''Terminator Salvation'' is a 2009 American
military science fiction
Military science fiction is a subgenre of science fiction that features the use of science fiction technology, mainly weapons, for military purposes and usually principal characters who are members of a military organization involved in military a ...
action film
Action film is a film genre in which the protagonist is thrust into a series of events that typically involve violence and physical feats. The genre tends to feature a mostly resourceful hero struggling against incredible odds, which include life ...
directed by
McG
The Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG), also known locally as "The 'G", is an Australian sports stadium located in Yarra Park, Melbourne, Victoria. Founded and managed by the Melbourne Cricket Club, it is the largest stadium in the Southern Hem ...
and written by
John Brancato and Michael Ferris
John Brancato and Michael Ferris are an American screenwriting duo, whose notable works include '' The Game'', '' Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines'', ''Terminator Salvation'', '' Surrogates'' and ''The Hunter's Prayer''. Brancato and Ferris me ...
. It is the fourth installment of the
''Terminator'' franchise and serves as a sequel to ''
Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines'' (2003). This is the first and only Terminator film to date not to feature
Arnold Schwarzenegger
Arnold Alois Schwarzenegger (born July 30, 1947) is an Austrian and American actor, film producer, businessman, retired professional bodybuilder and politician who served as the 38th governor of California between 2003 and 2011. ''Time'' ...
, though his likeness briefly appears digitally. Instead, it stars
Christian Bale
Christian Charles Philip Bale (born 30 January 1974) is an English actor. Known for his versatility and physical transformations for his roles, he has been a leading man in films of several genres. He has received various accolades, including ...
and
Sam Worthington
Samuel Henry John Worthington (born 2 August 1976) is an Australian actor. He is best known for playing Jake Sully in ''Avatar'' and its sequel, ''Avatar: The Way of Water''; Marcus Wright in ''Terminator Salvation'', and Perseus in '' Clash o ...
with
Anton Yelchin,
Moon Bloodgood
Korinna Moon Bloodgood (born September 20, 1975) is an American actress and model, known for her role as Lt. Blair Williams in the 2009 film ''Terminator Salvation'' and as Anne Glass in the TNT television series '' Falling Skies''.
Early life
...
,
Bryce Dallas Howard
Bryce Dallas Howard (born March 2, 1981) is an American actress and director. Howard was born in Los Angeles and attended New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, initially leaving in 2002 to take roles on Broadway but officially graduati ...
,
Common
Common may refer to:
Places
* Common, a townland in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland
* Boston Common, a central public park in Boston, Massachusetts
* Cambridge Common, common land area in Cambridge, Massachusetts
* Clapham Common, originally com ...
,
Michael Ironside
Frederick Reginald Ironside (born February 12, 1950), known as Michael Ironside, is a Canadian actor, producer, director, and screenwriter. He is known for playing villains and "tough guy" heroes, and has also portrayed sympathetic characters.
E ...
and
Helena Bonham Carter
Helena Bonham Carter (born 26 May 1966) is an English actress. Known for her roles in blockbusters and independent films, particularly period dramas, she has received various awards and nominations, including a British Academy Film Award a ...
in supporting roles. In a departure from the previous installments, ''Salvation'' is a
post-apocalyptic
Apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction is a subgenre of speculative fiction in which the Earth's (or another planet's) civilization is collapsing or has collapsed. The apocalypse event may be climatic, such as runaway climate change; ast ...
film set in the year 2018. It focuses on the war between
Skynet's machine network and humanity, as the remnants of the world's militaries have united to form the Resistance to fight against Skynet. Bale portrays
John Connor
John Connor is a fictional Character (arts), character in the Terminator (franchise), ''Terminator'' franchise. Created by screenwriter, writer and film director, director James Cameron, the character is first referred to in the 1984 film ''The T ...
, a Resistance fighter and central character, while Worthington portrays
cyborg
A cyborg ()—a portmanteau of ''cybernetic'' and ''organism''—is a being with both organic and biomechatronic body parts. The term was coined in 1960 by Manfred Clynes and Nathan S. Kline. Marcus Wright. Yelchin plays a young
Kyle Reese
Kyle Reese is a fictional character in the ''Terminator'' franchise, who serves as the protagonist of the first film with a supporting role in other works. The character is portrayed by Michael Biehn in '' The Terminator'' (1984) and '' Termi ...
, a character first introduced in ''
The Terminator
''The Terminator'' is a 1984 American science fiction action film directed by James Cameron. It stars Arnold Schwarzenegger as the Terminator, a cyborg assassin sent back in time from 2029 to 1984 to kill Sarah Connor (Linda Hamilton), whos ...
'', and the film depicts the origins of the
T-800 Terminator.
After troubled pre-production, with
The Halcyon Company
The Halcyon Company was an American media development company headed by Victor Kubicek and Derek Anderson. They were perhaps best known for acquiring the global rights to the ''Terminator'' franchise in 2007 and for producing ''Terminator Salvat ...
acquiring the rights from
Andrew G. Vajna
Andrew G. Vajna (born András György Vajna; 1 August 1944 – 20 January 2019) was a Hungarian film producer whose films include the first three entries in the ''Rambo'' series, '' Total Recall'', '' Tombstone'', ''Die Hard with a Vengeance' ...
and
Mario Kassar
Mario F. Kassar ( ar, ماريو قصار; born October 10, 1951) is a Lebanese film producer and industry executive who produced the first three films of the ''Rambo'' series, '' Terminator 2: Judgment Day'', '' Total Recall'', ''The Doors, Ange ...
, and several writers working on the screenplay, filming began in May 2008 in
New Mexico
)
, population_demonym = New Mexican ( es, Neomexicano, Neomejicano, Nuevo Mexicano)
, seat = Santa Fe
, LargestCity = Albuquerque
, LargestMetro = Tiguex
, OfficialLang = None
, Languages = English, Spanish ( New Mexican), Navajo, Ker ...
, and ran for 77 days. ''Terminator Salvation'' was released on May 21, 2009, by
Warner Bros. Pictures
Warner Bros. Pictures is an American film production and distribution company of the Warner Bros. Pictures Group division of Warner Bros. Entertainment (both ultimately owned by Warner Bros. Discovery). The studio is the flagship producer of ...
in North America and by
Sony Pictures Releasing
Sony Pictures Entertainment Motion Picture Group (commonly known as Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group, formerly known as the Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group until 2013, and abbreviated as SPMPG) is a division of Sony Pictures Entertainme ...
internationally, and grossed over $371 million worldwide and received mixed reviews.
''Salvation'' was intended to be the first installment of a second ''Terminator'' trilogy, but these plans were canceled following The Halcyon Company filing for bankruptcy after the film came out. The franchise rights were sold in 2012 to
Annapurna Pictures
Annapurna Pictures is an independent American media company founded by Megan Ellison in 2011, that specializes in film production, live theatre production, television through its Annapurna Television division, and video game publishing through i ...
, resulting in ''
Terminator Genisys
''Terminator Genisys'' is a 2015 American science fiction action film directed by Alan Taylor and written by Laeta Kalogridis and Patrick Lussier. Produced by Skydance Productions and distributed by Paramount Pictures, the film is a reboot o ...
'' (a reboot of the series) being released in 2015 with Schwarzenegger returning.
Plot
In 2003, Dr. Serena Kogan of
Cyberdyne Systems Cyberdyne may refer to:
* Cyberdyne Inc., a Japanese company which sells a powered exoskeleton called HAL 5 (Hybrid Assistive Limb)
*Cyberdyne (Cyber Dynamics Systems Corporation), a fictional corporation that created the Skynet system in the ''Ter ...
convinces death row inmate Marcus Wright to sign over his body for medical research following his execution.
Sometime later, the automated
Skynet system is activated and becomes self-aware; perceiving humans as a threat to its existence, it starts a
nuclear holocaust
A nuclear holocaust, also known as a nuclear apocalypse, nuclear Armageddon, or atomic holocaust, is a theoretical scenario where the mass detonation of nuclear weapons causes globally widespread destruction and radioactive fallout. Such a scenar ...
to eradicate them in the event known as "Judgment Day".
In 2018,
John Connor
John Connor is a fictional Character (arts), character in the Terminator (franchise), ''Terminator'' franchise. Created by screenwriter, writer and film director, director James Cameron, the character is first referred to in the 1984 film ''The T ...
orchestrates an attack on a Skynet base, where he discovers prisoners and schematics in a laboratory for incorporating living tissue into a new type of
Terminator
Terminator may refer to:
Science and technology
Genetics
* Terminator (genetics), the end of a gene for transcription
* Terminator technology, proposed methods for restricting the use of genetically modified plants by causing second generation s ...
, which he recognizes as the
T-800 T8 or T-8 may refer to the following:
Measurement
* T8, a Torx screwhead size
* T8, a 1 inch fluorescent lamp size
* A tornado intensity rating on the TORRO scale
Biology
* The 8th thoracic vertebra
* The T8 spinal nerve
Transportation
* Trikk ...
model. John survives an explosion on the base, which is destroyed. Following John's departure, Marcus emerges from the base's wreckage and begins walking toward
Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...
.
John returns to the Resistance headquarters located aboard a nuclear submarine and is briefed by General Ashdown that the Resistance has discovered a hidden signal containing a code protocol that they believe can initiate a shutdown of Skynet's machines. The Resistance plans to launch an offensive against Skynet's headquarters in
San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...
. It is decided among the Resistance that the offensive will commence in four days, due to an intercepted kill list created by Skynet, which plans to kill the Resistance's leaders within the same time frame. John learns he is second on this list, following
Kyle Reese
Kyle Reese is a fictional character in the ''Terminator'' franchise, who serves as the protagonist of the first film with a supporting role in other works. The character is portrayed by Michael Biehn in '' The Terminator'' (1984) and '' Termi ...
. The Resistance leaders do not understand Kyle's importance, but John knows that Kyle will eventually
travel back in time and become his father and realizes that Skynet has learned this.
Arriving at the ruins of Los Angeles, Marcus encounters Kyle and a mute child named Star during a skirmish with Skynet's machines. Kyle and Star are subsequently abducted and taken prisoner by Skynet. Two Resistance
A-10
The Fairchild Republic A-10 Thunderbolt II is a single-seat, twin-turbofan, straight-wing, subsonic attack aircraft developed by Fairchild Republic for the United States Air Force (USAF). In service since 1976, it is named for the Republi ...
airplanes are shot down while trying to intercept a machine transport. Marcus locates downed pilot Blair Williams, and they make their way to John's base, where Marcus is wounded by a magnetic land mine. Attempting to save his life, the Resistance fighters discover that Marcus is a
cyborg
A cyborg ()—a portmanteau of ''cybernetic'' and ''organism''—is a being with both organic and biomechatronic body parts. The term was coined in 1960 by Manfred Clynes and Nathan S. Kline. , with a cybernetic
endoskeleton
An endoskeleton (From Greek ἔνδον, éndon = "within", "inner" + σκελετός, skeletos = "skeleton") is an internal support structure of an animal, composed of mineralized tissue.
Overview
An endoskeleton is a skeleton that is on the ...
and a partially artificial
cerebral cortex
The cerebral cortex, also known as the cerebral mantle, is the outer layer of neural tissue of the cerebrum of the brain in humans and other mammals. The cerebral cortex mostly consists of the six-layered neocortex, with just 10% consisting of ...
