Exclusive: What Went Wrong With TERMINATOR SALVATION?

[Alan "Nordling" Cerny]

I haven't seen TS and based on the feedback, I think I can safely wait until DVD/Blu. I do like Bale as an actor, but this is a guy who needs to get with Adam McKay immediately. He needs to totally excise his stern growling persona and do something funny.

[Felt Pelt]

That just sounds awkward. An earlier thread concluded the only comedic people he could successfully work with (beside Brett Easton Ellis) were the Coen Brothers.

Imdb claims he's attached to a David O. Russell and a Bryan Singer project. If that's true/actually happens, I'm sure one of them would force him off autopilot.

[Fritz Chrome]

I'm not sure 'funny' is the way to go, but playing a character who's actually likeable and capable of non-smarmy charm would definitely be a good idea. Rescue Dawn showed he could pull off that kind of role well (to my surprise), but it seems to be the lone island in a sea of poe-faced sourness.

[pagoda]

Christian Bale CAN act. Just watch the movie I first saw him in, "Newsies." He plays a newsboy in 1899 NYC, yearning for nothing more then to go to Santa Fe, complete with his own song and dance routine.

That's all in jest though. In fact, Ebert named Newsies as one of his, "100 Movies I REALLY REALLY Hate." I loved it as a kid though.

[Domingo]

Hell, see Empire Of The Sun. Pretty good performance in that, and he was what? Ten?

[Moltisanti]

If Benicio Del Toro has a scheduling conflict then they should go with Bale as Moe.

[Cylon Baby]

Originally Posted by Litmus Configuration

Great article, Devin. As usual.

One thing I've been interested in for a while, and have even commented on here in the message boards in regards to films like SUPERMAN RETURNS, WATCHMEN and EPISODES II and III, for example, is the increasingly disturbing issue of fan pandering. Personally, I think any time a filmmaker goes out of his way to personally assure fans via interviews, video blogs, Comic-Con appearances, etc., that he's a true fan of the source material and respects the original author or filmmaker, and really goes out of his way to win fanboy approval, that movie is most likely doomed.

When Spielberg announced at Comic-Con that he was making CRYSTAL SKULL for "you fans," that was a far more grim death knell to me than any nuked fridge. I also feel Snyder's reverence for the importance of WATCHMEN, as opposed to idea of WATCHMEN, resulted in a good film that should have been much, much better. Conversely, look at the mostly aloof distance Chris Nolan and J.J. Abrams maintained between their work and the fans prior to DARK KNIGHT and STAR TREK, respectively. They were clearly more interested in their characters and storylines (flaws and all) than what Duke Fleed thought. And pretty much everyone was rewarded as a result.

Devin's breakdown of the early SALVATION script just goes to show that it was a mess from Day One. But I bet a filmmaker with a stronger, individual voice could have salvaged it. I actually thought there were some interesting ideas in the finished film that simply got derailed or sabotaged by being mishandled or simply abandoned before the movie was over. I think I would have enjoyed a Marcus/Reese/Star-centric film, kind of like an up-river APOCALYPSE NOW-type story where they had to find Connor for some incredibly important reason, keeping Connor in the shadows until the end, similar to what the original script tried to do but without that ridiculous Project ANGEL subplot or even the whole identity swap finale.

Throughout the promotion of SALVATION, going all the way back to before its big Comic-Con presentation, I found myself wishing that McG would just shut the fuck up, ignore the fans and make the best movie he could. That first Comic-Con reel delivered the goods in a big way and for a while, I forgave his unquenchable thirst to earn fan cred by making these ridiculous overtures to Cameron for his blessing, to Schwarzenegger for his approval, etc. Now, having seen SALVATION, I find these desperate measures to be kind of on par with Cannon Films convincing John Williams to come back and compose a couple new cues for SUPERMAN IV: THE QUEST FOR PEACE. Slapping a Mercedes hood ornament onto a Yugo doesn't make that Yugo a Mercedes.

