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★★★★★
1 April 2017
A movie review of TERMINATOR 2: JUDGMENT DAY 3D. |
“I know now why you cry,” The Terminator (Arnold Schwarzenegger)
Even if shot in 3D, the experience rarely enhances the cinema-going experience. There are rarities of course: GRAVITY, LIFE OF PI, HUGO, etc. One is even more sceptical when it comes to conversions. However, fans of the greatest action film of all time can relax, a stunning job has been achieved. Along with GRAVITY, TERMINATOR 2 3D is wonderfully, thrillingly immersive. Backgrounds and foregrounds have a seamless depth without any thought to clunky planes. If there was any doubt, the explosion as the truck collides against the bridge, in the storm drain, shows how much skill and effort has gone into the update.
Even if shot in 3D, the experience rarely enhances the cinema-going experience. There are rarities of course: GRAVITY, LIFE OF PI, HUGO, etc. One is even more sceptical when it comes to conversions. However, fans of the greatest action film of all time can relax, a stunning job has been achieved. Along with GRAVITY, TERMINATOR 2 3D is wonderfully, thrillingly immersive. Backgrounds and foregrounds have a seamless depth without any thought to clunky planes. If there was any doubt, the explosion as the truck collides against the bridge, in the storm drain, shows how much skill and effort has gone into the update.
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For those, like me, who have lost count of how many times the modern masterwork has been watched, the 3D allows a variation, keeping the experience fresh. The myriad versions over the years, with scenes returned from the cutting room floor, have done this too. Though, unlike James Cameron’s other director’s cuts, one still prefers the theatrical original. The additional sequences enhance the story, but slow down the perfect modulation of pace. Here we get a 3D-ification of the first lean, muscular take.
As choreography attempts to evolve, lesser action movies fall out of favour. Released on 1991, 26 years on, the stunts and combat remain stupendous. Even with increases in technology, TERMINATOR 2 remains a genre bellwether. Contrast the atrocious TERMINATOR GENISYS from 2015. (The franchise should have stopped with T2, everything since, including TV show THE SARAH CONNOR CHRONICLES, has been dire.)
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Director James Cameron and his team understood:
- Scale (e.g. the helicopter in the fore as a building detonates aft),
- Fear (a relentless, bizarrely enigmatic antagonist),
- Adrenaline (e.g. a van pursued dazzlingly by a chopper), and
- Characters to care for (turning the baddie from the previous instalment into the goodie is a bold move).
What links RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK, ALIENS, DIE HARD and T2 is a masterclass in storytelling: A compelling, nightmarish scenario of humankind on the brink of extinction, which may, against all odds, be prevented. The commentary fans out across what it means to be human, the dangers of technology, the nuclear family social unit, etc. etc. That a 10 year old protagonist teaches a killing machine the value of life, how many action movies do that? The acting is engrossing. Surely, if this were not a blockbuster, Linda Hamilton and Edward Furlong would have been nominated for Oscars? What a badass female lead! The ending is rare too: Not to rest on laurels, as well as self-sacrifice.
137 minutes of brilliance. Still the greatest action movie of all time, restored and enhanced, and reigns almost in a league of its own.
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