high concept, but it is (or at least was) out there enough that people felt like they were seeing something new. And at the same time, it could appeal to the fairly young, who definitely were seeing it as a new thing they hadn't seen done before. While it is rated R, I'm sure it was fairly easily edited for TV (trim a few ass shots early, put 'mother' in place of 'fucker' a few times, and cut the sex scenes), which by the same token means that it's not such a hard-R that all parents would be squeamish about letting their kids watch it even unedited; and yet because it is an adult movie, a lot of kids would want to see it. Also it was the 80's there were toys of this even if kids weren't watching it, which just made them want to watch it more because robots.
So that covers some of the initial reasons why I think this movie captured a generation of fans (and we'll talk after next time how I suspect T2 played into that, just that it was a very well timed sequal), but can't hope to find that kind of audience in the modern day. Some stuff I talked about it the She-Ra reviews also applies here, that people are exposed to more high concept entertainment from younger ages than they used to be, so the high concept here wouldn't stand out the same way here that it did in 1984; the adults have definitely seen this kind of thing before (including this movie) and as a culture we're a lot more squeamish about the kind of entertainment children should watch so getting people early and fresh is less likely.
Truthfully I have a few weird tangents that are going to make up this review I think, so it likely to be a bit all over the place.
The next one being that I could tell I was watching this movie wrong. Not, this time, because of picking it apart with eye to reviewing; my shattershot thoughts might tell you that wasn't the problem most of the time. But what I got was a very strong vibe of this movie having been made for the theater, not watched on my computer screen. I became very aware as I was watching it that while I was enjoying it well enough, I would probably have enjoyed it more if I had seen it as it was meant to be seen rather than like this. It probably would have been at least a little better if I'd turned off more lights and watched it on the TV, it would have felt more like a movie in some ways; but not enough ways that I opted to switch over. But this was a movie made for theaters, so if the chance comes I would recommend seeing it that way.
Not to say I didn't have any eye on reviewing as I watched it. I was paying some attention to what had me the most engaged, and in doing so have a pretty good guess why this stuck in my head as the superior Terminator movie: I want to know more about the future and the time loop implications. Truth is 'Salvation' could have been the movie I always wanted them to make in this franchise, telling the events leading up to this movie from the future perspective; but I never really heard anyone say that was what Salvation was so I haven't bothered with it (I'm considering that if this project doesn't burn me out again I might check out the other four Terminator movies at the end and compare these possible stories; no promises yet though).
It's not that the future is that interesting (and there is clear lack of worry about nuclear fallout that kind of bugged me), but every time it came up I found myself getting wrapped up in it. And I love time loops, it's especially interesting when no one seems aware that they're in one. Except John, he's the player in this we never see here, but is the only one acting with the knowledge of how this goes down. There weren't enough records, and those there were had been lost, for the machines to realize what's set in motion; Reese is clueless; and while Sarah spends the movie proving and becoming quite capable and hardened, genre-savviness isn't shown to be among her talents.
Look, I really want to know what John's relationship with Kyle was like in to post-apocalypse. John can't tell Kyle anything, but he has to set Kyle up to be the man they need when the moment comes. 'Hey Reese, why don't you hold on to this picture of my mom for me. No reason, just seems like a good idea.' 'Make sure you don't pick up any STDs Reese, but at some point you might want to have unprotected sex with someone on a whim.' 'Reese, I'm your commander not your father (silent eww).' I remember being disappointed in T3 that we didn't get anything from a young Reese; and I'm given to understand we will get some follow through in TSCC so I'm looking forward to that.
I could say some things about the movie itself; on how the character dynamics only kind of work given the compressed time frame involved (another reason to look forward to have TV series time to explore things); on how I'm a little confused by the geography of most of the chase scenes; about how “I'll be back,” is just not as impressive a line in context as it seems to hear it quoted so much; about how I think maybe another reason I historically prefer this movie to T2 is that I'm just not that into Arnold in this role; but I don't have a lot to say on any of those points. They didn't have a huge impact on my enjoyment of the movie so I didn't end up with a lot of thoughts I need to let out about them.
So my opinion of this movie hasn't changed much, let's go on to T2 and see if that continues to be the case.
I had forgotten a lot about that movie (not too surprising as it's probably been about 20 years since I saw it) but I remembered most of the broad strokes, and feel like my final opinion of it is probably fairly similar to what it was before. It's a solid movie, I may not entirely understand why it's such a seminal classic, but it's well made with a solid story.
Actually, I already have to correct myself a bit, because I kind of do understand how it became a classic in a lot of people's eyes, just with the caveat that it was never going to have the same impact of future generations. When it hit at the time, it was a mainstream genre story that captured the attention and imagination of people who weren't commonly exposed to those genre ideas in a mainstream way. It's accessible for a high concept, but it is (or at least was) out there enough that people felt like they were seeing something new. And at the same time, it could appeal to the fairly young, who definitely were seeing it as a new thing they hadn't seen done before. While it is rated R, I'm sure it was fairly easily edited for TV (trim a few ass shots early, put 'mother' in place of 'fucker' a few times, and cut the sex scenes), which by the same token means that it's not such a hard-R that all parents would be squeamish about letting their kids watch it even unedited; and yet because it is an adult movie, a lot of kids would want to see it. Also it was the 80's there were toys of this even if kids weren't watching it, which just made them want to watch it more because robots.
So that covers some of the initial reasons why I think this movie captured a generation of fans (and we'll talk after next time how I suspect T2 played into that, just that it was a very well timed sequal), but can't hope to find that kind of audience in the modern day. Some stuff I talked about it the She-Ra reviews also applies here, that people are exposed to more high concept entertainment from younger ages than they used to be, so the high concept here wouldn't stand out the same way here that it did in 1984; the adults have definitely seen this kind of thing before (including this movie) and as a culture we're a lot more squeamish about the kind of entertainment children should watch so getting people early and fresh is less likely.
Truthfully I have a few weird tangents that are going to make up this review I think, so it likely to be a bit all over the place.
The next one being that I could tell I was watching this movie wrong. Not, this time, because of picking it apart with eye to reviewing; my shattershot thoughts might tell you that wasn't the problem most of the time. But what I got was a very strong vibe of this movie having been made for the theater, not watched on my computer screen. I became very aware as I was watching it that while I was enjoying it well enough, I would probably have enjoyed it more if I had seen it as it was meant to be seen rather than like this. It probably would have been at least a little better if I'd turned off more lights and watched it on the TV, it would have felt more like a movie in some ways; but not enough ways that I opted to switch over. But this was a movie made for theaters, so if the chance comes I would recommend seeing it that way.
Not to say I didn't have any eye on reviewing as I watched it. I was paying some attention to what had me the most engaged, and in doing so have a pretty good guess why this stuck in my head as the superior Terminator movie: I want to know more about the future and the time loop implications. Truth is 'Salvation' could have been the movie I always wanted them to make in this franchise, telling the events leading up to this movie from the future perspective; but I never really heard anyone say that was what Salvation was so I haven't bothered with it (I'm considering that if this project doesn't burn me out again I might check out the other four Terminator movies at the end and compare these possible stories; no promises yet though).
It's not that the future is that interesting (and there is clear lack of worry about nuclear fallout that kind of bugged me), but every time it came up I found myself getting wrapped up in it. And I love time loops, it's especially interesting when no one seems aware that they're in one. Except John, he's the player in this we never see here, but is the only one acting with the knowledge of how this goes down. There weren't enough records, and those there were had been lost, for the machines to realize what's set in motion; Reese is clueless; and while Sarah spends the movie proving and becoming quite capable and hardened, genre-savviness isn't shown to be among her talents.
Look, I really want to know what John's relationship with Kyle was like in to post-apocalypse. John can't tell Kyle anything, but he has to set Kyle up to be the man they need when the moment comes. 'Hey Reese, why don't you hold on to this picture of my mom for me. No reason, just seems like a good idea.' 'Make sure you don't pick up any STDs Reese, but at some point you might want to have unprotected sex with someone on a whim.' 'Reese, I'm your commander not your father (silent eww).' I remember being disappointed in T3 that we didn't get anything from a young Reese; and I'm given to understand we will get some follow through in TSCC so I'm looking forward to that.
I could say some things about the movie itself; on how the character dynamics only kind of work given the compressed time frame involved (another reason to look forward to have TV series time to explore things); on how I'm a little confused by the geography of most of the chase scenes; about how “I'll be back,” is just not as impressive a line in context as it seems to hear it quoted so much; about how I think maybe another reason I historically prefer this movie to T2 is that I'm just not that into Arnold in this role; but I don't have a lot to say on any of those points. They didn't have a huge impact on my enjoyment of the movie so I didn't end up with a lot of thoughts I need to let out about them.
So my opinion of this movie hasn't changed much, let's go on to T2 and see if that continues to be the case.
