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Film Review:- 'Terminator
Genysis'
Written by Madeleine Saghir
THE latest film in the Terminator
series is in the cinema now and we popped in to take a look, at what some are
calling a fantastic film but others look very unfavourably on it. This film, as
our Editor calls it, is a "Marmite Film." You either love it or
hate it...
Terminator Genisys, is directed by Alan Taylor and stars Arnold Schwarzenegger,
back again as the Terminator, along with franchise legend are also Emilia Clarke
as a young Sera Connor, Jason Clarke as John Connor and Jai Courtney as the new
Kyle Reese.
Just before we start, it is worth noting that Emilia Clarke is British actress
and she has come to the fore since breaking through on 'Game of Thrones'
as the "The Mother of Dragons." But taking over the iconic
role of 'Sarah Connor' just shows how red hot she really is right now.
Interestingly, despite the name connection and the suggestion in the film that
Jason is related to Emilia,it isn't true in real life... Anyway back to the
film...
From the perspective of someone who grew up in
the Noughties', Terminator is not a film I had grown up with and, up to now, I
had never even watched it. I found "Terminator Genisys" was
an enjoyable film to watch and was entertaining, but after watching the others
since, this film that can't compare to the ones made before it, as too much time
is taken in explaining things that still don't seem to make that much sense.
As a person who is predominately into the documentary, true life and romantic
genre of firms, Terminator Genysis did not particularly appeal to me, due to the
Sci-Fi genre that surrounds it. Besides this, the trailer gave too much away and
involved almost every action scene which was disappointing! Yet, I found I was
pleasantly surprised and found it very entertaining to watch and I thoroughly
enjoyed it. The film will be more likable to watch if you have no set of
expectations for the film, because you are not comparing it to a timeless
classic, something that this film is not!
The film begins in a futuristic time line in
2029, after Judgment Day, where the world is in bleakness and darkness and
humanity is all but destroyed, because of the Sky Net Robots. Attempting to
overthrow the revolution is a promising John Connor (Jason Clarke) who leads a
revolution to fight back. Aware of this plot, the Sky Net Robots sends a
Terminator back to 1984 to destroy Sarah Connor, and Kyle Reese, (Jai Courtney)
is sent back to stop this. However, an older version T-800 is already there to
protect Sarah and has taught her to fight and Reese learns he has a much
different mission than to what he had expected. As the film progresses we learn
the app 'Genysis' will blow everyone up and kill them and the
events in the film aim to prevent this from happening.
The film is action packed with the most memorable scene for me was seeing Sarah
Connor (Emilia Clarke) and Reese dangling from a school bus off Golden Gate
Bridge. Again, this was not surprising to see as it had been revealed in the
trailer. Whilst this was entertaining, there is no particular action scene that
stands out for being iconic and especially incredible.
The acting in the film was moderate. Sarah Connor (Emilia Clarke) did manage to
come across as a bad ass' and as did John Connor (Jason Clarke), although they
were very much into their roles this came across too strong; you could tell on
some scenes they were acting; which is not a good thing. Emilia Clarke oversold
her character. Arnold Schwarzenegger made the film for me, and was without a
doubt the best part of the film. Schwarzenegger as Terminator played the role
extremely well and was very convincing. There were good strings of humour
saturated throughout the film, but I found this took away the dramatic and
fearsome nature of Terminator.
Overall, the film was enjoyable for a newbie to the Terminator series.
Yet, after watching Terminator Genysis I decided to watch number 1 and 2 for the
1st time and my view of the film changed by a lot. I found that Terminator
Genysis goes out of its way and tries too hard to explain events that happened
in Terminator 1 and 2 whilst it simultaneously adds a lot to the time line and
makes little connections.
The time line was confusing and in some parts just didn't make any sense. It
seemed that the 1st and 2nd Terminators were ruined regarding the time line,
whilst they remain great films and are effortlessly much better than Genysis
their meaning has been taken away by the last film. This is because the events
in the time line have been changed in the latest film. It also seemed although
too much time had been spent dragging this film out. In relation to this, I was
surprised that Sarah and John Connor were still the main focus, 3 decades later.
Surely, something else or someone else could have affected the time line and the
course of events, why did it still have to rely on them 4 films later?
It is a very hard question how to rate this film as it has too many twists and
turns to be able to rate it as one rating. So we have opted for 3 ratings to be
passed for this film...
1. Our editor's view, who remembers the original films:- "Not as dark as
the original, so it does not get under your skin. The music is not sinister and
the special effects are too cheesy and look like digital effects! In some parts
you could have been watching clips from Superman or X-Men... It has lost its
iconic, groundbreaking mojo... Why did they go for a 12a rating, as it is just
not what Terminator was about? Sorry, but when placed in the context of the
other films, this is a poor, but reasonable 2 out of 5. I was tempted to put it
down as 1, but I did kind of enjoy it as a standalone film. What a lost
opportunity!"
2. My view as a first time viewer, 4 out of 5, as I did enjoy it, but sadly it
just not that iconic and does not stand out from all the other action films as
of late!
3. In context with the others, having since seen them, 3 out of 5.
If you do go to see it, please email us your views about this film and any other
you go to see at:-
news24@southportreporter.com.
Running time:- 2h 6m
UK Film Certification:- 12a
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