. Although Marcus insists that he is human, John and his wife Kate suspect that Marcus has been sent to execute them, and John orders him to be killed. Blair helps Marcus escape. During the pursuit, Marcus saves John's life from Skynet's hydrobots and the two make a bargain: Marcus will enter Skynet's headquarters in San Francisco to help John rescue Kyle and the other prisoners if he lets him live.
John pleads with General Ashdown to delay the offensive so he can formulate a plan to extract the human captives, but Ashdown refuses and relieves John of his command. However, the Resistance disobeys Ashdown's orders and instead awaits John's signal. Marcus enters the base, interfaces with the computer, and disables
perimeter defense All-around defense or perimeter defense is a type of defensive fighting position intended to give military units the ability to repel attacks from any direction.
The positioning of the outer defensive fighting positions of a unit, is circular or ...
s so that John can release the prisoners. Marcus learns from Skynet (which assumes the form of Dr. Kogan on a screen) that he was resurrected by it to lure John to the base; when the Resistance launches its attack, John will be killed, achieving Skynet's goal. The hidden signal that the Resistance received earlier is revealed to be a ruse, and Skynet uses it to track down and destroy the Resistance command submarine.
Refusing to accept his fate, Marcus tears out the hardware linking him to Skynet and leaves to aid John. John locates Kyle and Star, but they are ambushed by a T-800 Terminator. As Kyle and Star escape, Marcus appears and fights the T-800 while John rigs together nuclear fuel cells to destroy the facility. Marcus is soon outclassed in strength and temporarily disabled until John comes to his aid, after which John is stabbed through the chest by the T-800 from behind. Marcus destroys the T-800 by tearing its head off and he, John, Kyle, and Star are airlifted out. John detonates the explosives, destroying a stockpile of Skynet's weapons, including the T-800s, with the base.
At a field hospital, John's injury is deemed terminal, so Marcus offers his heart for
transplantation, sacrificing himself to save John. As he recovers, John radios to other Resistance fighters that, although this battle has been won, the war continues.
Cast
*
Christian Bale
Christian Charles Philip Bale (born 30 January 1974) is an English actor. Known for his versatility and physical transformations for his roles, he has been a leading man in films of several genres. He has received various accolades, including ...
as
John Connor
John Connor is a fictional Character (arts), character in the Terminator (franchise), ''Terminator'' franchise. Created by screenwriter, writer and film director, director James Cameron, the character is first referred to in the 1984 film ''The T ...
. Director McG deemed Bale "the most credible action star in the world" during development.
McG wanted Bale for Marcus, but the actor—even though he "can't really remember why"—wanted to play John, and that led to the character's role getting expanded in rewrites of the script.
Bale was the first person to be cast and signed on for the role in November 2007. McG talked extensively with Bale in the UK about the role while the latter was filming ''
The Dark Knight
''The Dark Knight'' is a 2008 superhero film directed by Christopher Nolan from a screenplay he co-wrote with his brother Jonathan Nolan, Jonathan. Based on the DC Comics superhero, Batman, it is the sequel to ''Batman Begins'' (2005) and t ...
'', and they both agreed to proceed.
Although a fan of the ''Terminator'' series, he was at first uninterested until McG convinced him the story would be character-based and not rely on special effects.
They kept working on the story every day, along with Worthington.
McG said Bale broke his hand punching a Terminator prop during filming.
Bale spent six to eight hours each day with McG in the editing room to advise the finished product.
In January 2018, Bale revealed he rejected the role three times before accepting it, in part to prove wrong people who told him not to take the role.
*
Sam Worthington
Samuel Henry John Worthington (born 2 August 1976) is an Australian actor. He is best known for playing Jake Sully in ''Avatar'' and its sequel, ''Avatar: The Way of Water''; Marcus Wright in ''Terminator Salvation'', and Perseus in '' Clash o ...
as Marcus Wright, a human-terminator hybrid experiment. Worthington compared Marcus to
Dorothy
Dorothy may refer to:
*Dorothy (given name), a list of people with that name.
Arts and entertainment
Characters
*Dorothy Gale, protagonist of ''The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'' by L. Frank Baum
* Ace (''Doctor Who'') or Dorothy, a character playe ...
(''
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
''The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'' is a children's novel written by author L. Frank Baum and illustrated by W. W. Denslow. It is the first novel in the Oz series of books. A Kansas farm girl named Dorothy ends up in the magical Land of Oz after s ...
'') and
Alice (''
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' (commonly ''Alice in Wonderland'') is an 1865 English novel by Lewis Carroll. It details the story of a young girl named Alice (Alice's Adventures in Wonderland), Alice who falls through a rabbit hole into a ...
'') due to being "this person waking up in another world
ho thentries to find himself". ''Terminator'' creator
James Cameron
James Francis Cameron (born August 16, 1954) is a Canadian filmmaker. A major figure in the post-New Hollywood era, he is considered one of the industry's most innovative filmmakers, regularly pushing the boundaries of cinematic capability w ...
personally recommended Worthington (whom he directed in ''
Avatar
Avatar (, ; ), is a concept within Hinduism that in Sanskrit literally means "descent". It signifies the material appearance or incarnation of a powerful deity, goddess or spirit on Earth. The relative verb to "alight, to make one's appearanc ...
'') to McG.
Russell Crowe
Russell Ira Crowe (born 7 April 1964) is an actor. He was born in New Zealand, spent ten years of his childhood in Australia, and moved there permanently at age twenty one. He came to international attention for his role as Roman General Maxi ...
also recommended him to McG. The director decided Worthington looked tougher than the "great many of today's
aifyyoung male actors".
Worthington recalled Cameron told him "the ''Terminator'' to make is the one with the war". Worthington tore his
intercostal muscle
Intercostal muscles are many different groups of muscles that run between the ribs, and help form and move the chest wall. The intercostal muscles are mainly involved in the mechanical aspect of breathing by helping expand and shrink the size of ...
s during the first weeks of filming but nevertheless insisted on performing his own stunts.
McG once expressed interest in casting Christian Bale,
Daniel Day-Lewis
Sir Daniel Michael Blake Day-Lewis (born 29 April 1957) is an English retired actor. Often described as one of the preeminent actors of his generation, he received numerous accolades throughout his career which spanned over four decades, incl ...
or
Josh Brolin
Joshua James Brolin (; born February 12, 1968) is an American actor. He has appeared in films such as ''The Goonies'' (1985), ''Mimic'' (1997), ''Hollow Man'' (2000), ''Grindhouse'' (2007), ''No Country for Old Men'' (2007), '' American Gangste ...
in the part.
Brolin did talk to Bale and read a draft of the screenplay, which he found "interesting and dark; ultimately, though, I didn't think it felt right".
*
Anton Yelchin as
Kyle Reese
Kyle Reese is a fictional character in the ''Terminator'' franchise, who serves as the protagonist of the first film with a supporting role in other works. The character is portrayed by Michael Biehn in '' The Terminator'' (1984) and '' Termi ...
, a teenage refugee and admirer of John Connor and the Resistance. As portrayed by
Michael Biehn
Michael Connell Biehn ( ; born July 31, 1956) is an American actor, primarily known for his roles in science fiction films directed by James Cameron; as Sgt. Kyle Reese in '' The Terminator'' (1984), Cpl. Dwayne Hicks in ''Aliens'' (1986), and ...
in ''The Terminator'', he was sent back in time to 1984 to protect
Sarah Connor to ensure the survival of the human race, and fathered John with her. Yelchin said he wanted to portray Kyle as Biehn did and not make him appear weaker because it was a younger version of the character. The difference in his portrayal lies in showing Kyle as intense, but not concentrated until he joins the resistance proper. Yelchin tried to convey Kyle's intensity by focusing on how fast Biehn appeared when running in the original film.
*
Moon Bloodgood
Korinna Moon Bloodgood (born September 20, 1975) is an American actress and model, known for her role as Lt. Blair Williams in the 2009 film ''Terminator Salvation'' and as Anne Glass in the TNT television series '' Falling Skies''.
Early life
...
as Blair Williams, a "no-nonsense and battle-hardened" pilot of the Resistance who suffers from
survivor's guilt
Survivor guilt (or survivor's guilt; also called survivor syndrome or survivor's syndrome and survivor disorder or survivor's disorder) is a mental condition that occurs when a person believes they have done something wrong by surviving a traumati ...
and serves as a romantic interest for Marcus. McG characterizes her as continuing the feminine strength that has been prominent throughout the franchise.
*
Bryce Dallas Howard
Bryce Dallas Howard (born March 2, 1981) is an American actress and director. Howard was born in Los Angeles and attended New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, initially leaving in 2002 to take roles on Broadway but officially graduati ...
as Kate Connor, the wife of John Connor and daughter of Robert Brewster, who supervised the development of Skynet.
Charlotte Gainsbourg
Charlotte Lucy Gainsbourg (; born 21 July 1971) is a British-French actress and singer. She is the daughter of English actress Jane Birkin and French musician Serge Gainsbourg. After making her musical debut with her father on the song " Lemo ...
was originally set to play the part, but left due to scheduling conflicts with another film. As portrayed by
Claire Danes
Claire Catherine Danes (born April 12, 1979) is an American actress. She is the recipient of three Primetime Emmy Awards, four Golden Globe Awards, and two Screen Actors Guild Awards. In 2012, ''Time'' named her one of the 100 most influenti ...
in the third film, Kate was a
veterinarian
A veterinarian (vet), also known as a veterinary surgeon or veterinary physician, is a medical professional who practices veterinary medicine. They manage a wide range of health conditions and injuries in non-human animals. Along with this, vet ...
; but in this film, she is now a
physician
A physician (American English), medical practitioner (Commonwealth English), medical doctor, or simply doctor, is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through th ...
. Howard suggested, as part of the character's backstory, that Kate studied medical books and interviewed many surviving doctors after the events of Judgment Day. The film's subject matter reminded her of
developing countries
A developing country is a sovereign state with a lesser developed industrial base and a lower Human Development Index (HDI) relative to other countries. However, this definition is not universally agreed upon. There is also no clear agreem ...
, devastated by war and lacking basic supplies such as clean water, which "reflects things that are going on currently in this privileged world that we are living in where there hasn't been an apocalypse and robots haven't taken over the world. I think that's something definitely for us to reinvestigate and that we continue to make choices for our own future to take that into consideration". Howard focused on Kate "being accustomed to fear and loss" because the character was a
military brat
A military brat ( colloquial or military slang) is a child of serving or retired military personnel. Military brats are associated with a unique subcultureDavid C. Pollock, Ruth E. van Reken. ''Third Culture Kids: Growing Up Among Worlds'', Rev ...
.
*
Common
Common may refer to:
Places
* Common, a townland in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland
* Boston Common, a central public park in Boston, Massachusetts
* Cambridge Common, common land area in Cambridge, Massachusetts
* Clapham Common, originally com ...
as Barnes, John's right-hand man. Common stated the character was not overly developed, being "only just a bad-ass character, you know, really the big heavy of the movie", before McG's intervention. Common agreed with this, as "I didn't want to just be the big, bulky guy there" and worked on the emotional side, "thinking about how it would be in a world that's post-apocalyptic, a world where, you know, things have been destroyed and we're really fighting for survival."
