Terminator Salvation

Few could have imagined that a relatively small independent film called The Terminator would create such a behemoth of a franchise and its dialogue-free Teutonic star would be one of the most popular movie stars of the next two decades (and The Governator of California no-less).

However, here comes the shambling beast again, shorn of any of the inventive stop-motion puppet work of the original, the ground-breaking CGI of sequel (still barely bettered nearly two decades on) and bereft of any of the "nice ideas, though could try harder" of the forgettable Rise Of The Machines.

Salvation begins in the positively prehistoric time of 2003 in the prison cell of death-row inmate Marcus Wright (Sam Worthington), who has been convinced by the manipulative (yet cancer-stricken) Dr Serena Kogan (Helena Bonham-Carter) to sign over his soon to be lethally-injected body to the seemingly beneficent Skynet Corporation for biomedical research. Fast-forward to the future and the Resistance Leader John Connor (Christian Bale), who has foreseen the battle of man versus machines (AKA Judgment Day) from the time in his youth when his mother indoctrinated him of such events, fatefully meeting an old nemesis. Wright is so obviously part cyborg from the off and ergo the revelation is lost when he sleep-walks through such an evidently shattering event to solely the film-makers' surprise. Worthington will of course be the star of Cameron's Avatar, itself seeming to be a melange of teenage fantasy that will be as headache inducing as much of the Michael Bay style of exposition that is seen here.

The excitement of the original (or even the bombast of the sequel) is sorely lacking as the criminally over-employed McG provides us with large explosions and unsympathetic characters. It's impossible to see how Star Trek's Anton Yelchin could metamorphose into freedom fighter Kyle Reese and the less said about the return of a particularly ropey CGI Arnie the better. Bale has never been so dour and anonymous as he has been here - if only there was a suggestion that his famous rant was ever borne out of anything but abject frustration and the scenes that he suggests in said tirade that were ever worth fighting for came to the fore. But alas, all we are left with is a crushing disappointment.



Extras: Theatrical and Director's Cuts, Maximum Movie Mode, 'Re-Forging the Future' featurette, 'The Moto-Terminator' featurette.

Released on Blu-ray and DVD on 23rd November 2009 by Sony Pictures Home Entertainment.

Written by Simon Cole.