'Blu-ray or Bust'
TERMINATOR GENISYS (PG-13, 2015, 126 minutes, SKYDANCE
PRODUCTIONS/PARAMOUNT PICTURES)
“You are going to love this movie.”
That’s a quote from James Cameron, director of the first two
installments of the franchise.
Apparently, when they asked him for a quote to put at the very top of
the Blu-ray release, he was either talking to someone in a coma, or shooting up
or snorting his lunch that day. Honestly,
that’s the only thing I can imagine: Jim Cameron, slamming his face into a Tony Montana-sized pile of
cocaine, and pretending a Titanic model is a big-ass machine gun. That, or they were talking about THE LEGO MOVIE.
GENISYS is an attempt to reboot the sputtering franchise
with new faces, new twists on the plot line(s), and new action sequences. Some of this, they pull of wonderfully. But when decent actors have to read dialogue
written by someone that watched too many 80’s action films (and I’m referencing
the ones that went straight to video), you long for the times when more
attention to detail was commonplace.
There are one or two effects that the CGI just doesn’t seem
ready for, and this also makes the film suffer. The makeup effects are good, the props look great, and the sets
are wonderful and big and blow up nicely.
The human exposition, not so much.
A conversation about time travel leaves one of the
characters to utter the “classic” line “talking about time travel makes my head
hurt.” Really? Your crappy dialogue is making my ear-holes
bleed. And the locker room conversation
between the new Kyle Reece (Jai Courtney) and the new Sarah Connor (Emilia
Clarke, “Game of Thrones”) is so steeped in re-used and over-done banter about
an off-screen character that you wonder how many films the screenwriters
borrowed/stole dialogue from.
This is not a movie that picks up where the last one left
off (thank the Sweet Baby Hey-Zeus).
Because of that nifty, ever-present plot element called “time travel”,
director Alan Taylor is able to reimagine the series itself. By borrowing plot points from the first two
films, he is able to wrap up any similarities in the first half of the
film. There are stumbles along the way,
interwoven with some intense (and some trite) action sequences.
But the reliance on the time travel aspect to reboot the
franchise is the same thing that leaves so many gaping plot holes, and some
parts that just don’t make a whole lot of sense. This movie is not horrible, but surely Paramount was looking for
a better reboot than this. The best
thing about this film is the original Terminator himself: Arnold Schwarzenegger has the best lines, and
pretty much the best acting, in the whole film. Go figure.
The special features are a bit long for the movie that came
out of all their hard work, but the behind-the-scenes stuff is good. The best doc is the second one,
unfortunately titled “Infiltration and Termination”, which gives you more info
on filming locations than most docs include.
If you insist on watching this film, the only way you should watch it is
on Blu-ray; MOST of the effects look great, and the booming sound helps the
overall feel of the film dramatically.
For a film that opened dismally in the US, the International
Market may have secured a sequel. No
official announcement has been made yet, but grossing over $400,000,000
worldwide has to count for something.
Although the fact that only eighty-nine million of that staggering
number is from the U.S. box office should also tell you something about the
International Market…
Film Grade: C
Special Features: B
Blu-ray Necessary: Recommended
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