*
Jane Alexander
Jane Alexander (née Quigley; born October 28, 1939) is an American actress and author. She is the recipient of two Primetime Emmy Awards, a Tony Award, and nominations for four Academy Awards, and three Golden Globe Awards. From 1993 to 1997 ...
as Virginia, the leader of a group of human refugees.
*
Helena Bonham Carter
Helena Bonham Carter (born 26 May 1966) is an English actress. Known for her roles in blockbusters and independent films, particularly period dramas, she has received various awards and nominations, including a British Academy Film Award a ...
as Dr. Serena Kogan /
Skynet: an ex-Cyberdyne scientist who convinces Marcus to donate his body for her research. Her face is later used by the Skynet computer to communicate with Marcus.
Tilda Swinton
Katherine Matilda Swinton (born 5 November 1960) is a British actress. Known for her roles in independent films and blockbusters, she has received various accolades, including an Academy Award and a British Academy Film Award, in addition t ...
was originally considered for the part, but Bonham Carter replaced her before filming. She accepted the part because her then-
domestic partner
A domestic partnership is a legal relationship, usually between couples, who live together and share a common domestic life, but are not married (to each other or to anyone else). People in domestic partnerships receive benefits that guarantee ...
,
Tim Burton
Timothy Walter Burton (born August 25, 1958) is an American filmmaker and animator. He is known for his gothic fantasy and horror films such as '' Beetlejuice'' (1988), '' Edward Scissorhands'' (1990), '' The Nightmare Before Christmas'' (1993 ...
, was a ''Terminator'' fan. Her role was a "small but pivotal" one and would only require ten days of shooting. However, on July 20, 2008, Bonham Carter delayed filming by a day,
and was given an indefinite leave due to the death of four of her family members in a minibus accident in
South Africa
South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...
.
*
Michael Ironside
Frederick Reginald Ironside (born February 12, 1950), known as Michael Ironside, is a Canadian actor, producer, director, and screenwriter. He is known for playing villains and "tough guy" heroes, and has also portrayed sympathetic characters.
E ...
as General Ashdown, the leader of the Resistance.
*
Ivan G'Vera
Ivan G'Vera (born Ivan Šplíchal; April 1, 1959) is a Czech actor, best known for his role as Ivan Marais on the American soap opera '' Days of Our Lives'' from 1991 to 2000, 2011 and 2020.
Biography
At age 18, he fled Czechoslovakia for the ...
as General Losenko, a member of the Resistance.
*
Roland Kickinger
Roland Kickinger (born March 30, 1968) is an Austrian bodybuilder and actor from Vienna. Standing 6 ft 4 in tall (1.93 m) and weighing from 250-300 pounds (113 to 136 kg), he has appeared in numerous bodybuilding competitions, fit ...
as
T-800 T8 or T-8 may refer to the following:
Measurement
* T8, a Torx screwhead size
* T8, a 1 inch fluorescent lamp size
* A tornado intensity rating on the TORRO scale
Biology
* The 8th thoracic vertebra
* The T8 spinal nerve
Transportation
* Trikk ...
: the first Terminator covered in living tissue. Bodybuilder and actor Kickinger, who previously portrayed Schwarzenegger in the 2005 biographical film ''
See Arnold Run
''See Arnold Run'' is a 2005 American biographical film starring Jürgen Prochnow and Roland Kickinger, both playing Arnold Schwarzenegger at different ages. The film covers Arnold's early years in bodybuilding and his successful run for Gover ...
'', was his physical double on set. When asked about his role, Kickinger said it is "Arnold's character in the first ''Terminator''. That's basically my role, but 20 years before, so it establishes how the Terminator came about."
Polish
Polish may refer to:
* Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe
* Polish language
* Poles
Poles,, ; singular masculine: ''Polak'', singular feminine: ''Polka'' or Polish people, are a West Slavic nation and ethnic group, w ...
strongman athlete
Mariusz Pudzianowski
Mariusz Zbigniew Pudzianowski (; born 7 February 1977), also known as "Pudzian" and "Dominator", is a Polish entrepreneur, mixed martial artist and former strongman competitor. With 43 international victories at a record 70% winning percenta ...
was also considered for doubling Schwarzenegger. If Schwarzenegger had decided not to lend his appearance to the film, then John would have shot the T-800's face off before the audience got a good look at him.
**
Arnold Schwarzenegger
Arnold Alois Schwarzenegger (born July 30, 1947) is an Austrian and American actor, film producer, businessman, retired professional bodybuilder and politician who served as the 38th governor of California between 2003 and 2011. ''Time'' ...
's facial likeness was recreated with
CGI, with a mold of his face made in 1984 scanned to create the digital makeup. Schwarzenegger gave his consent to appear this way, due to being unavailable because he was serving as
Governor of California
The governor of California is the head of government of the U.S. state of California. The governor is the commander-in-chief of the California National Guard and the California State Guard.
Established in the Constitution of California, the g ...
.
*
Jadagrace Berry as Star, an 8-year-old girl in Kyle's care.
[ Born after Judgment Day, Star is mute due to the trauma of the post-apocalyptic world. Therefore, this has given her the unnatural ability to sense when a Skynet unit is approaching.]
* Brian Steele
Brian Steele is an American actor who has had many roles as monsters and creatures on television and in films. In 2018, he appeared as The Robot in ''Lost in Space''. Steele stands at 6 ft 7 in (2.01 m).
Career
On television, Steele was t ...
as the T-600.
* Linda Hamilton
Linda Carroll Hamilton (born September 26, 1956) is an American actress. She played Sarah Connor in the '' Terminator'' film series and Catherine Chandler in the television series ''Beauty and the Beast'' (1987–1990), for which she was nomina ...
as the voice of Sarah Connor, John's mother who died years ago of leukemia. In two scenes of the film, John plays Sarah's recorded cassette tapes for more information regarding Kyle Reese, Marcus Wright and Skynet's Terminators. Hamilton was uncredited for the role, and was the only actress from previous films to return.
* Isaac Kappy
Isaac Kappy (February 17, 1977 – May 13, 2019) was an American actor, musician, and conspiracy theorist. He had roles in the films ''Thor'' (2011) and ''Terminator Salvation'' (2009) and in the AMC television series '' Breaking Bad''. He was a ...
as Barbarosa.
Production
Development
In 1999, two years after C2 Pictures purchased the rights, two ''Terminator'' films' premises were mapped out and were supposed to be developed simultaneously. Tedi Sarafian
Tedi Sarafian is an American screenwriter. He was a co-writer of '' Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines'' (2003). He is the son of Richard C. Sarafian, and the brother of Richard Sarafian Jr. and Deran Sarafian and the nephew of Robert Altman. ...
was hired to write '' Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines'', which he eventually received shared story credit for, while David C. Wilson was to write ''Terminator 4''. Before any revisions were done, ''T3'' initially took place in 2001 and revolved around the first attacks between Skynet and humans. ''T4'' would follow immediately afterward and centered primarily on the war briefly seen in the first two films. Warner Bros. gave the film the codename "Project Angel".
Following the release of ''Terminator 3'' in 2003, producers Andrew G. Vajna
Andrew G. Vajna (born András György Vajna; 1 August 1944 – 20 January 2019) was a Hungarian film producer whose films include the first three entries in the ''Rambo'' series, '' Total Recall'', '' Tombstone'', ''Die Hard with a Vengeance' ...
and Mario Kassar
Mario F. Kassar ( ar, ماريو قصار; born October 10, 1951) is a Lebanese film producer and industry executive who produced the first three films of the ''Rambo'' series, '' Terminator 2: Judgment Day'', '' Total Recall'', ''The Doors, Ange ...
contracted Nick Stahl
Nicolas Kent Stahl (born December 5, 1979) is an American actor. Starting out as a child actor, he gained recognition for his performance in the 1993 film '' The Man Without a Face'', co-starring Mel Gibson.
He later transitioned into his adul ...
and Claire Danes
Claire Catherine Danes (born April 12, 1979) is an American actress. She is the recipient of three Primetime Emmy Awards, four Golden Globe Awards, and two Screen Actors Guild Awards. In 2012, ''Time'' named her one of the 100 most influenti ...
to return as John Connor and Kate Brewster in another film. Director Jonathan Mostow
Jonathan Mostow (born November 28, 1961) is an American film director, screenwriter, and producer. He has directed films such as ''Breakdown'', '' U-571'', '' Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines'', and '' Surrogates''.
Early life
Mostow was born ...
helped develop the script, written by John Brancato and Michael Ferris
John Brancato and Michael Ferris are an American screenwriting duo, whose notable works include '' The Game'', '' Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines'', ''Terminator Salvation'', '' Surrogates'' and ''The Hunter's Prayer''. Brancato and Ferris me ...
, and was set to begin production in 2005 after completing another film. It was known by then that Arnold Schwarzenegger's role would be limited, as he had assumed office as Governor of California
The governor of California is the head of government of the U.S. state of California. The governor is the commander-in-chief of the California National Guard and the California State Guard.
Established in the Constitution of California, the g ...
. The producers sought to have Warner Bros.
Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. (commonly known as Warner Bros. or abbreviated as WB) is an American film and entertainment studio headquartered at the Warner Bros. Studios complex in Burbank, California, and a subsidiary of Warner Bros. D ...
finance the picture as they did for ''Terminator 3''. In 2005, Stahl said John and Kate would be recast as the story jumped forward in time. By 2006, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc., also known as Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures and abbreviated as MGM, is an American film, television production, distribution and media company owned by amazon (company), Amazon through MGM Holdings, founded o ...
(a successor to Orion Pictures and current owners of the Hemdale Film Corporation
Hemdale Film Corporation, known as Hemdale Communications after 1992, was an independent American-British film production company and distributor. The company was founded in London in 1967 as the Hemdale Company by actor David Hemmings and John D ...
library, distributor and producer of the original film, respectively) was set to distribute the fourth film as part of the new CEO Harry Sloan's scheme to make the studio a viable Hollywood player.
On May 9, 2007, it was announced that production rights to the ''Terminator'' series had passed from the feuding Vajna and Kassar to the Halcyon Company
The Halcyon Company was an American media development company headed by Victor Kubicek and Derek Anderson. They were perhaps best known for acquiring the global rights to the ''Terminator'' franchise in 2007 and for producing ''Terminator Salvat ...
. The producers hoped to start a new trilogy. The purchase was financed with a loan by Pacificor, a hedge fund
A hedge fund is a pooled investment fund that trades in relatively liquid assets and is able to make extensive use of more complex trading, portfolio-construction, and risk management techniques in an attempt to improve performance, such as sho ...
from Santa Monica
Santa Monica (; Spanish: ''Santa Mónica'') is a city in Los Angeles County, situated along Santa Monica Bay on California's South Coast. Santa Monica's 2020 U.S. Census population was 93,076. Santa Monica is a popular resort town, owing to ...
. By July 19, the project was in legal limbo due to a lawsuit between MGM and Halcyon subsidiary T Asset. MGM had an exclusive window of 30 days to negotiate for distribution of the Terminator films. When negotiating for ''Terminator 4'', Halcyon rejected their initial proposal, and MGM suspended negotiations. After the 30 days were over, MGM claimed that the period during which negotiations were suspended did not count and their exclusive period was still open. Halcyon asked a court for an injunction allowing them to approach other distributors. Later, the lawsuit was settled and MGM got a 30-day right of first refusal to finance and distribute the fifth ''Terminator'' film.