Having said that, and in response to one of Devin's points, I now fully believe that filmmakers and the studios should simply ignore any major leaks, no matter when they occur. Unless the leak forces the filmmakers to come up with a clearly superior idea, they should just stick to their guns and make the story they originally intended to make.

Think about this in the most basic of forms. If you're sitting around a campfire in the forest listening to ghost stories, do you want the storyteller to stop every few sentences to make sure you're enjoying the direction his story is going in? Hell no. Whether or not it's a good story, or the storyteller is effective in his role, should be determined afterwards. Pandering to fans, revising scripts based on feedback from web journalists who are only privy to some of the big picture, and worrying what a tiny handful of geeks think are only recipes for disaster. As TERMINATOR SALVATION pretty conclusively proved.

Bumped for truth!

If a Director wants to go to ComicCon and wax poetic about how he really love Plastic Man and made a movie that's true to the source material, that's one thing (Marketing). When the Director actually means it, look out.

[chappers]

This may have been covered, but after just reading that piece by Dev that states the film feels like it only "worked" at 108 minutes or 151 minutes what are the odds we get a Directors Cut with the excised material?

Cause as mixed as I am personally on the film I did like quite a bit and would be really intrigued if a DC is presented.

[Bitches Leave]

Well in a recent interview (post release) McG was very adamant that this edition of T4 WAS his director's cut. He did suspect a few scenes might be reinserted but he was no fan of this. One scene he mentioned was the Moon Bloodgood topless scene.

But he has been spilling so many lies throughout and with the OW numbers being so depressing, things might get a different tune soon.

[James Woods' Career]

Am I the only one that thinks McG looks like a chubby, blonde Damien Lewis? Anyone?

I wouldn't mind reading the original script.

[Carnotaur3]

Originally Posted by Bitches Leave

But he has been spilling so many lies throughout and with the OW numbers being so depressing, things might get a different tune soon.

I hope so. I still believe that the film's biggest problem was the editing, not the screenplay. The novel filled in the gaps quite nicely and gave a good bit of characterization and development. The final film you can tell is trying to be lean and mean. Sometimes a film needs some fat.

[Abbott & Prospero]

Originally Posted by Alan "Nordling" Cerny

I haven't seen TS and based on the feedback, I think I can safely wait until DVD/Blu. I do like Bale as an actor, but this is a guy who needs to get with Adam McKay immediately. He needs to totally excise his stern growling persona and do something funny.

Bale for one of the new Ghostbuster recruits. The overly serious one, of course, who the other recruits can't stand and spends most of the film getting slimed.

[Orin_Quon]

I thought Devin gave four stars to Terminator Salvation?

I guess he can't keep lying about it being a "very good" movie anymore, eh?

[Jason Pollock]

CHUD doesn't do stars. It's a ten point scale.

[Andrew Woods]

Originally Posted by Orin_Quon

I thought Devin gave four stars to Terminator Salvation?

I guess he can't keep lying about it being a "very good" movie anymore, eh?

Huh?

[The Dark Shape]

Originally Posted by Orin_Quon

I thought Devin gave four stars to Terminator Salvation?

I guess he can't keep lying about it being a "very good" movie anymore, eh?

Devin gave it 3/5 - the editor thought the review read as more positive and bumped it up to 4/5.

Regardless, why in the piss would Devin lie? That's borderline retarded.

[The Rain Dog]

Originally Posted by Orin_Quon

I thought Devin gave four stars to Terminator Salvation?

I guess he can't keep lying about it being a "very good" movie anymore, eh?

Your juvenile agenda is dull and you have a face like an idiot.

[Misfit]

Originally Posted by Abbott & Prospero

Bale for one of the new Ghostbuster recruits. The overly serious one, of course, who the other recruits can't stand and spends most of the film getting slimed.

Hoooooold up. He could be Walter Peck's nephew.

[darkraven28]

How come nobody mentions that Bryce Dallas Howard is obviously pregnant in this movie???? WTF?

