Terminator (film)
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | Terminator |
| Original title | The Terminator |
 | |
| Country of production | United States |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 1984 |
| length | 107 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 16 |
| Rod | |
| Director | James Cameron |
| script | James Cameron, Gale Anne Hurd |
| production | Gale Anne Hurd |
| music | Brad Fiedel |
| camera | Adam Greenberg |
| cut | Mark Goldblatt |
| occupation | |
| |
| chronology | |
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Successor → |
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Terminator (Original title: The Terminator ; derived from the English verb to terminate ' to end') is a science fiction film by the director and screenwriter James Cameron from 1984 . In it, Arnold Schwarzenegger embodies an android (referred to as a cyborg in the film ), the Terminator , from the future, whose mission is to kill Sarah Connor in the present (to "terminate"). The unexpectedly very successful auteur film is the first of a series of six feature films and a television series to date.
The B-movie , which was shot on a relatively modest budget , developed into one of the most influential science fiction films of the 1980s and a cult film . At the same time, the film lastingly increased the popularity of Schwarzenegger, who was still at the beginning of his acting career. Despite a very small amount of text, his sentence "I'll be back" was voted 37th in a list of the 100 most famous film quotes by the American Film Institute .
The film opened in cinemas in the United States on October 26, 1984, and premiered in Germany on March 11, 1985.
action
The Future - Backstory (2029)
In 2029, the earth will be devastated and most of humanity will be wiped out as a result of a nuclear war that culminated in a nuclear holocaust . Intelligent machine-beings developed by humans began the war against their creators as war machines, when they suspected that they were a threat to their own existence. The survivors of the war have the choice of serving the machines as work slaves or joining the resistance of the people, the Resistance. When the human resistance under the leadership of John Connor is on the verge of a decisive victory over the central machine authority Skynet in 2029, the machines send a terminator to 1984. This android - a machine encased in living human tissue to infiltrate people inconspicuously - is set on Sarah Connor, the mother of John Connor, to kill her before she can give birth to John, who will lead the resistance of the people against the machines in the future.
By conquering the time machine (which can only be used by living tissue without equipment), the Resistance can send the soldier Kyle Reese back in time to protect Sarah. The Terminator and Reese arrive at various locations in Los Angeles in 1984. Due to the destruction of the time machine in 2029, both are left on their own and begin the search for Sarah Connor.
The Present - Los Angeles (1984)
The Terminator, who traveled naked by a time machine in 1984, procures clothes, a vehicle and weapons by attacking three punks and killing an arms dealer. In the phone book he finds three people with the name Sarah Connor and begins to systematically seek them out and kill them. The now armed Kyle Reese also goes in search of Sarah, but unlike the Terminator, knows her appearance from a photo that John Connor gave him in the future before he left.
Sarah Connor lives with her friend Ginger in a shared apartment. While at work, she learns from television about two murders of her namesake and believes she is in danger. Kyle Reese, who has already found Sarah, follows her and is mistaken for the killer. She takes refuge in the “Tech-Noir” nightclub and tries to contact her friend Ginger. Meanwhile, the Terminator reaches Sarah's apartment and kills Ginger and her friend Matt. Sarah leaves a message on the answering machine stating her whereabouts and the request to pick her up there. The Terminator overhears this and sets off.
There is a shootout between the Terminator and Kyle Reese at the nightclub. The Terminator can only be temporarily put out of action by the weapons of 1984. Sarah and Kyle narrowly escape him, and after a car chase, Kyle is arrested by the police. During the interrogation at the police station, the terminator attacks the police station and massacres the police officers. Sarah and Kyle can escape again with difficulty and rent a motel. The terminator withdraws, damaged on the surface. Kyle Reese organizes ingredients to make explosives, and the two of them can rest for a while. The Terminator has since repaired itself enough that it can be used again in public. Sarah calls her mother, but the Terminator foresaw this and murdered Sarah's mother. On the phone he imitates her voice and learns Sarah's whereabouts.
Sarah and Kyle get closer in the next few hours at the motel and father Sarah's son John Connor. Then the terminator arrives. A car chase ensues, in which the Terminator chases his victims first on a motorcycle and then on a truck. Kyle manages to detonate the tanker truck with a self-made pipe bomb. The Terminator appears destroyed, but its metal skeleton rises only slightly damaged from the burning wreckage and continues to pursue Sarah and Kyle, who flee to a factory. Kyle is able to stop the Terminator with another pipe bomb, but is killed in the process. The terminator is torn in two by the explosion; the still intact upper body pursues Sarah until she finally succeeds in almost completely destroying the terminator in a hydraulic press. (The Special Edition explains that the company is Cyberdyne Systems , which will later develop the Skynet computer program. The incident is covered up and the chip found in the terminator's head will serve as the basis for Skynet.)
A few months later, Sarah, who is now visibly pregnant, travels to Mexico, where she wants to evade the impending nuclear war and raise her son John. A little boy takes a photo of her - the one that John Connor will hold in his hands 45 years later. The film ends with a conversation between a Mexican gas station attendant and Sarah:
"Sarah: What did he say now?
Gas station attendant: That big storm will come!
Sarah: I know! "
Then Sarah drives her Jeep Renegade down the street into an approaching thunderstorm.
main characters
Terminator
The android known as Terminator is portrayed by former bodybuilder Arnold Schwarzenegger. The Terminator materializes in the Griffith Observatory parking lot in Los Angeles. The naked and unusually muscular figure slowly rises from a crouch. Her face exudes determination and hardness. She walks slowly and looks down into the city, sparkling at night. Taciturn and with great brutality she procures clothes from loitering punks .
In contrast to many other " bad guys ", the Terminator always acts very rationally and quickly. He does not waste time with unnecessary threats or explanations and uses all means available to him to achieve his goal. Compassion , remorse or even fear are alien to him. His superiority over humans is mainly condensed in the apparent indestructibility of his body: Shots at him are intercepted by his metal skeleton. Its organic outer skin is only gradually damaged in combat. When the Terminator runs through a burning obstacle, the ends of his hair and eyebrows burn off. As a result, his mask-like nature emerges clearly. His physical effort hardly seems to suffer. When Kyle Reese escapes with Sarah Connor, he jumps onto the hood of the moving car, holds on to the body and smashes through the windshield with his fist to pull Sarah out to him.
It was only after a devastating chase in which he crashed his car against a wall that he was so badly damaged that parts of his outer skin were destroyed. He retires to a hotel room, repairs his damaged mechanical wrist and removes his damaged organic eye, which reveals his glowing red electromechanical eye. In order to continue to be active in public, he hides his partially dehumanized face behind black sunglasses. Even the explosion of a tanker truck cannot stop the terminator. Completely freed from its human skin, the Terminator, consisting only of a metal skeleton, continues to fight; it cannot be stopped until Sarah uses a press to destroy his main unit in his head.
Sarah Connor
Sarah Connor, portrayed by Linda Hamilton , is a young woman whose average stressed life makes it difficult to guess what situation she will get into. Nevertheless, the intelligent woman quickly reveals a certain acumen when she learns of the strange series of murders of people with the same name. She goes to a disco and decides to call the police. The latter reassures her that she is in a public place safe and wants to send a patrol car. Sarah meets the Terminator in the nightclub for the first time and can hardly believe that a few seconds after he has been hit by a weapon several times, he gets up and starts chasing again. At first she is reluctant to let Kyle Reese explain her, but instinctively follows him. Her lack of understanding gives way relatively quickly, and in return she finds trust in Reese, with whom she fights the machine threat in ever-increasing engagement.
Sarah Connor is regarded as the prototype of the female film hero, who from this film on is increasingly portrayed with strong physical effort. A few years earlier Sigourney Weaver embodied a similarly vigorous and determined female role as Ellen Ripley in Alien , but the figure of Sarah Connor in particular has become iconic in the consciousness.
Kyle Reese
Kyle Reese is a tech sergeant in the Resistance and a seasoned war veteran. He has the important role of protecting Sarah Connor, whom he only knows from an old photo, from the Terminator in the past. When he arrives in 1984 and follows her, she initially perceives him as a criminal stalker, but over time learns his motives, finally believes him and falls in love with him. As it turns out later, because of his love night with Sarah, he is finally the father of John, the leader of the Resistance.
background
script
Cameron said he had a dream about a flaming robot skeleton during the production of Piranha 2 - Flying Killer in 1981. Together with his friends William Wisher Jr. and Randall Frakes , he developed the first draft of the script. Cameron later sold it to producer Gale Anne Hurd for $ 1 on condition that he was allowed to direct it. Cameron and Hurd continued to refine the script and received sole writing credits .
Author Harlan Ellison took Cameron to court after the release of Terminator because he saw copyright infringement in similarities to his scripts Soldier and Demon with a Glass Hand , which were filmed in the 1964 US television series The Outer Limits . Later Terminator releases include a credit reference to Ellison's work. The plot of the film is also similar to that of Franklin Adreon's 1966 B-movie Cyborg 2087 .
According to producer and co-screenwriter Gale Anne Hurd, the makers of Terminator originally had guidelines for the end of the film. After that, Terminator should end with a hug between characters Kyle Reese and Sarah Connor. In the end, however, Hurd and director Cameron succeeded in enforcing their vision.
Filming
The film, which was produced at a comparatively low cost of 6.4 million dollars, was the greatest success to date for Arnold Schwarzenegger, who speaks only 17 sentences with a total of around 70 words in the entire film. The originally scheduled for spring 1983 production start should take place in Toronto , but was delayed because of the filming of Conan the Destroyer , so that filming only began in March 1984 in Los Angeles. Most of the film scenes were shot in and around the Los Angeles metropolitan area. The scenes of the showdown at the factory were filmed in the City of Industry east of the city; the final scene at the Sun Valley gas station was filmed north of Los Angeles. Filming lasted until May 1984.
Age ratings and cuts
The original version of the film was originally rated from 18 years of age and was indexed on October 31, 1985 by the Federal Testing Office for Media Harmful to Young People; in August 2010 it was removed from the index. It was then re-examined by the Voluntary Self-Control of the Film Industry (FSK) and received an age rating of 16 years and over on September 27, 2010, which protects it from being indexed again.
Due to the indexing of the original version, only cut versions were allowed to be shown on German free TV until 2010. These versions were approved for ages 16 or over, depending on the extent of the cuts. It was first broadcast on German television on April 19, 1992 on RTLplus . This version still corresponded to the slightly shortened FSK-18 video version at that time, all other broadcasts on German television were then more heavily shortened until the re-examination.
The old German DVD, released for ages 16 and over, was shortened by around five minutes compared to the original version.
Distant scenes
Some scenes were removed from the later version of the film, which give indications of the plot going beyond the end of the film. Sarah Connor already considers the destruction of the Cyberdyne company, which will later develop Skynet, and discusses this possibility with Kyle Reese. However, he insists that this is not his mission, although Sarah has already researched the address of the company from the telephone book. Sarah will have already tried to put her plan into action in Terminator 2 - Judgment Day and will follow suit. Two scenes also point out how Cyberdyne Systems Corporation obtained the knowledge to develop Skynet. When the injured Sarah is being transported away, the writing Cyberdyne can be read on the company logo of the factory building, in which two employees discover a computer chip from the main unit of the terminator in another scene.
Sequels
Two sequels followed in 1991 and 2003, which were shot with considerably more effort: Terminator 2 - Day of Reckoning (costs approx. 100 million US dollars), also shot by James Cameron, and Terminator 3 - Rebellion of the Machines (costs approx. $ 170 million) directed by Jonathan Mostow . The Terminator played by Schwarzenegger becomes a protector in the two sequels. In Terminator 2 he is responsible for protecting John Connors. In Terminator 3 , this protection applies primarily to Kate Brewster and only secondarily to John Connor. He has to deal with more and more advanced Terminator models (T-1000 and TX).
In 2008 and 2009 US television ran the series The Sarah Connor Chronicles , which tells the story of Sarah and John Connor after Terminator 2 - Day of Judgment in a different timeline, in which John Connor sends another Terminator back through time to save his mother from death in Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines . 2009 also came with Terminator: The Redemption, the fourth feature film, to which the computer-animated, six-part spin-off web series Terminator Salvation: The Machinima Series followed in the same year . In 2015 the movie Terminator: Genisys was released .
At the end of October 2019, a sixth part of the Terminator series was released in theaters. This sixth film acts as a continuation of the second part Terminator 2 - Reckoning Day . Terminator 3 - Rise of the Machines , Terminator: Redemption and Terminator: Genisys are thus ignored.
| year | title | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1984 | 1 | Terminator | Motion picture |
| 1991 | 2 | Terminator 2 - Day of Reckoning | Motion picture |
| 2003 | 3 | Terminator 3 - Rise of the Machines | Motion picture |
| 2008 | Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles | Television series | |
| 2009 | 4th | Terminator: Salvation | Motion picture |
| 2009 | Terminator Salvation: The Machinima Series | Computer animated web series | |
| 2015 | 5 | Terminator: Genisys | Motion picture |
| 2019 | 6th | Terminator: Dark Fate | Motion picture |
Reviews
The film received mostly positive reviews. The film review portal Rotten Tomatoes gives the film 100% positive out of 63 evaluated reviews and it has a Metascore of 85 out of 100 on Metacritic .
"An original, well-crafted and oppressively intense action film with a martial tone, which of course celebrates violence all too uncompromisingly."
"A milestone in the action genre."
“Above all structurally, 'Terminator' is an action film like no other in that it reduces the genre to its essence. That doesn't mean: just fights, shootings or car hunts. Rather: This film is like the Terminator itself, it rolls on inexorably. The necessary background information is provided in between, sometimes in the middle of a chase, such as in an underground parking duel. The result is an action film that tells a fascinating story and also puts a lot of pressure on the accelerator. "
Awards
- Best science fiction film
- Best Screenplay : James Cameron and Gale Anne Hurd
- Best make-up : Stan Winston
- further nominations:
- Best Director : James Cameron
- Best Actor : Arnold Schwarzenegger
- Best Actress : Linda Hamilton
- Best music : Brad Fiedel
- 2008 admission to the National Film Registry
Others
- The basic theme of the film is referred to in the literature as the grandfather's paradox .
- The short story Second Variety by Philip K. Dick describes a world in which fighting machines similarly evolve undesirably by humans and eventually become murderous androids.
- Originally, Lance Henriksen was slated for the role of Terminator, and Arnold Schwarzenegger would play Kyle Reese. When Schwarzenegger and Cameron agreed that Schwarzenegger would be the better Terminator, Henriksen got the supporting role as Detective Vukovich. Other candidates for the title role were O. J. Simpson and Jürgen Prochnow . According to Cinema, Magnum actor Tom Selleck was also intended as a fighting machine from the future.
- The soundtrack for the film was released in May 1994 under the title The Terminator (The Definite Edition) and was written by Brad Fiedel . Its Terminator theme, which is very well known by soundtrack fans, was taken up again in the fourth part of the series by composer Danny Elfman and re-orchestrated so that it sounds more epic. Sometimes it is also played as a guitar solo. Three songs sung by Tané McClure ( You Can't Do That , Burnin 'in the Third Degree and Photoplay ) are from the band Tahnee Cain & Tryanglz.
- The Terminator is referred to as a cyborg in the film by Reese. Strictly speaking, this is not correct. A cyborg is a form of life that has been expanded by technical means. The terminator is an android. In the second film, he correctly describes himself as a cybernetic organism, consisting of human tissue over a metallic endoskeleton . Only in the fourth part of the film series is a real cyborg portrayed in the person of Marcus Wright.
- In 1990, Terminator II was a supposedly unauthorized sequel by director Bruno Mattei . The film was released under the title "Shocking Dark" due to licensing problems in the USA. In Germany it appeared under the title Contaminator . The story of Contaminator is more of a plagiarism of Cameron's Aliens - The Return , in which elements from Terminator were inserted.
synchronization
The dubbing was done by Hermes Synchron based on a dialogue book and the dialogue direction by Ronald Nitschke , who also has a speaking role in the film.
| role | actor | Voice actor |
|---|---|---|
| Terminator T-800 | Arnold Schwarzenegger | Thomas Danneberg |
| Sarah Connor | Linda Hamilton | Joseline Gassen |
| Kyle Reese | Michael Biehn | Ulrich Gressieker |
| Lieutenant Ed Traxler | Paul Winfield | Helmut Krauss |
| Detective Vukovich | Lance Henriksen | Engelbert von Nordhausen |
| Ginger Ventura | Bess Motta | Traudel Haas |
| Dr. Peter Silberman | Earl Boen | Friedrich W. Building School |
| Matt Buchanan | Rick Rossovich | Ronald Nitschke |
| Arms seller | Dick Miller | Hans Nitschke |
| Punk # 1 | Bill Paxton | Nicolas Boell |
| Punk # 2 | Brian Thompson | Tobias Master |
| Nancy | Shawn Schepps | Bettina Spier |
literature
- Randall Frakes , Bill Wisher : The Terminator. A novel. Spectra, 1985, ISBN 978-0-553-25317-7 .
- Ulrich Bähr: The determiner. Nun and enlightener, machine and human, B-movie and blockbuster - the transformations of a film material . In: Eckhard Pabst (Ed.): Myths - Mothers - Machines. The universe of James Cameron . Verlag Ludwig, Kiel 2005, ISBN 3-933598-71-0 (pages 44-70).
- Thomas Bohrmann: Ethics - Advertising - Media Violence. Advertising related to violence on television. A socio-ethical program. Reinhard Fischer, Munich 1997, ISBN 3-88927-211-8 . Pp. 136-153 (Terminator Film Analysis), pp. 265-266 (Terminator Table of Contents), pp. 266-270 (Terminator Sequence Listing).
- Karl-Heinz Borns: Terminator. In: Theo Piegler (Ed.): “I see something that you don't see” - Psychoanalytical film interpretations. Psychosozial-Verlag, Giessen 2010, ISBN 978-3-8379-2034-5 . Pp. 81-92
- Richard Brown, Kevin S. Decker (Eds.): Terminator and Philosophy. I'll be back, therefore I am. John Wiley & Sons, New Jersey 2009
- Sean French: The Terminator. BFI Publishing 1996, ISBN 978-0-85170-553-8 .
- Theo Ligthart : Terminator ...: about the end as the beginning . Passagen Verlag, Vienna 2003, ISBN 3-85165-607-5 .
- Eckhard Pabst: The best of all possible worlds. James Cameron's "The Terminator" and "Terminator 2: Judgment Day". In: Ingo Irsigler, Gerrit Lemke, Willem Strank (eds.): Action! Classics of popular cinema. Bertz + Fischer, Berlin 2014, pp. 60–79
Web links
- Terminator in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Terminator at rotten tomatoes (English)
- Terminator at Metacritic (English)
- Terminator in the online film database
- Viewing the film on film music world
- Overview of the cut versions on schnittberichte.com
- Terminator - headfirst into bankruptcy at TV Spielfilm
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Certificate of Release for Terminator . Voluntary self-regulation of the film industry , September 2010 (PDF; test number: 55 315 V).
- ^ French: The Terminator. Page 76
- ↑ AFI's 100 Years… 100 Movie Quotes
- ^ A b Dana Goodyear: Man of Extremes: The Return of James Cameron . In: newyorker.com of October 26, 2009
- ↑ Completely turned inside out: Terminator was supposed to end this harmlessly . In: moviepilot.de . October 23, 2018 ( moviepilot.de [accessed October 24, 2018]).
- ↑ Blade41: Terminator is removed from the index. (No longer available online.) In: schnittberichte.com . August 30, 2010, archived from the original on August 30, 2010 ; Retrieved August 30, 2010 .
- ↑ OFDb.de: Terminator version view
- ↑ Arnie released from hospital: "Terminator" postponed to 2019. Retrieved April 13, 2018 .
- ↑ Terminator at Rotten Tomatoes (English)
- ↑ Terminator at Metacritic (English)
- ↑ Terminator. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film Service , accessed December 8, 2009 .
- ↑ TERMINATOR. In: Cinema . Retrieved November 3, 2009 .
- ↑ Simon Staake: Terminator & Terminator 2: Day of Reckoning. In: www.filmszene.de . Retrieved November 3, 2009 .
- ↑ Cinema : Background Article Full of Role: Hollywood's Casting Carousel. Edition 02/11, p. 80.
- ↑ Information on international titles of the unauthorized sequel on imdb.com
- ↑ TRASH TUBE: Contaminator // The murder machine from the future // Terminator 2 // Aliens Ripoff. October 8, 2014, accessed January 4, 2017 .
- ↑ German synchronous index: German synchronous index | Movies | Terminator. Retrieved July 13, 2015 .