Finally, Warner Bros. paid $60 million to acquire the United States distribution rights of ''Terminator Salvation''; Sony Pictures
Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc. (commonly known as Sony Pictures or SPE, and formerly known as Columbia Pictures Entertainment, Inc.) is an American diversified multinational mass media and entertainment studio Conglomerate (company), conglom ...
also paid just over $100 million to acquire the film's distribution rights in all international territories (excluding South Korea, where it was distributed by Lotte Entertainment
Lotte Cultureworks ( ko, 롯데 컬처웍스), formerly known as Lotte Entertainment ( ko, 롯데 엔터테인먼트) is a South Korean film production and distribution company. Established in the Republic of Korea, the company has distributed f ...
and Middle East, where it was distributed by Gulf Film).
Writing
McG
The Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG), also known locally as "The 'G", is an Australian sports stadium located in Yarra Park, Melbourne, Victoria. Founded and managed by the Melbourne Cricket Club, it is the largest stadium in the Southern Hem ...
signed on to direct, as the first two films were among his favorites, and he had even cast Robert Patrick
Robert Hammond Patrick (born November 5, 1958) is an American actor. Known for portraying villains and honorable authority figures, he is a Saturn Award winner with four other nominations.
Patrick dropped out of college when drama class sparke ...
(who played the T-1000
The T-1000 is a fictional Character (arts), character in the Terminator (franchise), ''Terminator'' franchise. A shapeshifter, shapeshifting Android (robot), android Terminator (character concept), Terminator Assassination, assassin, the T-1000 ...
) in his previous films. Though he was initially unsure about "flogging a dead horse,"[ he felt the post-apocalyptic setting allowed the film to be different enough so as not to be just an inferior sequel. The idea that events in '' Terminator 2: Judgment Day'' and ''Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines'' altered the future allowed them to be flexible with their presentation of the futuristic world.] McG met with the series' co-creator James Cameron, and, although he neither blessed nor denigrated the project, Cameron told the new director he had faced a similar challenge when following Ridley Scott
Sir Ridley Scott (born 30 November 1937) is a British film director and producer. Directing, among others, science fiction films, his work is known for its atmospheric and highly concentrated visual style. Scott has received many accolades thr ...
's ''Alien
Alien primarily refers to:
* Alien (law), a person in a country who is not a national of that country
** Enemy alien, the above in times of war
* Extraterrestrial life, life which does not originate from Earth
** Specifically, intelligent extrater ...
'' with ''Aliens
Alien primarily refers to:
* Alien (law), a person in a country who is not a national of that country
** Enemy alien, the above in times of war
* Extraterrestrial life, life which does not originate from Earth
** Specifically, intelligent extrate ...
''.[ He maintained two elements of the previous films; that John is an outsider to the authorities, and someone of future importance is being protected, and in this film, it is Kyle Reese.]
The first full screenplay for the film was written by ''Terminator 3'' writers John Brancato and Michael Ferris, who received full screenplay credit. Paul Haggis
Paul Edward Haggis (born March 10, 1953) is a Canadian screenwriter, film producer, and director of film and television. He is best known as screenwriter and producer for consecutive Best Picture Oscar winners '' Million Dollar Baby'' (2004) and ...
rewrote Brancato and Ferris's script,[ and ]Shawn Ryan
Shawn Ryan (born October 11, 1966 in Rockford, Illinois) is an American screenwriter and television producer.
He created and co-created a number of TV drama series, including ''The Shield'' (2002–2008), ''The Chicago Code'' (2011), '' Last Re ...
made another revision three weeks before filming. Jonathan Nolan
Jonathan Nolan (born 6 June 1976) is a British-American screenwriter, producer, director and author. He is the creator of the CBS science fiction series ''Person of Interest'' (2011–2016) and co-creator of the HBO science fiction western s ...
also wrote on set, which led to McG to say, "I would have to characterize Jonah as ''the lead writer of the film.''" In response to whether or not Nolan would receive a writing credit for his contribution, McG went on to say, "I don't know how the WGA rules work, but honest to goodness, we did the heaviest lifting with Jonah."[ Nolan contributed to the film after Bale signed on and created Connor's arc of becoming a leader.] Unfortunately according to its main actor Christian Bale
Christian Charles Philip Bale (born 30 January 1974) is an English actor. Known for his versatility and physical transformations for his roles, he has been a leading man in films of several genres. He has received various accolades, including ...
, due to the 2007–08 Writers Guild of America strike
From November 5, 2007, to February 12, 2008, all 12,000 film and television screenwriters of the American labor unions Writers Guild of America, East (WGAE), and Writers Guild of America West (WGAW) went on strike.
The Writers Guild of America ...
, Nolan had to abruptly leave the project due to another commitment.[ ]Anthony E. Zuiker
Anthony E. Zuiker (pronounced ; born August 17, 1968) is an American television writer, television producer, and author. He is best known as the creator of ''CSI: Crime Scene Investigation''. He produced all four editions of the ''CSI'' franc ...
contributed to the script as well. So extensive were the rewrites that Alan Dean Foster
Alan Dean Foster (born November 18, 1946) is an American writer of fantasy and science fiction. He has written several book series, more than 20 standalone novels, and many novelizations of film scripts.
Career ''Star Wars''
Foster was the ghos ...
decided to rewrite the entire novelization after submitting it to his publisher because the compiled shooting script was very different from the one he was given beforehand.
In the early script drafts, John was a secondary character. Producer James Middleton explained "'' Ben-Hur'' was influenced by Jesus Christ
Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious ...
, but it was his story. Much in that way, this ew maincharacter will be influenced by John Connor."
The original ending was to have John killed, and his image kept alive by the resistance by grafting his skin onto Marcus' cybernetic body. Marcus would have then murdered Kate, Barnes, Kyle, and Star. However, after the ending was leaked on the Internet, Warner Bros. decided to completely change the entire third act of the film. McG and Nolan did continue the Christ element of John's character though, in which he has some followers who believe what he knows about Skynet and others who do not.
McG described the film's theme as "where you draw the line between machines and humans".[ The friendship between Marcus—who was executed (for murder) when humanity still ruled the world—and Kyle Reese illustrates how war and suffering can bring out the best in people, such as when they worked together to survive during the ]Blitz
Blitz, German for "lightning", may refer to:
Military uses
*Blitzkrieg, blitz campaign, or blitz, a type of military campaign
*The Blitz, the German aerial campaign against Britain in the Second World War
*, an Imperial German Navy light cruiser b ...
. The title was derived from this second chance given to humanity and to Marcus, in addition to John's efforts to save humanity from the machines. The film's original title was ''Terminator Salvation: The Future Begins'', but this was dropped during filming.
Throughout writing, the cast and crew would watch scenes from the three films to pick moments to reference or tribute, including "Come with me if you want to live" and " I'll be back", which is uttered by John in this film. McG found himself having to decide which ideas for references would be included and which would not. An opening scene has John fighting a Terminator on a crashed helicopter, which was storyboarded as an homage to the climax of the original film, where his mother Sarah, having broken her leg, is chased by a crippled Terminator. McG did this to reflect the skills John learned from her.[
]
Filming
With an estimated $200 million budget, ''Terminator Salvation'' is the most expensive ''Terminator'' film to date, followed closely by '' Terminator: Dark Fate'' (2019) (estimated budget $185-$196 million). The shooting of the film started on May 5, 2008, in New Mexico
)
, population_demonym = New Mexican ( es, Neomexicano, Neomejicano, Nuevo Mexicano)
, seat = Santa Fe
, LargestCity = Albuquerque
, LargestMetro = Tiguex
, OfficialLang = None
, Languages = English, Spanish ( New Mexican), Navajo, Ker ...
, with parts of the filming taking place at Kirtland Air Force Base, after the United States Air Force
The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Signal ...
agreed to provide the crew guidance and aircraft. The filmmakers had originally intended to begin filming on March 15 in Budapest
Budapest (, ; ) is the capital and most populous city of Hungary. It is the ninth-largest city in the European Union by population within city limits and the second-largest city on the Danube river; the city has an estimated population ...
or Australia, but a 25 percent tax rebate
A tax refund or tax rebate is a payment to the taxpayer due to the taxpayer having paid more tax than they owed.
By country
United States
According to the Internal Revenue Service, 77% of tax returns filed in 2004 resulted in a refund check ...
and absence of an interest rate cap and floor An interest rate cap is a type of interest rate derivative in which the buyer receives payments at the end of each period in which the interest rate exceeds the agreed strike price. An example of a cap would be an agreement to receive a payment for ...
made the filmmakers seek the cheaper New Mexico, because of their elevated budget. To avoid delays caused by a possible 2008 Screen Actors Guild strike in July, all exterior scenes were completed by then, so production could restart easily. The shoot ended on July 20, 2008, though some pick-ups took place in January 2009.
In addition to Bale breaking his hand and Worthington hurting his back, special effects technician Mike Menardis almost lost his leg filming an explosion. The sequence required a manhole cover being blown into the air, which hit Menardis and partially severed his leg. McG noted it was a testament to the gritty style of the film. "I say with respect, I didn't want that ''Star Wars
''Star Wars'' is an American epic film, epic space opera multimedia franchise created by George Lucas, which began with the Star Wars (film), eponymous 1977 film and quickly became a worldwide popular culture, pop-culture Cultural impact of S ...
'' experience of everything's a blue screen, tennis balls, and go for it. I had Stan Winston build all the machines. We built all the sets, the explosive power, the explosive power so you feel that wind and that percussion and that heat blowing your eyebrows off. And with that, you get a couple bumps and bruises on the way, but you get it in an integrity and a realism that hopefully echoes ''Apocalypse Now
''Apocalypse Now'' is a 1979 American epic war film produced and directed by Francis Ford Coppola. The screenplay, co-written by Coppola, John Milius and Michael Herr, is loosely based on the 1899 novella ''Heart of Darkness'' by Joseph Conr ...
''. You couldn't say, 'Let's just shoot ''Apocalypse Now'' in Burbank, I think it's going to feel just as good.[
The film used ]Technicolor
Technicolor is a series of Color motion picture film, color motion picture processes, the first version dating back to 1916, and followed by improved versions over several decades.
Definitive Technicolor movies using three black and white films ...
's Oz process during post-production. This is a partial silver retention on the interpositive
An interpositive, intermediate positive, IP or master positive is an orange-based motion picture film with a positive image made from the edited camera negative. The orange base provides special color characteristics that allow more accurate color ...
, similar to bleach bypass
Bleach bypass, also known as skip bleach or silver retention, is a chemical effect which entails either the partial or complete skipping of the bleaching function during the processing of a color film. By doing this, the silver is retained in t ...
, which will be used to lend to the sense of detachment from the modern world McG was looking for. Industrial Light & Magic
Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) is an American motion picture visual effects company that was founded on May 26, 1975 by George Lucas. It is a division of the film production company Lucasfilm, which Lucas founded, and was created when he began pro ...
developed shader
In computer graphics, a shader is a computer program that calculates the appropriate levels of light, darkness, and color during the rendering of a 3D scene - a process known as ''shading''. Shaders have evolved to perform a variety of spec ...
programs to make the desaturated lighting of the CGI realistic and well-integrated to the on-set footage. The filmmakers consulted with many scientists about the effects of an abandoned world and nuclear winter
Nuclear winter is a severe and prolonged global climatic cooling effect that is hypothesized to occur after widespread firestorms following a large-scale nuclear war. The hypothesis is based on the fact that such fires can inject soot into t ...