What? Bale couldn't even say something like "I'm doing this for our children's future" or "I can't imagine our child growing up in a world where we can't choose for ourselves" or SOMETHING like that. I'm not a screenwriter, but showing total neglect while the kid's in the womb is very troubling.

In all fairness, I don't think the movie's that bad. Does it go to the same lofty perch where we put T1 and T2? Hell no. How could it? The only way you get a film equal to the level of Cameron's Terminator films is to convince Cameron to come back as a writer and director and give him creative control and then you get another classic. As such, Cameron will not make another Terminator film so we're stuck with imitators like Mostow and McG. Are their films (#3 and #4) abominations like people have said? No. Mostow's is a fun retread, and McG's is pretty much ok but they're not classics. They are franchise installments with typical diminshing returns. Three and four in this series could never meet expectations but then with the rushes we all felt after the first two, how could they? I'm over talking about this series and how it has gone from sublime to ok. It has continued as a typical franchise with makers that have come and gone. It has gone from perfection to perfunctory like anything else. Should we be surprised? No. Are we surprised anyway and upset anyway? Yes, and perhaps that is the human condition.

But still, if I have to nitpick, then two glaring issues come to mind: Elfman's score and the baby issue. Elfman hasn't done something really cool with music since Sleepy Hollow. And he doesn't re-establish himself here. He is Brad Fiedel's bitch here and Fiedel walks all over him. It's a missed opportunity.

And again with the baby? Seriously? NOT ONE WORD?

[Abbott & Prospero]

Originally Posted by Misfit

Hoooooold up. He could be Walter Peck's nephew.

He could have been sent to Ghostbusters HQ by a vindictive Walter Peck to infiltrate the training process. Cue the other recruits constantly sabotaging Bale's parapsychology experiments and locking him in the containment facility with angry hobo ghosts.

[Felt Pelt]

He would just stab them again.

He would be best as an obnoxious, unfunny and extremely threatening Bill Murray character or an intense, mute Victorian ghost. And in terms of the other Atherton classic, I bet he could perfectly reduplicate Ellis.

[Greg Clark]

Ah, I can fandom up a meeting between the Peck, Jr. and Venkman.

"Guess he had a dick after all."

[RathBandu]

I think the last time we had the Bale can't be funny argument -- and I think he's pretty fucking hilarious in American Psycho -- somebody suggested a guest stint on 30 Rock. I've always liked that.

Also, Newsies is terrible, and I grew up watching that fucking movie.

[EvilTwin]

In the end, I think the chief problem with TS is that it doesn't take us to a decision that really matters. The status quo hardly changes which makes the whole thing seem unnecessary.

There's one story that I think needed to be told, John Connor struggling with the idea of sending his own father to his death and carrying through on it. And then to the great unknown after that, where the series is finally free of what Cameron established back in the mid 80s.

[The Rain Dog]

...or at the end of the day, for the mainstream public, could it simply be that the average movie goer just wasn't that interested in a Terminator film that didn't feature the man most closely associated with the tale any more than they were a TV series?

[ryoken]

Originally Posted by The Rain Dog

...or at the end of the day, for the mainstream public, could it simply be that the average movie goer just wasn't that interested in a Terminator film that didn't feature the man most closely associated with the tale any more than they were a TV series?

Isn't "Star Trek" the complete opposite of this, memorable franchise man thing aside? Not to be an asshole, but the thought just hit me.

[The Rain Dog]

Originally Posted by ryoken

Isn't "Star Trek" the complete opposite of this, memorable franchise man thing aside? Not to be an asshole, but the thought just hit me.

Yeah but Trek isn't fused in the public consciousness to the star that made it such a success in the first place like the Governator is with the first 3 Terminator films.

[Electrichead]

Originally Posted by darkraven28

How come nobody mentions that Bryce Dallas Howard is obviously pregnant in this movie???? WTF?

I was wondering wtf about that too. I had a fever dream thought in which I thought that perhaps that unborn baby was actually John Connor Jr. The John Conner that we heard about.

