The Terminator (by Gregory Perez)

Movie Analysis:  The Terminator (Gregory Perez)

During the 1980s the high popularity of the Sci-fi film moved Hollywood to produce several films to attempt to gain profit from moviegoers.  The Terminator was a 1984 Sci-fi film and an early film of James Cameron’s successful productions.  The film was notable for bringing Arnold Schwarzenegger, former Mr. Olympia, huge stardom and lifting his career as the robotic assassin.  As a director developing fame in the 1980s, James Cameron was able to begin a legacy by directing The Terminator; the success of the film eventually led to him directing other sci-fi films and extending a long career.  The Terminator features references to the Holocaust, criticisms of police in society, male roles in society, a fear of technological advancement, and also themes of a parallel universe; Cameron uses innovative camera techniques like the stop-animation terminator as well as close up shots to capture each character’s role in the movie.

                Throughout the movie, The Terminator features themes of the Holocaust in World War Two.  The film begins with soldiers being shot from above by the robots, similar to the beach attacks on Normandy in World War Two when the allied forces were being shot from above by the Germans.  Cameron uses a low angle on the soldiers to show that they are in hiding from the new artificial intelligence that has overthrown humans.  After Kyle Reese is transported to the 1980s and finds Sarah Connor, he mentions that the reason for the aliens rising was a nuclear war that broke out in the world in 2029.  The humans end up in prison camps and some people are killed off by the ruling robotic race.  Cameron uses the extermination of the humans by robots to relate to the prison camps of Nazi Germany against the Jews.  The genocide of humans by robots reflects the attempted genocide of Jews by Nazi Germany in World War Two.

Cameron criticizes the police force in the 1980s as lazy, unorganized and incompetent with identifying the danger of many criminals.  The lieutenant chief, Traxler, is shown as very passive once he is told that there is a killer hunting down women named Sarah Connor in the phone book.  The Lieutenant directs his investigators to let the news media bring the surviving Sarah Connor to them.  When the investigators do finally catch Connor and Reese they dismiss Reese a mentally ill person because he says he is from the future; the team fails to realize that there is still a killer hunting down Sarah Connor.  Another example of police incompetence the film presents is when the Terminator walks into the police station, the officer behind the reception window passively ignores the request to see Sarah Connor even though there have been two prior killings of women named Sarah Connor all over the news.  Irritated by the officer’s unhelpfulness The Terminator drives a police car through the front of the station and crushes through the reception window and the office behind it.  

The advancement of technology as a negative influence on the human race and concepts of alternate realities are shown through the Terminator.  The artificial intelligence created in the future would pose a threat to human society; the artificial life decides that humans are too dangerous because of nuclear weapons; they decide humans must be exterminated for global safety.  The theme of alternate realities is mentioned as Reese tells Sarah Connor about her son, John Connor.  Reese explains that her son will lead the human rebellion against the future artificial intelligence, yet they both do not know that it is the child that Connor conceives from Reese that is John Connor.  Cameron puts into question that maybe in an alternate universe John Connor is never born and the robots rule Earth.

Rather than relying on Schwarzenegger’s acting, Cameron relies on close up shots of the Terminator’s facial expressions and his violent actions to convey his character.  Schwarzenegger has few lines to communicate the role of the Terminator.  Schwarzenegger’s initial appearance begins with “where is Sarah Connor?” and “give me your clothes” and he stares blankly at the men with knives.  Without hesitation, Terminator tosses the men like rag dolls and punches through one of the men, violently killing him; the scene closes in on the Terminator’s eyes and Cameron uses this technique to communicates the Terminator’s mission is to find Sarah Connor and let no human stop him; the blank facial expressions express the fearlessness, and unsympathetic character of the Terminator.

Masculinity and male roles in society are also emphasized with the physical structure, bravery and fearlessness of the Terminator and Kyle Reese.  Schwarzenegger as the Terminator showed that a physically adept male cyborg built by robots was ideal for hunting and eliminating threats.  Through the car chase crashes and explosions the Terminator always rises up.  The constant rising up of Schwarzenegger also helped make the tagline “I’ll be back” famous.  Kyle Reese is shown as a similarly tough soldier as he comes back in time.  Although he gets shot by Terminator he hesitates getting treated by Connor.  Reese is shown as heroic and brave as he sacrifices himself to save Connor from the Terminator.

Cameron’s themes and camera techniques enhanced his film and accredited his career with a Saturn Award for best writing and best science fiction film in 1985 for The Terminator.  The concepts Cameron presented evidently captured the attention of the Science Fiction community.  The new action hero with little dialogue and a lot of action serves as a template films like The Transporter or Faster, with stars like Jason Statham and Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson who have mostly action scenes and little dialogue in their movies.  Additionally, the film’s positive reception gave opportunities to James Cameronto direct a sequel, Terminator 2: Judgement Day and other science fiction films like Aliens and Avatar.