.[ McG cited '']Mad Max 2
''Mad Max 2'' (released as ''The Road Warrior'' in the United States) is a 1981 Australian post-apocalyptic action film directed by George Miller. It is the second installment in the ''Mad Max'' franchise, with Mel Gibson reprising his role a ...
'', the original ''Star Wars
''Star Wars'' is an American epic film, epic space opera multimedia franchise created by George Lucas, which began with the Star Wars (film), eponymous 1977 film and quickly became a worldwide popular culture, pop-culture Cultural impact of S ...
'' trilogy and '' Children of Men'', as well as the novel ''The Road
''The Road'' is a 2006 post-apocalyptic novel by American writer Cormac McCarthy. The book details the grueling journey of a father and his young son over a period of several months across a landscape blasted by an unspecified cataclysm that ha ...
'', as his visual influences.[ He instructed his cast to read the latter as well as '']Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
''Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?'' (retroactively retitled ''Blade Runner: Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?'' in some later printings) is a dystopian science fiction novel by American writer Philip K. Dick, first published in 1968. Th ...
''[ Like ''Children of Men'', McG would storyboard scenes so that it would be edited together to resemble a seamless, continuous shot.] It took two weeks to film a two-minute shot of Connor getting caught up in a bombing on the Skynet base where he discovers plans for the T-800.
Design and special effects
McG sought to create as many "in-camera" elements as possible to make the film more realistic.[
A version of the work originally appeared on the ''Terminator Salvation'' DVD (Region 4) from Columbia House Home Video.] Many of the settings were hand-built, including an entire gas station for the Harvester attack scenes. The Terminator factory was built in an abandoned factory,[ A version of this work also originally appeared on the ''Terminator Salvation'' DVD (Region 4) from Columbia House Home Video. Note, "Focus Points" is a collection of shorts—see See also .] and the design crew consulted robot manufacturer companies for a more realistic depiction.[ A model built and detonated by Kerner Optical was used for the explosion of Skynet's 30-story San Francisco-based lab.]
The majority of the machines were designed by Martin Laing, a crew member on Cameron's ''Titanic
RMS ''Titanic'' was a British passenger liner, operated by the White Star Line, which sank in the North Atlantic Ocean on 15 April 1912 after striking an iceberg during her maiden voyage from Southampton, England, to New York City, United ...
'' and ''Ghosts of the Abyss
''Ghosts of the Abyss'' is a 2003 American documentary film produced by Walden Media and released in most countries by Walt Disney Pictures. It was directed by James Cameron after his 1997 film ''Titanic''. During August and September 2001, Camer ...
''. McG described many of the machines as having an H. R. Giger
Hans Ruedi Giger ( ; ; 5 February 1940 – 12 May 2014) was a Swiss artist best known for his airbrushed images that blended human physiques with machines, an art style known as " biomechanical". Giger later abandoned airbrush for pastels, mark ...
influence.[ McG's intent was to create a gritty, tactile 2018 on screen, and Laing concurred the robots would have to be black and degraded as none of them are new. Laing devised ]Aerostats
An aerostat (, via French) is a lighter-than-air aircraft that gains its lift through the use of a buoyant gas. Aerostats include unpowered balloons and powered airships. A balloon may be free-flying or tethered. The average density of the craf ...
, which are smaller versions of the Aerial Hunter Killers from the previous films. The Aerostats send a signal to the humanoid Harvesters. They are very big and slow, so they use Mototerminators to capture humans, and the Harvesters place them in Transporters. Laing was unsure of how to design the Transporters until he saw a cattle transport while driving through Albuquerque.
The film features the first aquatic Skynet robot, the Hydrobot, which Laing modeled on eel
Eels are ray-finned fish belonging to the order Anguilliformes (), which consists of eight suborders, 19 families, 111 genera, and about 800 species. Eels undergo considerable development from the early larval stage to the eventual adult stage ...
s, and was built by the animatronics
Animatronics refers to mechatronic puppets. They are a modern variant of the automaton and are often used for the portrayal of characters in films and in theme park attractions.
It is a multidisciplinary field integrating puppetry, anatomy a ...
crew with its exterior made of metal-looking rubber so it could be used in the aquatic scenes.[
The film features rubber-skinned ]T-600
In the ''Terminator'' film series, a Terminator is an autonomous cyborg, typically humanoid, originally conceived as a virtually indestructible soldier, infiltrator, and assassin.
James Cameron introduced the first Terminator character in the ...
robots. McG interpreted Kyle Reese's description in the original film of the T-600 as being easy to spot by making them tall and bulky.[ For scenes of humans fighting with Terminators, the actors interacted with stuntmen wearing ]motion capture
Motion capture (sometimes referred as mo-cap or mocap, for short) is the process of recording the movement of objects or people. It is used in military, entertainment, sports, medical applications, and for validation of computer vision and robo ...
suits, later replaced by digital robots.[ For the Moto-Terminators, Ducati designers were hired to create the robots, and the on-screen robot was a combination of stuntmen driving actual Ducatis and a Moto-Terminator mock-up, as well as a digital Moto-Terminator. Visual effects studio Imaginary Forces created the Terminator point-of-view sequences, and tried to depict a simple interface, " free of the frills—anything that a machine would not purely need", and with more ]software bug
A software bug is an error, flaw or fault in the design, development, or operation of computer software that causes it to produce an incorrect or unexpected result, or to behave in unintended ways. The process of finding and correcting bugs i ...
s and anomalies since the robots of ''Salvation'' were not as advanced as the Terminators from the previous films.
The majority of the special effects were done by Industrial Light & Magic
Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) is an American motion picture visual effects company that was founded on May 26, 1975 by George Lucas. It is a division of the film production company Lucasfilm, which Lucas founded, and was created when he began pro ...
. ''Salvation'' was one of the last films that Stan Winston, the visual effects supervisor
In the context of film and television production, a visual effects supervisor is responsible for achieving the creative aims of the director or producers through the use of visual effects
Visual effects (sometimes abbreviated VFX) is the process ...
on the first three films, worked on. Winston died on June 15, 2008, after a long struggle with multiple myeloma
Multiple myeloma (MM), also known as plasma cell myeloma and simply myeloma, is a cancer of plasma cells, a type of white blood cell that normally produces antibodies. Often, no symptoms are noticed initially. As it progresses, bone pain, an ...
. McG dedicated the film to him in the end credits.[ John Rosengrant and Charlie Gibson replaced Winston,][ and McG commented that they are "trying to achieve something that's never been done before" and "push the envelope".] Asylum Visual Effects created digital plates, Marcus' endoskeleton, and a digital T-600. Rising Sun Pictures
Rising Sun Pictures (RSP) is an Australian visual effects company headquartered in Adelaide, South Australia, co-founded and headed by Tony Clark. Since April 2021 it has been owned by FuseFX. Its film and television credits include '' Black W ...
did the digital correction of day for night
Day for night is a set of cinematic techniques used to simulate a night scene while filming in daylight. It is often employed when it is too difficult or expensive to actually shoot during nighttime. Because both film stocks and digital image s ...
scenes, the destruction of the submarine and Marcus' robot hand.
Music
Danny Elfman
Daniel Robert Elfman (born May 29, 1953) is an American film composer, singer and songwriter. He came to prominence as the singer-songwriter for the new wave band Oingo Boingo in the early 1980s. Since the 1990s, Elfman has garnered internation ...
began composing the score in January 2009. Elfman's score had a different theme but it did feature the five notes which had been featured in every Terminator film used here & there in the score.
Beforehand, McG wanted to hire Gustavo Santaolalla
Gustavo Alfredo Santaolalla (born 19 August 1951) is an Argentine musician, composer, and record producer. He is known for composing his film scores with his collaborator and acclaimed director Alejandro González Iñárritu, which composed the ...
to work on the music for the human characters, while having either Thom Yorke
Thomas Edward Yorke (born 7 October 1968) is an English musician and the main vocalist and songwriter of the rock band Radiohead. A multi-instrumentalist, he mainly plays guitar and keyboards and is noted for his falsetto. He has been descri ...
or Jonny Greenwood for Skynet's themes. He couldn't get Hans Zimmer
Hans Florian Zimmer (; born 12 September 1957) is a German film score composer and music producer. He has won two Academy Awards, Oscars and four Grammy Awards, Grammys, and has been nominated for two Primetime Emmy Awards, Emmys and a Tony Awar ...
but he did meet with the original ''Terminator'' composer Brad Fiedel
Brad Ira Fiedel (born March 10, 1951) is an American composer of scores for film and television. He is well known for his collaborations with director James Cameron on ''The Terminator'' (1984) and its blockbuster sequel, '' Terminator 2: Judgmen ...
but decided he did not want to repeated the sounds Fiedel achieved in his films. McG wanted Elfman to give those themes and ambient sounds a "Wagnerian
Wilhelm Richard Wagner ( ; ; 22 May 181313 February 1883) was a German composer, theatre director, polemicist, and conductor who is chiefly known for his operas (or, as some of his mature works were later known, "music dramas"). Unlike most op ...
quality".
Reprise Records
Reprise Records is an American record label founded in 1960 by Frank Sinatra. It is owned by Warner Music Group, and operates through Warner Records, one of its flagship labels.
Artists currently signed to Reprise Records include Enya, Michael ...
released the soundtrack on May 19, 2009, which included 15 tracks. While Common
Common may refer to:
Places
* Common, a townland in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland
* Boston Common, a central public park in Boston, Massachusetts
* Cambridge Common, common land area in Cambridge, Massachusetts
* Clapham Common, originally com ...
had expressed interest in writing a song for the soundtrack, Alice in Chains
Alice in Chains (often abbreviated as AIC) is an American rock band from Seattle, Washington, formed in 1987 by guitarist and vocalist Jerry Cantrell and drummer Sean Kinney, who later recruited bassist Mike Starr and lead vocalist Layne ...
' "Rooster
The chicken (''Gallus gallus domesticus'') is a domesticated junglefowl species, with attributes of wild species such as the grey and the Ceylon junglefowl that are originally from Southeastern Asia. Rooster or cock is a term for an adult m ...
" is the only featured song. Although not included in the soundtrack, "You Could Be Mine
"You Could Be Mine" is a song by American rock band Guns N' Roses from their fourth studio album, '' Use Your Illusion II''. The song was released on June 21, 1991, as the first single from the ''Use Your Illusion'' albums. The song was origin ...
" by Guns N' Roses
Guns N' Roses is an American hard rock band from Los Angeles, California, formed in 1985. When they signed to Geffen Records in 1986, the band comprised vocalist Axl Rose, lead guitarist Slash, rhythm guitarist Izzy Stradlin, bassist Duff McKa ...
, which was featured in ''Terminator 2: Judgment Day'', can be heard briefly in a scene of the film as well.
Some of the music wasn't officially released. The complete soundtrack are listed below:
* 1M1 Marcus' Death/Main Title
* 1M2 Connor Arrival
* 1M3 In The Hole pt 1
* 1M4 In The Hole pt 2
* 1M5 In The Hole pt 3
* 1M6 Everybody's Dead
* 1M7 All Is Lost pt 1
* 1M8 All Is Lost pt 2
* 1M9 Marcus Walks
* 1M10 Jumper
* 1M11 A Solution
* 2M1 Connor Comes Home
* 2M2 Reset the Future
* 2M3 Come With Me
* 2M4 What Happened Here?