It's a dumb idea, but no worse than what was in the film. There really is no reason for her to be pregnant.

[Name_user]

The novelization seemed to get a lot of positive reviews, can anyone explain that ?

I stand by my judgement that Bale has "funny" in him. I found him hilarious in American Psycho and his Bruce Wayne was pretty goofy. I think if you watch him in those films you get a sense that he at least has decent comic timing. I think the issue is just that he's been typecast and also that there are barely any good comedies coming out of major, non-independent studios.

[Humanoid]

Maybe, but he seems to have absolutely zero sense of humour. He's like the Bono of the acting world.

[Aranion]

Originally Posted by Name_user

The novelization seemed to get a lot of positive reviews, can anyone explain that ?

Nerds with no literary taste?

[Johnny Tremaine]

Originally Posted by Aranion

Nerds with no literary taste?

Yeah, I'll cop to enjoying some movie novelizations, but you're right: 95% of them are junk, fiction written quickly, usually by otherwise talented writers, for a quick buck.

Over the years, I've only read a few that were any good: Asimov's novelization of Fantastic Voyage; David Morrell's (the novelist who first wrote First Blood) novelization of James Cameron's script of Rambo II and, though it wasn't that good, but interesting as hell too read---an old battered copy I found of Steven Spielberg's novelization of his own Close Encounters of The Third Kind.

[SAIRUS]

I'll be quick, but I think a less Conner version of the movie centering on Marcus and Kyle Reese with John in the backdrop/radio would of been a fantastic idea. It would of added some weight and could of been a surprise reveal in the factory when Kyle asks who John is. It would of been flat out awesome as we suddenly realize John Conner is there, and his stab through the heart would of been even more tragic.

The idea of his becoming a terminator seems thematically awesome, as you could take a dull character and take it places. Still it wouldn't of sat well with a lot of people and the idea of a John Conner sequel after him showing up at the end would of been better.

Oh and the heart transplant? Yeah I would prefer now it has happened that John needs to be sidelined a little bit. Allow him to sit back and return to the shadows as now he seems to have command of the resistance. Time to move to the night, and for gosh sakes, Bale use another accent.

[ElCapitanAmerica]

I don't know. A movie where Connor just shows up at the end only to be killed and be replaced by a Terminator just sounds gimmicky as hell. As boring as this movie is, the whole idea of a Terminator leading the resistance sounds like a trick that would lose its novelty very quickly.

[Pop Zeus]

Fascinating behind-the-scenes stuff here, Devin. After the critical drubbing, I saw this just to read the article (well, not really but it's partially true.)

What's frustrating is that while the final film has deep flaws, you could see there was some intent to work through the problems in the original draft. The potential for a really good film was somewhere in there, it seems like the filmmakers were too busy putting out fires to rebuild the house, so to speak.

And we'll never know exactly why the rewrites were done. It turns out they were a mixed bag. Would've preferred the original ending. Oh, and by theway, I had no idea what it was until I read this article. So much for being force-fed spoilers. If you want to stay in the dark about something its not that hard.

[Richard Dickson]

Originally Posted by Name_user

The novelization seemed to get a lot of positive reviews, can anyone explain that ?

A friend of mine read the prequel novel by Timothy Zahn and thought that story would have made a better film than what we actually got.

[Carnotaur3]

Considering Cameron made an excellent Terminator film with 6 million dollars back in 1984, is anyone interested in a small budget Terminator future war flick?

It might be for the best.

[Litmus Configuration]

I'd be up for someone like Alfonso Cuarón to make a scrappy low budget TERMINATOR film. It's probably a little too much of "been there, done that" for him though.

[The Rain Dog]

True, the only franchise Cuarón ever jumped onto still had a pulse for starters.

[Name_user]

I'm seeing an animated series in my vision of the future of this series. Handled by Paul Dini or someone like that, it could work.

If you think the producers are giving up the rights to this thing and never making another Terminator film you are in the wrong Jack. Anyway, I'm certain that a second film would be a vast improvement if McG wises up and uses fresh screenwriters and plans it out.

