Rabs’ Review: “Terminator Salvation” Delivers What It’s Suppose To

Before I delve into the in-depth analysis of this review, I just want to say right off the bat that Terminator Salvation is a really good action movie and a decent movie overall. It is currently being destroyed by most critics, sitting at an unfair 32% on Rotten Tomatoes. They are holding it up to very ill-conceived expectations that  do not have merit based on the previous films in the Terminator franchise and the concept of this film in general.

So here we are, Terminator Salvation, or “Terminator 4″ as many people cynically label it as they roll their eyes at the idea. They roll their eyes  because of one question, “Why?”. “Why do we need another Terminator? We just had T3: Rise of the Machines only 6 years ago back in 03′, which was decent at best.” Salvation director McG has had to answer this question hundreds of times during interviews and panel presentations at Comic Con and Wondercon. His answer and the reason is obvious; because we haven’t had a Terminator movie that solely takes place POST-judgment day. All of the original three films (the first two directed by James Cameron and the 3rd directed by Jonathan Mostow) took place at the “present time” when it was made. Everyone involved in the inevitable “Man v. Machine” war came back in time (Kyle Reese, T-800, T-1000, etc.), bringing the Terminator mythology with them.Combined in all three films, we probably got like 2 minutes max in glimpses of the post-judgment day war between humans and SkyNet. And that’s fine because that wasn’t the story then, but it would have  been really cool to see and now we have it. Because Terminator is all about robots and micro-chips, I’m going to breakdown this review in a very technical fashion.

Story (minor spoilers)

It starts off with Marcus Wright (Sam Worthington), a death row inmate in 2003, who mistakenly and naively donates his organs to Cyberdyne and becomes the first human-modeled Terminator. He is “executed” and wakes up  from being cryogenically frozen 15 years later during the post-judgment day war.  John Connor (Christian Bale) is the leader of the resistance fighting the Terminators with every morsel of blood, sweat and tears that he can muster. The rest of the story is basic per SE. Connor is leading the resistance, trying to find a way to destroy SkyNet, the original A.I. program that became self-aware and turned on the human race. The resistance discovers a wave frequency that disables the machines and they plan to use it during a massive, concentrated strike to destroy SkyNet once and for all. Pretty understandable and classic sci-fi action plot. The film is, however, very dependent on previous Terminator mythology knowledge. If you haven’t seen the original The Terminator and you don’t know who Kyle Reese is, then you’ll probably be confused on why John Connor is searching for his 20 year-old father, though John Connor’s mom Sarah mentions it in her periodic taped monologues to her son.

The story doesn’t rely on much character development because the main character has already been established. John Connor, though shown at  younger ages in the previous two films, already has well-established relationships with his mother Sarah Connor, in T2, and his to-be wife, Kate Connor, in T3 (Claire Danes). One big piece of his story that I would have liked to have seen would have been his rise as a resistance fighter. We know he’s always been the key to stopping SkyNet, but in Salvation he just kind of shows up as the proclaimed “One” without any courtesy montages showing how he evolved from the druggie, sarcastic kid,  into the serious, soldier badass. We see some emotional interactions with John and his pregnant wife Kate Connor (played by the beautiful Bryce Dallas Howard). It displays the fragile, but precious human quality of love, staying true to the “the difference between machines and humans is feelings” theme. The conceptual struggle of man vs. machine is conveyed through the internal struggle of Marcus Wright, which you’ll just have see for yourself. But this is an action movie, taking place in the future as the human race is fighting killer robots. There’s really no need for any forced existential subplots to appease snobby critics.

Acting

The guy who steals the show is Aussie newcomer Sam Worthington as Marcus Wright/a Terminator. He has such a commanding, charismatic presence in every scene he’s in. You just want him to keep talking, he’s such a badass.  He will definitely be an actor to look out for (i.e. James Cameron’s Avatar this December). Bale was a little stale as John Connor. Christian Bale is one of my favorite actors, probably in my top 3, but he was just so boring and mechanical in this. I mean, I guess it might have been the way the character was written, but he could have put a little more life and charm into John Connor’s character. For McG  “staying true” to the Terminator mythology, in both T2 & T3 John Connor was a smart-mouthed wise-cracker, which was none existent in TS. And I have no idea on why he insists of projecting his bellowing gruff voice. It sounds like Clint Eastwood lifting weights while taking a shit. Which also happened to be the main complaint about The Dark Knight. Bryce Dallas Howard made brief, but effective appearances as Kate Connor, she’s great in whatever she does. I was impressed by the other female performance from the smokin’ hot Moon Bloodgood (that’s seriously her name). She plays resistance fighter Blair Williams who develops a soft spot for Marcus when he is found out to be a Terminator. Her role didn’t require much emotional projection, but the little that it did, was done well.  Lastly, I am starting to become an Anton Yelchin fan. I liked him in Charlie Bartlett, I thought he was very good in Star Trek and he did a great job at providing the very limited amount of comic relief as Kyle Reese. As well as displaying the angst, despair but also internal strength, while being hoarded to a concentration camp.

Directing & Effects

This is the reason to see this film. The special effects were absolutely astounding (again take note Wolverine) and the direction was pretty damn good. There are some that were bashing McG for his “sloppy direction,” but I was actually seriously impressed given his action portfolio (Charlies Angels). The world he created was dark, desperate and dirty. As I alluded to earlier, a majority of the film is constant action climax. McG displays a solid ability to take us into the trenches, using up close and shaky camera angles with bullets whizzing by and a creative sequence of camera motion to display this futuristic war. The cinematography is crisp, illuminating and in your face. Then there’s the special effects. The coolest thing to see are these terminator motorcycles that spit off the leg of the massive Harvester robot and zoom towards its human prey. They are shifting and spinning in every direction as they dodge the giant pieces of debris that are coming at them on the high way. It’s also really sweet to see for the first time, due to the huge advancements in effects technology, several kick-ass hand-t0-hand combat featuring human vs. terminator. In the previous Terminator films, the general motion of the traditional first-model terminators was limited due to special effects restraints. We only got to see Arnold fight T-1000 in their human covers with a few pieces missing here and there to display their machinery innards. In Salvation, there’s like a 15-minute fight scene between a Connor, Marcus and the classic terminator, red-piercing eyes and all…and it’s badass!

Overall

It’s a good action film. Is it going to win best picture? No. Are there pieces missing that could have made it a lot better? Yes.  Are some parts confusing? Yes (learn the “predestination paradox” concept as you try to decipher the time-traveling sequences of Kyle Reese). But it’s just a rockin’ good time at the theater filled to the brim with explosions, gun fights, chases scenes and killer robots. What more could you ask for in a summer movie?

What Should You Do? Def check it in theaters out if you’re an action junkie.

3 out of 4 STARZ