Finally we see a different side of a bigger story of the world James Cameron created with the original classic Terminator. Fans of the concept and series of films will enjoy this new take thoroughly, since this is one of the many possible angles that has not yet been told onscreen. McG does an admirable job overall. He is not Cameron but he shows great respect to the world Cameron created in Salvation.
The actors all do really well IMO, especially the leads. Bale is once again solid as the adult leader of the resistance John Conner (don't believe the bitter non sense that Bale doesn't do a good job, those are the people that are looking to rip him after the much publicized rant of a crew member) who battle the rise and advancement of the machines. Good action, good FX and great intensity overall in this film. Sam Worthington does an excellent job as well, and he is well on his way to becoming a serious A list talent. I won't be annoying and spil anything about this film. Go see it and be ready to be stuck to your chair the whole time. You aren't even going to want to blink, because you'll be worried that you might miss the next scene!
This film may not be able to hold the original two films jocks, Terminator and the great sequel T2, but it easily surpasses the third film, Terminator Rise of the Machines as the third best film in the series. A nice FRESH visual Terminator story for the summer is what this film truly is.
8/10 for me
Looks like another case of Watchmen. We are getting a movie that fans will enjoy, but one that critics don't like. The difference with Watchmen is that this movie is much more linear and simple, Watchmen was much deeper, layered, and more complex, not to mention much more gory and violent. Salvation should make a decent amount of money in the box office.
The problem with this film is it tries to be about John Connor and is really a Marcus story. Hell, Bale was approached for the Marcus role. Marcus is the lead, Connor was a last minute tack on. If they wanted this to be a Connor film, they SHOULD NOT have included Marcus. I am not saying the Marcus character is not interesting, but from a narrative POV, you need to more cohesive and focused for a film. McG does not have the talent for this type of narrative and character juggling, and he should not even attempt it (yet). In other words, he should have made a film about Marcus OR Connor and expand on either characters. This is probably the biggest mistake.
Given his interviews and how Bale "explicates" the film as a satisfactory loud popcorn film, it's a nice way of saying, its a loud dumb film. It's not like there is anything wrong with loud dumb films (Star Trek); it's probably not entertaining. Warner Brothers mortgaged the R-Rating and long term potential for a bigger short term opening weekend. They opted for the security of PG-13 over R.
Warner should have not made Watchmen, because it was destined to commercially fail. No matter how faithful or unfaithful. The story is not conducive for film. Terminator is more conducive to film, and deserves the R unlike Watchmen. It's not like this is a matter of hindsight, a number of people have been saying this for years, hell even Moore pointed this out. Without Watchmen this film would have been R.
I never doubted McG has a visual flair, but I suspect his editing and pacing style will destroy this film. Whereas Abrams salvaged a bad script, McG will savage a good script, such as cutting lines out and making dialogue awkward (aka the preview clips). Especially when we are talking about 30-40 minutes of material.
In the end, it all boils back down to McG.
People need to stop laying blame ONLY on McG. People need to understand that it was Halcyon Company that approached McG to direct Salvation, and not the other way around. Even McG himself initially wanted nothing to do with this movie. It was also Halcyon Company that hired Brancato and Ferris to write that awful original script. It then took a long time to get Bale to sign on, who only did so once script rewrites had occured. Warner Brothers then made the decision to change the ending of the movie after it had leaked online. Finally, McG was given a lot of creative freedom by WB to make the movie. What happened in the last minute it seems is that there some was studio pressure from Warner to make it PG-13, reportedly because Warner was dissapointed with the performance of Watchmen.
Even though Watchmen was not commercially successful, fans loved it. DVD sales may prove to be strong. Studios need to take creative risks like allowing movies such as Watchmen to be made, otherwise studios risk alienating fans of certain mythologies and also risk alienating some general audiences.
McG definitely has some flaws and is not a great director, but most of the blame here needs to go to Warner Brothers for some silly decisions as well as Halcyon Company since THEY hired McG and they were the ones that got Brancato and Ferris to write the initial full script.
If McG had been given total freedom by WB and Halcyon, he probably would have gotten Nolan to do the entire script with no rewrites, and the movie would have been over 2 hours with an R rating.
What's done is done. If they had gone originally with the Marcus story, it would have been a disaster in the eyes of the fans. It also likely would have flopped at the box office. Bale refused to do the movie playing the Marcus character, so they would have lacked star power as well. Unfortunately McG was not able to do a movie only about Connor since the script was already written, and Halcyon Company wanted to go with the Marcus angle originally. All that McG (with some convincing from Bale) was able to do was compromise with Halcyon, making the story about both John and Marcus.
McG was not the only one who did the editing, so blame cannot go only to him. WB (and Halcyon) very likely pressured him into cutting the movie and making it suitable for a PG-13 rating. Conrad Buff was the main editor for the movie.
The rumoured 30-40 minutes of material are supposed to be deleted/cut footage along with some behind-the-scenes stuff and other extras. I guarantee it is not going to be purely cut footage.
Basically a lot of twists, turns, compromises and revisions occured in the making of this movie. If it had been made the way Halcyon originally wanted it to, I guarantee it would have been an even worse movie.
What McG did was salvage a bad initial script, turning it into a decent script after rewrites and from all accounts he has made a good *Terminator* movie. It may not be a great movie in general, but as a Terminator movie it looks like McG has given new life to the franchise.
Lastly, I will say that I am not even a McG fan in any way, but I give respect where it is due.
Especially the extent he says that Haggis and especially Nolan worked on the script.
We'll have to remember that if he's going to helm the sequel.
t:
