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James Cameron Director | previously directed Piranha II: The Spawning |  |
The Terminator is a Sci-fi action film directed by James Cameron and starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. A Terminator is sent back in time to kill Sarah Connor, mother of John Connor, so that her son can never be born and rebel against the robotic rule of the future.
Trivia:
Lance Hendrickson was James Cameron's first choice to play The Terminator. The original concept was for a machine that could easily blend into a crowd of people and not draw attention to itself. The idea changed drastically when cameron met Arnold Schwartzenegger for the first time.
14 More Trivia |
Harlan Ellison | The Outer Limits teleplays "Soldier" and "Demon with a Glass Hand") originally uncredited |
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James Cameron | |
| Gale Anne Hurd | ||
| William Wisher Jr. |
Overview
The Terminator is a Sci-fi action film directed by James Cameron and starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. The film takes place in two time periods, the first is 1984 and the second is the apocalyptic future of 2029. James Cameron directed the film which was produced by Hemdale Film Corporation and distributed by Orion Pictures, and filmed in Los Angeles. The film went on to spawn 3 sequels so far and a television series, as well as serving as the big breaks for both Cameron and Schwarzenegger.
Creation
The initial idea for the film came to James Cameron one night while he was in Rome promoting Piranha 2. He dreamt of a metallic torso dragging itself from an explosion bearing kitchen knives. Upon returning to the US, he set about writing the a draft for the film, he turned to his friend Bill Wisher to help with turning the draft into a script and the two communicated ideas by recoding telephone conversations of what the other had written. Cameron's agent did not like the script and told him to work on something different so Cameron fired him and continued working on the film. Orion Pictures agreed to distribute the film if they found financial backing elsewhere. Cameron presented the script to John Daly at Hemdale Pictures ands had Lance Henriksen arrive at the meeting first as the Terminator complete with gold foil covering his teeth. Daly was impressed by the script and the passions for the project and agreed to finance the film with a budget of $4 million which was later changed to $6.5 million.
Plot Summary
The Future
The machines rose from the ashes of the nuclear fire.
Their war to exterminate mankind had raged for decades,
but the final battle would not be fought in the future.
It would be fought here, in our present.
Tonight...
Los Angeles 1984
Terminator needs clothes
Terminator at work
The Terminator finds Sarah
Surgery complete
It will not stop
Storm is coming
Production
The first job Cameron had to do on the production was to cast the role of Kyle Reese. At first Orion Pictures want a rising star with appeal overseas and wanted Cameron to meet with Schwarzenegger to be considered for the role. Cameron did not want Arnold for the role and had planned to have an argument with him at the meeting so as to say he could not work with him, as he believed that if Arnold played Kyle then he would need somebody bigger for the Terminator. The studio suggested O J Simpson for the role but Cameron said he could not see him as a killer. When he met Arnold he began to sketch him and left the meeting having decided that he would play a very good Terminator. Schwarzenegger was not pleased about this and said in an interview while on the set of Conan when asked about The Terminator "Oh some shit movie I'm doing, take a couple weeks." The role of Kyle eventually went to Michael Biehn as of all the people who read for the role he was the only one that could believably develop a human connection to Sarah.
The production was supposed to begin in early 1983 but was called off when Dino De Laurentiis optioned Schwarzenegger for the sequel to Conan, Conan The Destroyer, which put the shoot back by 9 months. During this time Cameron continued refining the script, was asked to write a sequel to First Blood and set up a meeting with producers David Giler and Walter Hill to discuss an Alien sequel.
In March 1984, the film began production in Los Angeles. Most of The Terminator's action sequences were filmed at night, this meant that the production was working to strict deadlines where shots needed to be completed before the sun rose. A week before filming started. The schedule was again changed when Linda Hamilton sprained her ankle at the beginning of the shoot, leading to the scenes in which Hamilton needed to run occurred as late as the filming schedule allowed. Hamilton's ankle was taped every day and she spent most of the film production in pain.
Critical Reception
The film was released on October 26, 1984. At first Orion Pictures did not have faith in the film and refused to screen it for critics, but after constant lobbying from the stars agents they agreed to one press screening. The film went straight to No.1 at the box office and remained there fro two weeks. By the end of it's theatrical run the film had finally taken a total of $78 million worldwide. It is currently holding Rotten Tomatoes rating of 100%, a metacritic score of 84, and is in the IMDB Top 250 films of all time.
The Terminator has received recognition from the American Film Institute. The film ranked 42nd on AFI's 100 Years... 100 Thrills, a list of America's most heart-pounding films. The character of the Terminator was selected as the 22nd greatest movie villain on AFI's 100 Years... 100 Heroes and Villains. Arnold's catch phrase "I'll be back" was voted the 37th greatest movie quote by the AFI. In 2005, Total Film named The Terminator the 72nd best film ever made. In 2008, Empire magazine selected The Terminator as one of The 500 Greatest Movies of All Time. Empire also placed the T-800 14th on their list of The 100 Greatest Movie Characters. In 2008, The Terminator was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry.
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B+ -
100 -
84 -
3.9 -
8.1
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Box Office
Domestic $38,371,200 Foreign +$40,000,000 - = total worldwide gross $78,371,200
- - a reported budget of $6,500,000
- = a 1,105.7% net profit of $71,871,200
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In today's dollars
Domestic $38,371,200 Foreign +40,000,000 - = total worldwide gross $78,371,200
- - a reported budget of $6,500,000
- = a 1,105.7% net profit of $71,871,200
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