[Johnny Tremaine]

Originally Posted by Name_user

I'm seeing an animated series in my vision of the future of this series. Handled by Paul Dini or someone like that, it could work.

If you think the producers are giving up the rights to this thing and never making another Terminator film you are in the wrong Jack. Anyway, I'm certain that a second film would be a vast improvement if McG wises up and uses fresh screenwriters and plans it out.

You could be right; 'Terminator' may very well live on as a Saturday morning animated series or direct-to-DVD low budget features. But I think you can pretty much guarantee that there won't be another $200 Million summer tent-pole Terminator movie.

[chans]

Originally Posted by chans

Some people put too much blame on Warner Bros. In fact, this film is financed/produced by Halcyon; Warner is only the distributor.

By the way, Warner Bros only paid $50 million to acquire T3, and Warner Bros hoped that T3 could gross $150 million at US box office. (and it did)

Warner Bros also paid $50 million to acquired the US rights of T4, I suspect that Warner Bros will be happy if T4 can gross about $150 million in US box office.
http://www.variety.com/article/VR111...goryid=13&cs=1

LA Times has different info: it states that Warner Bros actually paid $60 million to acquire the US rights of "Terminator Salvation".
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-f...645,full.story

After failing to reach a deal with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer -- which led to another lawsuit, now settled -- Borman signed Warner Bros. to distribute the film in North America and Sony to release it in all but two foreign markets. Warner paid $60 million and Sony just over $100 million for the rights and eventually kicked in extra money for additional footage, said several people familiar with the deals. Halcyon used that money, along with pre-sales from South Korea and the Middle East, to fund the production.

With a version of the script in hand, Warner's blessing and a summer '09 release targeted, Anderson and Kubicek quickly settled on McG to direct and Bale to star. People close to the matter said the director received $6 million and Bale $8 million and both are guaranteed a percentage of gross ticket sales.

I believe the info of LA times is more truthful than the info of Variety.com: Based on the US box office success of "Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines", Warner Bros would pay more money to acquire the US rights of "Terminator Salvation". (Warner Bros only paid $50 million to acquire the US rights of "Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines". )

[TShand]

Is it wrong if I liked this movie? I definitely had a few problems with it... Bale did nothing for me in the role... And I didn't like Helena's "floating head"... And the ending was WAYYYY too abrupt... But otherwise I had fun with it. When JC gets stabbed through the chest - I got excited and thought they maybe kept the original ending.

I can understand why some people would be pretty pissed with this flick... But I had a much better time with this than I did with Wolverine. Maybe that wasn't the best way to start the summer movie season...

[Name_user]

Granted I had low expectations but I dug the film. When the film worked it just worked.

There were times where I genuinely felt I was watching a science fiction film ripped out of my childhood. Other times I felt I was watching a Terminator film that genuinely felt like it was in the Terminator universe, which impressed me seeing as how the most iconic characters of the series was barely even in it. I even enjoyed the references from Guns n' Roses, Alice in Chains, Arnold's appearance to Marcus teaching Kyle Reese the gun holster trick. Hell I even liked the "I'll be back" line, as well as the three times the theme kicked in.

My major problem with this film though, is that I felt that every scene worked, the characters worked (minus Newt 2), the action worked, the cinematography was great, but it felt like there was nothing in between the scenes to glue them together. It was exactly, and I mean exactly like I was watching a classic film on DVD for the 100th time so I just kept skipping to all the money shots and interesting parts and glazing over anything that was plot development, or character development related and the twist ending or resolution (because I already knew the answer).

It was like someone went into the editing room, watched a decent film, then cut out all the good parts, stuck em together and what we got was this film.

I got this vibe. Like I was looking at a severely hurt war veteran after some great plastic surgeons did all they could. It may be nice to look at, has some good external structure, but the destruction is still there and there's nothing they can do to smooth it out. Sometimes they had to go to extremes to save the film like amputate an ending and stick on an artificial one.