* 2M5 Connor the Hero
* 2M6 Connor Broadcast
* 2M7 Marcus' Dream
* 2M8 itle Unknown* 2M9 Aerostat
* 2M10 Mini Mart
* 2M11 Harvester
* 3M1 The Harvester Returns
* 3M2 Canyon Dogfight
* 3M3 Blair? Transport
* 3M4 Hot Rain
* 3M5pt1 Rednecks pt1
* 3M5pt2 Rednecks pt2
* 3M6 Signal Success
* 3M7 Fireside
* 3M8 No Plan
* 4M1 Mine Field
* 4M2 Flashback
* 4M3 The Reveal
* 4M3B Hallway talk
* 4M4 The Shiv
* 4M5 Mom's Voice
* 4M6 The Escape
* 4M7 Hydrobot Attack
* 4M8 Look At Me
* 4M9 You're Out
* 4M10 Connor Speech
* 5M1 Weepy Donuts
* 5M2 itle Unknown* 5M3 Marcus Emters Skynet pt1
* 5M4 Marcus Enters Skynet pt2
* 5M5A Serena (parts 1, 2 and 3)
* 5M5B Marcus Decides (parts 1, 2 and 3)
* 5M6 Father Meets Son
* 5M7 Fuel Cells
* 5M8 Final Confrontation pt1
* 6M1 Final Confrontation pt2
* 6M2 Final Confrontation pt3
* 6M3 Idea
* 6M4 Bad News
* 6M5 Salvation
* 6M6 Finale - End Credits
Marketing
Promotion
On July 16, 2008, Warner Bros. debuted the film's teaser trailer
A teaser (or more specifically teaser trailer) is a mini- trailer and a form of teaser campaign advertising that focuses on film and television programming. It is a videography pre-release move or television show advertisement. Short in length, te ...
on Yahoo!
Yahoo! (, styled yahoo''!'' in its logo) is an American web services provider. It is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California and operated by the namesake company Yahoo Inc., which is 90% owned by investment funds managed by Apollo Global Man ...
, accompanied by a voiceover by Christian Bale's character of John Connor. On November 25, 2008, Sony Pictures unveiled a motion poster, showing a T-800 with the words: "Welcome to Los Angeles, 2018". In December 2008, the first theatrical trailer was released on the Apple
An apple is an edible fruit produced by an apple tree (''Malus domestica''). Apple fruit tree, trees are agriculture, cultivated worldwide and are the most widely grown species in the genus ''Malus''. The tree originated in Central Asia, wh ...
website. In March 2009, the second trailer was released on Yahoo! Movies
Yahoo! Movies (formerly Upcoming Movies), provided by the Yahoo! network, is home to a large collection of information on movies, past and new releases, trailers and clips, box office information, and showtimes and movie theater information. Yaho ...
and was attached to ''Watchmen
''Watchmen'' is an American comic book maxiseries by the British creative team of writer Alan Moore, artist Dave Gibbons and colorist John Higgins. It was published monthly by DC Comics in 1986 and 1987 before being collected in a single-vo ...
'', accompanied by a remix version of Nine Inch Nails
Nine Inch Nails, commonly abbreviated as NIN and stylized as NIИ, is an American industrial rock band formed in Cleveland in 1988. Singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and producer Trent Reznor was the only permanent member of the band ...
' " The Day the World Went Away". On May 8, 2009, the extended four-minute final trailer was released on Apple.
Tie-ins
In addition to the novelization by Alan Dean Foster, a prequel novel titled ''Terminator Salvation: From the Ashes'' by Timothy Zahn
Timothy Zahn (born September 1, 1951) is an American writer of science fiction and fantasy. He is known best for his prolific collection of ''Star Wars'' List of Star Wars books, books, chiefly the Thrawn trilogy, ''Thrawn'' series, and has publis ...
was released. Two further books were inspired by the film ''Cold War'' by Greg Cox and ''Trial by Fire'', again by Zahn. IDW Publishing
IDW Publishing is an American publisher of comic books, graphic novels, art books, and comic strip collections. It was founded in 1999 as the publishing division of Idea and Design Works, LLC (IDW), itself formed in 1999, and is regularly recog ...
released a four-issue prequel comic, as well as an adaptation. It follows Connor rallying together the resistance in 2017, as well as examining normal people overcoming their intolerances to defeat Skynet. Dark Horse Comics
Dark Horse Comics is an American comic book, graphic novel, and manga publisher founded in Milwaukie, Oregon by Mike Richardson in 1986. The company was created using funds earned from Richardson's chain of Portland, Oregon comic book shops known ...
released a twelve-issue sequel comic to the film, titled ''Terminator Salvation: The Final Battle'' by J. Michael Straczynski
Joseph Michael Straczynski (; born July 17, 1954) is an American filmmaker and comic book writer. He is the founder of Synthetic Worlds Ltd. and Studio JMS and is best known as the creator of the science fiction television series ''Babylon 5'' ( ...
from 2013 to 2014. Playmates Toys
Playmates Toys Limited is a Hong Kong toy company. The company was founded in Hong Kong in 1966 by Sam Chan as Playmates Industrial, manufacturing dolls for other companies. In 1975, Playmates began marketing their own line of pre-school toys, ...
, Sideshow Collectibles
Sideshow Collectibles is an American specialty manufacturer of movie, film, television and collectible action figures, statues, and high end pieces. Sideshow's licenses include ''Star Wars'', DC Comics, Marvel Comics, ''The Lord of the Rings'', Dis ...
, Hot Toys
Hot Toys Limited is a Hong Kong production house for designing, developing, and manufacturing highly detailed collectible merchandise to worldwide markets. Established in 2000 in Hong Kong (with its current headquarters in Kwun Tong District), the ...
, Character Options, and DC Unlimited produced merchandise, while Chrysler
Stellantis North America (officially FCA US and formerly Chrysler ()) is one of the " Big Three" automobile manufacturers in the United States, headquartered in Auburn Hills, Michigan. It is the American subsidiary of the multinational automoti ...
, Sony
, commonly stylized as SONY, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. As a major technology company, it operates as one of the world's largest manufacturers of consumer and professional ...
, Pizza Hut
Pizza Hut is an American multinational restaurant chain and international franchise founded in 1958 in Wichita, Kansas by Dan and Frank Carney. They serve their signature pan pizza and other dishes including pasta, breadsticks and dessert at d ...
, and 7-Eleven
7-Eleven, Inc., stylized as 7-ELEVE, is a multinational chain of retail convenience stores, headquartered in Dallas, Texas. The chain was founded in 1927 as an ice house storefront in Dallas. It was named Tote'm Stores between 1928 and 1946. A ...
were among the product placement partners. On May 23, 2009, a roller coaster named after the film opened at Six Flags Magic Mountain
Six Flags Magic Mountain, formerly known and colloquially referred to as simply Magic Mountain, is a amusement park located in Valencia, California, northwest of downtown Los Angeles. It opened on May 29, 1971, as a development of the Newh ...
. In 2011, the ride was no longer licensed and renamed as ''Apocalypse: The Ride''.
Video game
A third-person shooter video game of the same name was released on the same week of the release of the film. Christian Bale declined to lend his voice, so Gideon Emery
Gideon Emery is an English actor and singer. He is best known for his role as Deucalion in '' Teen Wolf'' and for providing voice-over work in video games, television series and films.
Early life and education
Emery was born to Pauline, a compe ...
voiced the character of John Connor. The game features the voices of Common and Moon Bloodgood as Barnes and Blair Williams, respectively. Despite not appearing in the film, Rose McGowan
Rósa Arianna "Rose" McGowan (born September 5, 1973) is an American actress. After her film debut in a brief role in the comedy ''Encino Man'' (1992), McGowan achieved wider recognition for her performance in the dark comedy ''The Doom Generati ...
voiced the character of Angie Salter, an ex-high school teacher. The game is set in 2016, after the events of ''Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines'' and before the events of ''Terminator Salvation''. Another video game also titled ''Terminator Salvation'' was released in 2010 in the arcades. It's a light gun
A light gun is a pointing device for computers and a control device for arcade and video games, typically shaped to resemble a pistol.
Early history
The first light guns were produced in the 1930s, following the development of light-sensin ...
shooter developed by Play Mechanix and published by Raw Thrills
Raw Thrills, Inc. is an arcade game entertainment company based in Skokie, Illinois. It is best known for developing arcade games based on films.
History
Raw Thrills was founded in 2001 by Eugene Jarvis, Deepak Deo, and Andrew Eloff. The staff ...
.
Animated series
On May 18, 2009, Machinima released '' Terminator Salvation: The Machinima Series'', an animated
Animation is a method by which still figures are manipulated to appear as moving images. In traditional animation, images are drawn or painted by hand on transparent celluloid sheets to be photographed and exhibited on film. Today, most ani ...
prequel
A prequel is a literary, dramatic or cinematic work whose story precedes that of a previous work, by focusing on events that occur before the original narrative. A prequel is a work that forms part of a backstory to the preceding work.
The term " ...
web series
A web series (also known as a web show) is a series of scripted or non-scripted online videos, generally in episodic form, released on the Internet, which first emerged in the late 1990s and became more prominent in the early 2000s. A single i ...
set before the video game, comprising six episodes. Set after Judgment Day, Blair Williams (again voiced by Bloodgood) is fighting the war against the machines in downtown Los Angeles while tracking down the computer hacker named Laz Howard (voiced by Cam Clarke
Cam Clarke is an American voice actor, known for his work in animation, video games and commercials. Among his notable roles are Leonardo and Rocksteady in the 1987 ''Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles'' animated series, Shotaro Kaneda in the 1989 ...
) and trying to convince him to join sides with the resistance. The series was created using real-time computer animation from the video game. It was distributed by Warner Premiere
Warner Premiere was an American direct-to-video label of Warner Bros. Home Entertainment, itself a subsidiary of Warner Bros.
History Early years (2006–2008)
In 2006, Warner Bros. Home Entertainment announced that they would enter the market ...
, produced by Wonderland Sound and Vision
Wonderland Sound and Vision is an American production company founded by director and producer Joseph McGinty Nichol in 2001. It independently develops, produces and finances its own slate of feature films, television and digital projects. The co ...
and The Halcyon Company
The Halcyon Company was an American media development company headed by Victor Kubicek and Derek Anderson. They were perhaps best known for acquiring the global rights to the ''Terminator'' franchise in 2007 and for producing ''Terminator Salvat ...
and was released on DVD on November 3, 2009.
Release
Theatrical
The film was released in North America on May 21, 2009, with Warner Bros. setting the American premiere on May 14, 2009, at the Grauman's Chinese Theatre in Hollywood. Elsewhere, Sony Pictures Entertainment released the film in most overseas territories on different dates in June. One exception was Mexico
Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...
, because of the swine flu outbreak in the country, which forced Sony to push the release date to July 31, 2009.
