ecl@hocsj.UUCP (11/02/84)
TERMINATOR
A film review by Mark R. Leeper
The concept of a human from a future being sent into the past to
prevent that future from ever happening has been done before. Specific
examples include CYBORG 2087 (1966), and an early episode of OUTER LIMITS
called "Soldier" and written by Harlan Ellison. TERMINATOR, for what it's
worth, has an interesting variation on this theme. Yes, the nuclear war
came. It wasn't between East and West so much as between humans and
sentient defense machines. Our defense systems revolted and decided to have
the nuclear war all by themselves. When it was over, they modified
themselves like Saberhagen's Berserkers to hunt down and kill the remaining
humans. Oddly enough, this is *not* the nightmare future that anyone tries to
avoid. It is considered pretty much a forgone conclusion that the war will
take place. What happened is that the humans eventually rallied under the
direction of a powerful human leader and defeated the machines. Why the
machines could not destroy all life with remaining nuclear weapons is not
clear. In any case, the machines' idea of how to prevent the counter-
revolution is to send an invincible, flesh-covered robot (Arnold
Schwarzenegger) into 1984 to kill Sarah Connor, the mother of the
revolutionary leader-to-be. The humans send back a representative to thwart
the robot's plans.
Now all this is more science fiction concept than most science fiction
films have, but it really amounts to just a few minutes of screen time.
That and about five minutes at the end actually make this a science
fiction/horror film, but most of the rest of the film is chase and mindless
violence. Schwarzenegger is a terminator-class robot (hence the title--I
wonder if a machine would really pick a name like that for another machine).
He arrives naked from the future. The machines have invented time travel,
but it doesn't work on clothing. It works fine on flesh-covered robots,
metal skeleton and all, and it works fine on humans, but it has this problem
sending clothing. He must find his own clothing and weapons, as must the
human who follows him. Whatever the robot needs, it can kill to get. We
are treated (?) to a long stretch of chasing and killing and shooting and
more chasing.
The end of the film finally gets around to some more traditional
mindless SF trappings to please the people who saw the film expecting them,
but until then the SF audience just has to sit and count inconsistencies.
One I noted is that while the Terminator is said to come to 1984, someone in
the film refers to Thursday, May 12. It was 1983 that May 12 fell on a
Thursday, gang; this year it's a Saturday. In another, the human from the
future gives Sarah a handgun to protect herself from the robot. At this
point everyone concerned should know that a handgun is useless. Sometimes
the robot is not even affected by the momentum of the gunblasts, sometimes
he is. The list goes on. This film is rated a neutral 0 (on a -4 o +4
scale) for having some ideas to ponder but burying them in trash.
(Evelyn C. Leeper for)
Mark R. Leeper
...ihnp4!lznv!mrlian@loral.UUCP (Ian Kaplan) (11/12/84)
My wife and I saw Terminator last weekend. We recommend it. Although this movie has been the subject of several reviews on the net, the reviews did not prepare me for the movie. To us it was one of the scariest movies we have ever seen. Do not take you children if they are prone to nightmares (or for that matter, skip it if you are). Arnold does an excellant job as the terminator robot. This is the first time I have seen him play the villian, and he does a pretty good job. As usual, his part is mostly action, very few spoken lines. This could be due to his heavy Austrian accent. Enough said. If you like action movies that leave you like a terrified forest creature, see Terminator. Ian Kaplan