The Terminator
1984 · Directed by James Cameron
Original language: English
- action
- thriller
- science fiction
The story
In the post-apocalyptic future, reigning tyrannical supercomputers teleport a cyborg assassin known as the "Terminator" back to 1984 to kill Sarah Connor, whose unborn son is destined to lead insurgents against 21st century mechanical hegemony. Meanwhile, the human-resistance movement dispatches a lone warrior to safeguard Sarah. Can he stop the virtually indestructible killing machine?
What it’s like
Night-time Los Angeles rendered in grimy, low-key 1980s grit: sodium-orange streetlight, rain-slick asphalt, the sickly green-blue of fluorescent motel corridors and police station interiors, with the future sequences drenched in ashen, smoke-choked brown and black. Cameron's camera is kinetic and handheld when the chase starts, then cuts to hard, nervous close-ups that linger on faces and machinery. The sound is a pulsing synth score that thuds beneath the action and falls away into tense near-silence, punctuated by the clank and whine of the Terminator's mechanics. The vibe is relentless, sweat-streaked dread with a rough, pulpy energy. Pacing is taut and propulsive, with few breathers, and the emotional arc follows a frightened young woman slowly hardening into a fighter under the pressure of a protector who is himself bruised and scarred. Intensity is high: frequent gunfire, explosions, brutal hand-to-hand violence, and a famously graphic, bloody final act; sexual content is brief and not central, and there is strong peril and jump-scare tension throughout. This suits people who want a lean, adrenaline-fuelled sci-fi thriller with a retro-noir look, and who are comfortable with sustained violence and dread.
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