It is rated PG-13 by the Motion Picture Association of America
The Motion Picture Association (MPA) is an American trade association representing the five major film studios of the United States, as well as the video streaming service Netflix. Founded in 1922 as the Motion Picture Producers and Distrib ...
for "intense sequences of sci-fi violence, action, and language," unlike the first three films which are rated R. The decision to release the film with a PG-13 rating was met with much criticism from fans, as well as the media. The rating decision was made after McG cut out a shot of Marcus stabbing a thug with a screwdriver, as the director felt disallowing the young audience due to that one shot was unfair. He also deleted a topless scene for Moon Bloodgood because "It was a soft moment between a man and a woman that was designed to echo the Kelly McGillis
Kelly Ann McGillis (born July 9, 1957) is an American stage actress. She is known for her film roles such as Rachel Lapp in ''Witness'' (1985), for which she received Golden Globe and BAFTA nominations; Charlie in '' Top Gun'' (1986); ''Made i ...
/Harrison Ford
Harrison Ford (born July 13, 1942) is an American actor. His films have grossed more than $5.4billion in North America and more than $9.3billion worldwide, making him the seventh-highest-grossing actor in North America. He is the recipient o ...
moment in ''Witness
In law, a witness is someone who has knowledge about a matter, whether they have sensed it or are testifying on another witnesses' behalf. In law a witness is someone who, either voluntarily or under compulsion, provides testimonial evidence, e ...
'' utin the end, it felt more like a gratuitous moment of a girl taking her top off in an action picture, and I didn't want that to convolute the story or the characters." In September 2020 McG again mentioned that he had a darker cut of the film that might have worked better.
The producers had expected the rating because of the modern leniency toward violence in PG-13 films, such as the 2007 action film, ''Live Free or Die Hard
''Live Free or Die Hard'' (released as ''Die Hard 4.0'' outside North America) is a 2007 American action-thriller film directed by Len Wiseman, and serves as the fourth installment in the ''Die Hard'' film series. It is based on the 1997 arti ...
''.
Home media
The DVD
The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kind ...
and Blu-ray Disc
The Blu-ray Disc (BD), often known simply as Blu-ray, is a Digital media, digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 2005 and released on June 20, 2006 worldwide. It is designed to supersede the DVD format, and c ...
of the film was released on December 1, 2009. The DVD contains the theatrical cut of the film with a featurette on the Moto-Terminators. The Blu-ray features both the theatrical cut and the R-rated Director's cut
A director's cut is an edited version of a film (or video game, television episode, music video, or commercial) that is supposed to represent the director's own approved edit in contrast to the theatrical release. "Cut" explicitly refers to the ...
, which is three minutes longer (118 minutes), with bonus material including Maximum Movie Mode, a video commentary in which director McG talks about the film while it plays, featurettes, a video archive, and a digital comic of the first issue of the official film prequel comic. Both versions include a digital copy
A digital copy is a commercially distributed computer file containing a media product such as a film or music album. The term contrasts this computer file with the physical copy (typically a DVD, Blu-ray, Blu-ray 3D, or Ultra HD Blu-ray disc) w ...
of the theatrical cut for portable media players
A portable media player (PMP) (also including the related digital audio player (DAP)) is a portable consumer electronics device capable of storing and playing digital media such as audio, images, and video files. The data is typically stored o ...
. Target Stores
Target Corporation (doing business as Target and stylized in all lowercase since 2018) is an American big box department store chain headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It is the seventh largest retailer in the United States, and a compon ...
will be the only retailer to carry the Director's Cut on DVD. On its first week of retail, ''Terminator Salvation'' debuted at the top spot of the Blu-ray charts, and second in the DVD charts, behind ''Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian''. The film made $29,811,432 in domestic DVD sales bringing its total gross to $401,439,971 In 2019, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment released the film in Ultra HD Blu-ray
Ultra HD Blu-ray (4K Ultra HD, UHD-BD, or 4K Blu-ray) is a digital optical disc data storage format that is an enhanced variant of Blu-ray. Ultra HD Blu-ray discs are incompatible with existing standard Blu-ray players, though a traditional Bl ...
in Europe and Australia
Reception
Box office
The film's first nationwide U.S. screenings on Thursday, May 21, 2009, made $3 million from midnight screenings and earned $13.3 million in its first day and grossed an additional $42,558,390 on its four-day Memorial Day
Memorial Day (originally known as Decoration Day) is a federal holiday in the United States for mourning the U.S. military personnel who have fought and died while serving in the United States armed forces. It is observed on the last Monda ...
opening weekend from 3,530 theaters. It debuted at number two behind '' Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian'', giving it a lower first-weekend take than its predecessor, becoming the first film in the series not to open at number one and failing to meet Boxoffice Magazine
''Boxoffice Pro'' is a film industry magazine dedicated to the movie theatre business published by BoxOffice Media LP.
History
It started in 1920 as ''The Reel Journal'', taking the name ''Boxoffice'' in 1931 and still publishes today, with ...
predictions by 50%. ''Terminator Salvation'' was more successful in its international release, opening at number one in 66 of 70 territories through the first week of June, and continuing to be the highest-grossing film in the following week. The film's total domestic gross was $125,322,469, along with $246,030,532 from overseas territories, for a worldwide gross of $371,353,001. As of December 2009, the film ranks 14th for the year internationally and 23rd domestically (U.S. and Canada), which puts it below initial expectations in terms of domestic gross and first weekend, as well as overall global take.
Critical response
On Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...
the film has an approval rating of 33% based on 282 reviews, with an average rating of 5.10/10. The website's critics consensus reads, "With storytelling as robotic as the film's iconic villains, ''Terminator Salvation'' offers plenty of great effects but lacks the heart of the original films." On Metacritic
Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...
, the film has a weighted average
The weighted arithmetic mean is similar to an ordinary arithmetic mean (the most common type of average), except that instead of each of the data points contributing equally to the final average, some data points contribute more than others. The ...
score of 49 out of 100, based on 46 reviews, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Audiences surveyed by CinemaScore
CinemaScore is a market research firm based in Las Vegas. It surveys film audiences to rate their viewing experiences with letter grades, reports the results, and forecasts box office receipts based on the data.
Background
Ed Mintz founded Ci ...
gave the film a grade B+ on scale of A to F.
Roger Ebert
Roger Joseph Ebert (; June 18, 1942 – April 4, 2013) was an American film critic, film historian, journalist, screenwriter, and author. He was a film critic for the ''Chicago Sun-Times'' from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, Ebert beca ...
of the ''Chicago Sun-Times
The ''Chicago Sun-Times'' is a daily newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Since 2022, it is the flagship paper of Chicago Public Media, and has the second largest circulation among Chicago newspapers, after the ''Chicago T ...
'' gave the film 2 out of 4 stars, saying that "After scrutinizing the film, I offer you my summary of the story: Guy dies, finds himself resurrected, meets others, fights. That lasts for almost two hours." Michael Rechtshaffen of ''The Hollywood Reporter
''The Hollywood Reporter'' (''THR'') is an American digital and print magazine which focuses on the Cinema of the United States, Hollywood film industry, film, television, and entertainment industries. It was founded in 1930 as a daily trade pap ...
'' wrote that the film isn't the same without Arnold Schwarzenegger and that it misses its dramatic element. Likewise, Claudia Puig of ''USA Today
''USA Today'' (stylized in all uppercase) is an American daily middle-market newspaper and news broadcasting company. Founded by Al Neuharth on September 15, 1982, the newspaper operates from Gannett's corporate headquarters in Tysons, Virgini ...
'' gave the film a 2/4 and called it "predictable" with the "dramatic elements flat-lin ng. She considered Christian Bale's performance "one-dimensional", but found his co-stars to "come off better", saying Sam Worthington had "a quiet intensity marred only by yelling "Nooooo!" three times in about 10 minutes" and that Anton Yelchin had "some of the best lines".
''Total Film
''Total Film'' is a British film magazine published 13 times a year (published monthly and a summer issue is added every year since issue 91, 2004, which is published between July and August issue) by Future Publishing. The magazine was launched ...
''s review gave the film 4/5 with its verdict: "The Terminator story recharges with a post-apocalyptic jolt of energy. Frantic and full of welcome ties to the past, it also ploughs new ground with purpose. Fingers crossed McG will follow Cameron's lead and serve up a worthy sequel." Devin Faraci of ''Empire
An empire is a "political unit" made up of several territories and peoples, "usually created by conquest, and divided between a dominant center and subordinate peripheries". The center of the empire (sometimes referred to as the metropole) ex ...
'' also gave a positive rating of four out of five stars, saying: "McG has sparked a moribund franchise back to life, giving fans the post-apocalyptic action they've been craving since they first saw a metal foot crush a human skull two decades ago." However, on CHUD, the latter said, "Bale's desire to star as John Connor was probably the most fatal blow to the film; it completely distorted the shape of the story as it existed." Furthermore, he expressed that the third act was when the film began falling apart, saying, "McG and Nolan muddied the end of the picture, delivering action generics (yet another Terminator fight in a factory) while never finding their own hook that would give this movie more of an impact than you would get from an expanded universe novel." In contrast, James Berardinelli
James Berardinelli (born September 25, 1967) is an American film critic and former engineer. His reviews are mainly published on his blog ''ReelViews.'' Approved as a critic by the aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, he has published two collections of r ...
considered the ending the best part of the film, feeling that the first two-thirds were "rambling and disjointed" and that the lack of a central villain was only fixed when the T-800 appeared.
Betsy Sharkey of the ''Los Angeles Times
The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the Un ...
'' stated that " ale'sstrengths do not serve him, or the movie, as well here" and that "when the story starts to crumble around Bale, Worthington is there to pick up the pieces". Craig Sharp of FilmShaft gave the film 3/5, saying "If you're looking for action then this is one damn good film! If it's character depth you're after then move along please." A.O. Scott
Anthony Oliver Scott (born July 10, 1966) is an American journalist and cultural critic. He has been chief film critic for ''The New York Times'' since 2004, a title he shares with Manohla Dargis.
Early life
Scott was born on July 10, 1966 in ...
of ''The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' said the film has "a brute integrity lacking in some of the other seasonal franchise movies" and "efficient, reasonably swift storytelling". Ben Lyons
Ben Lyons (born October 8, 1981) is an American entertainment reporter and sportscaster. He is the co-host of Bonjour Sports Talk on Amazon Prime Video Sports Talk.
Early life
Lyons is the son of entertainment reporter Jeffrey Lyons and the g ...
and Ben Mankiewicz
Benjamin Frederick Mankiewicz (born March 25, 1967) is an American television personality, political commentator, and film critic. He is a host on Turner Classic Movies and has been a commentator on '' The Young Turks'' and ''What the Flick?!'' ...
gave the film a "See It" and "Skip It", respectively, on their show '' At the Movies'' with the latter mentioning that it "is the worst big budget summer release I've seen in some time".
Arnold Schwarzenegger, star of the preceding three films in the series, initially remarked that ''Terminator Salvation'' was "a great film, I was very excited", but later reversed this position and said it was "...awful. It tried hard, not that they didn't try, the acting and everything. It missed the boat." ''Terminator'' series creator James Cameron considered it an "interesting film" that he "didn't hate as much as I thought I was going to" and praised Sam Worthington's performance but also said he would not return to the franchise: "he series
He or HE may refer to:
Language
* He (pronoun), an English pronoun
* He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ
* He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets
* He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' ...
has kind of run its course ..frankly, the soup's already been pissed in by other film makers". He also felt his two films were better than either of the later films. Linda Hamilton
Linda Carroll Hamilton (born September 26, 1956) is an American actress. She played Sarah Connor in the '' Terminator'' film series and Catherine Chandler in the television series ''Beauty and the Beast'' (1987–1990), for which she was nomina ...
