
Pictured: The most boring Terminator I've ever seen.
So, like with Star Trek, I went to a Wednesday preview showing of Terminator Salvation, and like most Terminator fans, I was salivating for Salvation. Then the movie started. As always, if you don’t want spoilers, just avoid the green paragraphs.
This movie sucked. I can actually say with certainty that the only real enjoyment I found in the first two-thirds of the movie came from me and a friend mocking Christian Bale every time he said anything. Every time John Conner said anything, we added how it was distracting, and how he and that actor/robot/vehicle were done, professionally.
(For the two people who didn’t get that joke, it’s about Bale yelling at a guy for walking in his light and being, in his words, “@#$%^%ing distracting.” It also spurred a five minute yelling session from the angry crybaby actor. Youtube “Christian Bale freak out.”)
Not that John Conner was the main character. Yup, you heard right. The previews have lied to you. The main character is the interesting, yet totally gypped, due to editing, Marcus. That being said…
The entirety of the first half of the movie is terribly predictable. From the very first shot, I predicted a majority of the movie. With proper editing, the movie’s suspense could have been top notch and the plot could have actually flowed. An hour in, I actually nearly fell asleep and asked my girlfriend if she was just as bored as I was. She was. Now, time for the spoilers.
In the first scene, we learn about a guy on death row who sells his body to Dynacorp, so we are instantly like, Terminator, lulz. If that wasn’t enough, we then see him emerging from a burning Skynet tower in Conner’s adult time. So, most everyone puts two and two together and realizes he’s a Terminator.
However, the movie then beats us over the head with it, making him do impossible things, time and time again. He hits a flying machine with a four-way and destroys it in a single hit, people break their fists on his face, he hits rocks at a couple hundred miles an hour to no damage. At this point, I’m yawning, knowing he’s a Terminator for an hour now, and THEN they play it off as some big shock, showing you his inner workings.
In addition, they overplay a hook on the back of a tow truck for the better part of five minutes, as well as a scene where the Terminator, named Marcus, is gunned down by the resistance, finally trying to make it seem cool that he suddenly shows battle damage.
Now, if the movie had started with Marcus yelling in a burning ruin, then the title, then his introduction and battle, underplaying his super-heroism, and then suddenly showed the flashback just before revealing his half-machine nature, it could have been really dramatic.
But those problems are passable, even if it IS a simple editing fix that could have saved the movie and made it interesting. The real two problems I had with the movie, that were BLOODY DISTRACTING, were the lack of a soundtrack and poor pacing.
The soundtrack was more than minimal. If I read the ending credits correctly, there were only FOUR SONGS. They play a Guns ‘n Roses Song for six seconds or so, as well as an Alice in Chains song for the same duration. In addition, they play (according to the credits) the theme from Terminator 1 and 2. They still released a soundtrack, but of the ten people I saw it with, no one remembers the songs playing during the movie even once past the opening credits. Also, for no reason, they say the title twice in the opening. Why? Who knows.
The pacing was bad. REALLY bad, going from a scene where someone was talking peacefully with a girl to INSTANT ACTION with no transition. No wipe, no music, just a scene switch that makes my highschool home movies look like gems.
Also, by the end of the movie, nothing has happened, at all.
They destroyed one Skynet tower, with hundreds left, or so they say, meaning NOTHING HAPPENED. In fact, the only enjoyable part was the Arnold impersonator showing up near the end and the final fight sequence.
In the end, I feel like I spent 2 hours feeling like I had watched a boring 3 hour movie. Skip this nonsense.
GG gives this mess 3 / 10
(4 with Bale’s freak out lines inserted.)
Until next time guys, we’re done professionally. -GG
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