I'm guessing Nolan and Haggis saw something they just couldn't make a masterpiece out of, so they opted to just save it. Still though, I just thought at the very least they could have added some meat here and there. For example, I get that it was a cool idea to have Marcus teach Kyle the gun holster trick, but couldn't they have found a cool reason to teach him ? Or have it service the plot in some way, or pay off in a major way later on in the film ? It added nothing of value to the film, in fact at that point I didn't even get why Marcus just got up, took the gun, shushed Kyle and showed it to em. At times it felt they were going for the "big brother/little brother" dynamic, but they set it up and never follow through with it. I don't even understand why expanding Connor's role had to detract from the rest of the movie. Their was enough space for Kyle and Marcus to grow as characters.

I also realized that technically the film ignored T3. Wasn't the Terminator sent to protect Connor in the third, the same one that had supposedly killed him in the future, thus sent back by the resistance ? It confirmed for me that the initial plan all along from T3 was to have this film end with Connor's death. If they planned on discarding the T3 mythology then why even bother with the T3 guys script ?

All in all though, despite all the flaws, I still wouldn't call this a bad movie. I still thought the effort was commendable. It's entertaining as heck and I was struck by just how accurate Devin's review was. I personally believe that Devin is one of the genuine film critics out there that not only present you with an opinion, but also get the difference between a completely subjective opinion piece on a film and a deconstruction and evaluation of a film on its own merits. I felt Devin's article and exclusive nailed what were what didn't work.

This certainly didn't deserve the polarizing views of an overly vicious Harry Knowles review, to an overly positive Total Film review. It's a film made by a bunch of really talented people that did all they could with something below their standards (the main script). I think what's really getting to people is the lost potential. Throughout the film I just felt like I was watching a montage of scenes from a grander, better, more complete film.

Side note: I still stand by my belief that McG will one day prove himself as a worthwhile director. I see the major issue in this flick, is that there were two McGs. There was the confident McG that blasted us through an explosion scene through an intense helicopter POV shot, damaged the film slightly to produce that silver effect, brought us that Arnie scene and put Yelchin as Reese as well as the brisk pace and general composure of everything. Then there's the insecure McG that couldn't stick to his guns and shake up the canon established by Cameron, that would compromise the film to please the fans,producers, stars, etc (although I don't know if I can blame him for that). I think with full creative control and confidence, the man could deliver something special, whether it's a Terminator film or something new, I trust the guy.

[Pop Zeus]

Had this movie on the brain recently and dug around to reread this article (and apparently expand on my previous post). I'm surprised they didn't ditch the Project Angel stuff earlier in production since it so obviously doesn't work on the page and doing so would've likely given us a third act that made some semblance of sense.

Also completely agree with Bale's forced rewrites making things generally worse. What's annoying about those rewrites (besides changing the superior ending) is that the obvious motivation to give Connor is to find Kyle Resse. Connor knows Skynet knows who Reese is. He also knows that eventually they fight in the resistance together, which means he's probably living near LA, and he knows that he has to reach him before Skynet does because if they do find him, he's dead as dirt. I can't think of a better MacGuffin than that. On a personal level, you can't get much more intimate than racing against time to save your dad. Marcus (with an assist from Connor) fills the role of Reese/T2 Arnie and Sarah as the protector. Not much else needs to change besides the shitty 3rd act.

In the final film, it really bugged me that Skynet knows who Reese is but they don't kill him immediately. Keeping him alive makes zero strategic sense. Granted, in the original script its a bigger plothole that Skynet doesn't know they've got Connor since all Terminators have facial recognition software and they're all linked into a computer network. Sigh. This isn't exactly rocket science.

There is a very tightly-plotted film scurrying around the margins of Terminator Salvation. And given that McG's action chops really stood out, this movie could've been something very memorable. Instead all he did was make a better giant kiler robot movie than Michael Bay.

If there's ever been an argument against the revealing of spoilers, its this film. Making crucial creative decisions by internet fanboy jury is a colossal mistake.