, who portrayed Sarah Connor in ''The Terminator'' and ''Terminator 2: Judgment Day'' and lent her voice to ''Terminator Salvation'', wished the film "all the best" but expressed her opinion that the series "was perfect with two films. It was a complete circle, and it was enough in itself. But there will always be those who will try to milk the cow".
In '' Reel Power: Hollywood Cinema and American Supremacy'', Matthew Alford argued that with the fourth installment, "the franchise had made a clear shift towards supporting establishment narratives, despite its earlier reservations" and that a "central theme" is whether John Connor "should prioritise striking a decisive military blow against the machines or rescue some captured humans, who are entombed—with shades of Auschwitz
Auschwitz concentration camp ( (); also or ) was a complex of over 40 concentration and extermination camps operated by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland (in a portion annexed into Germany in 1939) during World War II and the Holocaust. It con ...
—by the Terminators". " e flashforwards from the first three Terminator films hinted at a horrible future scape of pain, deprivation and ad-hoc guerrilla warfare", he writes, but "in contrast, producer Jeffrey Silver explained that the Department of Defense gave 'fantastic cooperation o Salvationbecause they recognized that in the future portrayed in this film, the military will still be the men and women who protect us, no matter what may come'". Alford concludes that "for a world that is set just fifteen years after a global nuclear holocaust
A nuclear holocaust, also known as a nuclear apocalypse, nuclear Armageddon, or atomic holocaust, is a theoretical scenario where the mass detonation of nuclear weapons causes globally widespread destruction and radioactive fallout. Such a scenar ...
the survivors are fancifully healthy, not to mention hairy" and that this "normalises the unthinkable".
In 2020, following the critical and commercial failures of the two subsequent films, ''Terminator Genisys
''Terminator Genisys'' is a 2015 American science fiction action film directed by Alan Taylor and written by Laeta Kalogridis and Patrick Lussier. Produced by Skydance Productions and distributed by Paramount Pictures, the film is a reboot o ...
'' and '' Terminator: Dark Fate'', MovieWeb
MovieWeb is an entertainment news website and video brand.
Overview
MovieWeb reports on entertainment news through their long-running website and related social media and video platforms. The site also maintains a searchable database of films.
H ...
reported that ''Terminator Salvation'' had developed a strong cult following, and that fans had begun petitioning for McG's R-rated director's cut to be released.
Accolades
The film was nominated for several awards in 2009–10.
Controversies
During filming, Bale lost his temper with director of photography Shane Hurlbut for walking onto the set during an intense scene; he swore at and criticized Hurlbut before threatening to quit the film. Audio of Bale's rant leaked to the public and went viral. Bale apologized publicly and said he reconciled his differences with Hurlbut, stating that he dislikes it when takes are ruined, and that after the incident took place they continued to work together for a number of hours that day. A satirical
Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of shaming or e ...
dance remix
A remix (or reorchestration) is a piece of media which has been altered or contorted from its original state by adding, removing, or changing pieces of the item. A song, piece of artwork, book, video, poem, or photograph can all be remixes. The o ...
song based on this incident titled, "Bale Out
"Bale Out: RevoLucian's Christian Bale Remix!" is a satirical dance remix by American composer Lucian Piane, also known as RevoLucian, released on February 2, 2009, to YouTube and Myspace. The piece parodies Christian Bale by utilizing audio f ...
" was created by composer Lucian Piane
Lucian Piane (born October 4, 1980), also known by the Internet nickname RevoLucian, is an American composer and music producer. He has composed music for several films, television shows, theater productions and singers, and received a RIAA Pl ...
.
In March 2009, producer Moritz Borman
Moritz Borman is a veteran film producer. His credits include '' K-19: The Widowmaker'', '' The Life of David Gale'', ''Mindhunters'', ''Nurse Betty'', ''Alexander'', '' Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines'' and ''Terminator Salvation''.
Borman ...
filed a lawsuit against the Halcyon Company, seeking $160 million. Borman, who had arranged the transfer of the ''Terminator'' rights to Halcyon in May 2007, claimed the company's two managers, Derek Anderson and Victor Kubicek, had "hijacked" the production and refused to give him his $2.5 million share of the production. Borman alleged budget overruns were the reasons Anderson and Kubicek did not pay him and that they had $1 million in debt. Nevertheless, an "amicable" resolution was reached a month later.
Further complications occurred on May 20, 2009, when executive producer Peter D. Graves, who informed Anderson and Kubicek about the ''Terminator'' rights, filed a breach-of-contract claim for arbitration, alleging that they owe him $750,000.
Other media
Cancelled sequels and animated prequel
While ''Terminator Salvation'' was initially intended to begin a new trilogy, production of a fifth film was halted by legal trouble, as well as The Halcyon Company
The Halcyon Company was an American media development company headed by Victor Kubicek and Derek Anderson. They were perhaps best known for acquiring the global rights to the ''Terminator'' franchise in 2007 and for producing ''Terminator Salvat ...
filing for Chapter 11
Chapter 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code (Title 11 of the United States Code) permits reorganization under the bankruptcy laws of the United States. Such reorganization, known as Chapter 11 bankruptcy, is available to every business, wheth ...
bankruptcy protection. While some anonymous sources insisted that ''Terminator 5'' would be moving forward, the majority of analysts predicted that its future was in jeopardy.
In late September 2009, it was announced that the rights to the franchise were once again up for sale as The Halcyon Company tried to pull itself out of bankruptcy.
In late October 2009, Halcyon announced it would auction off the rights to future ''Terminator'' material and was seeking $60–70 million, though the only offer made was by director Joss Whedon
Joseph Hill Whedon (; born June 23, 1964) is an American filmmaker, composer, and comic book writer. He is the founder of Mutant Enemy Productions, co-founder of Bellwether Pictures, and is best known as the creator of several television series: ...
for $10,000. In December 2009, Halcyon issued a statement saying that they were looking at various options including sale and refinancing of the rights with an announcement on the outcome no later than February 1, 2010. On February 8, 2010, an auction was held to determine the owner of the ''Terminator'' rights. After studios Sony Pictures
Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc. (commonly known as Sony Pictures or SPE, and formerly known as Columbia Pictures Entertainment, Inc.) is an American diversified multinational mass media and entertainment studio Conglomerate (company), conglom ...
and Lionsgate
Lions Gate Entertainment Corporation, doing business as Lionsgate, is a Canadian-American entertainment company. It was formed by Frank Giustra on July 10, 1997, domiciled in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada and is currently headquartered ...
bid separately, Pacificor, the hedge fund that pushed Halcyon into bankruptcy, made a deal for $29.5 million. Pacificor hired an agency to sell off the rights to the franchise.
In August 2010, it was reported that a new ''Terminator'' film was being developed. The new film would not be a direct sequel to ''Salvation'', but rather an animated reboot of the original series. It would have been entitled ''Terminator 3000'' and would be shot by Hannover House
Hannover House is an American entertainment media distributor, specializing in the manufacture and release of pre-recorded movies and programs onto DVD and Blu-ray Disc, Blu-ray video devices, and the publication of literary and non-fiction books ...
. However, Pacificor, the owner of the rights to the ''Terminator'' franchise, had not given any official license to Hannover House
Hannover House is an American entertainment media distributor, specializing in the manufacture and release of pre-recorded movies and programs onto DVD and Blu-ray Disc, Blu-ray video devices, and the publication of literary and non-fiction books ...
to develop a new film.
On February 16, 2011, it was announced that Universal Studios
Universal Pictures (legally Universal City Studios LLC, also known as Universal Studios, or simply Universal; common metonym: Uni, and formerly named Universal Film Manufacturing Company and Universal-International Pictures Inc.) is an Ameri ...
was considering a fifth ''Terminator'' film with Arnold Schwarzenegger returning as the star and with ''Fast Five
''Fast Five'' (also known as ''Fast & Furious 5'' or ''Fast & Furious 5: Rio Heist'') is a 2011 American action film directed by Justin Lin and written by Chris Morgan. It is the sequel to ''Fast & Furious'' (2009) and the fifth i ...
''s Justin Lin
Justin Lin (, born October 11, 1971) is a Taiwanese-American film director. His films have grossed US$2.3 billion worldwide as of March 2017. He is best known for his directorial work on '' Better Luck Tomorrow'' (2002), the ''Fast & Furious'' f ...
directing along with Chris Morgan as the screenwriter. The discussions for the film had been in the very early stages. On April 27, 2011, it was announced that a rights package to a ''Terminator'' film, to which Schwarzenegger, Lin, and producer Robert W. Cort were attached, but no screenwriter, had been circulating among the studios. Universal, Sony and Lionsgate, and CBS Films
CBS Films Inc. was an American film production and distribution company founded in 2007 as a subsidiary of CBS Corporation and was considered a mini-major studio up until 2019.
CBS Films originally was planned to distribute, develop and prod ...
had been some of the interested companies. According to sources close to Schwarzenegger, he had only wanted to commit fully if a good script could be created.
It was reported on May 13, 2011, that Megan Ellison
Margaret Elizabeth Ellison (born January 31, 1986) is an American film producer and entrepreneur. She is the founder of Annapurna Pictures, established in 2011. She produced the films ''Zero Dark Thirty'' (2012), '' Her'' (2013), '' American Hu ...
and her production company Annapurna Pictures won the rights to make at least two more ''Terminator'' films, including ''Terminator 5'', in an auction deal that is rumored to have hit the $20 million mark. While Schwarzenegger was claimed to be up for a substantial role, the film would not be anchored by him; instead, a young male actor would take the lead. On December 4, 2012, a year and a half after negotiations were entered, the deal was finally closed. Ellison said that she and her brother David Ellison
David Ellison (born January 9, 1983) is an American film producer and actor best known as the founder and CEO of Skydance Media.
Early life and education
David Ellison was born in Santa Clara County, California. He is the son of billionaire Ora ...
were "starting from scratch as they seek out a screenwriter to plot the end".
Reboot
''Terminator Genisys'' is a reboot
In computing, rebooting is the process by which a running computer system is restarted, either intentionally or unintentionally. Reboots can be either a cold reboot (alternatively known as a hard reboot) in which the power to the system is physi ...
of the franchise, taking the premise of the original film in another direction while restarting the series from scratch. ''Genisys'' was intended to be the first of a trilogy, with Schwarzenegger reprising his role as the T-800. ''Genisys'' was released on July 1, 2015. Though the film received negative reviews from critics, it was a mild box office success overseas.
References
External links
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
{{Good article
2009 films
2000s chase films
2000s science fiction action films
Alternate timeline films
American chase films
American post-apocalyptic films
American science fiction action films
American science fiction war films
American sequel films
Columbia Pictures films
Cyborg films
D-Box motion-enhanced films
Drone films
2000s English-language films
Films directed by McG
Films scored by Danny Elfman
Films set in 2003
Films set in 2018
Films set in Los Angeles
Films set in San Francisco
Films set in the future
Films shot in New Mexico
Salvation
Salvation (from Latin: ''salvatio'', from ''salva'', 'safe, saved') is the state of being saved or protected from harm or a dire situation. In religion and theology, ''salvation'' generally refers to the deliverance of the soul from sin and its c ...
Wonderland Sound and Vision films
Films using motion capture
Techno-thriller films
Warner Bros. films
2000s American films
Lotte Entertainment films
Rating controversies in film