Terminator Salvation: The Shrink Blog Review

Christian Bale is busy hamming it up on a submarine that serves as the headquarters for the Resistance, while his future father, Kyle Reese (played by Anton Yelchin, the guy who also plays Chekhov in Star Trek this summer) and a human-machine hybrid named Marcus Wright stumble across a post-apocalyptic gas station full of the usual post-apocalyptic characters, including the white-haired mystical old lady.  The sequence that follows represents all that is good--and not so good--about this installment of the Terminator franchise.

The ACTING of lines that are supposed to have great IMPORTANCE in a scene that has no good purpose other that to let the robots burst in and unleash one of the best action sequences you have ever seen is pretty characteristic of this movie that is fun, but perhaps a tad pretentious.  Director McG probably burned a hole through his Children of Men DVD in preparing for this challenge.  He nails the bleached out, end of days look, but he overshoots the emotional tone. The story is not nearly as strong as it should be nor as deep as it is passed off to be, so it ultimately lacks the GRAVITAS that the actors and director seem to be fighting for in what should have just been a bit of summer fun.  As it is, it is a visually-spectacular but joyless affair.  The action sequence that abrubtly ends the overwrought gas station scene (by snatching the white-haired old lady up in a giant robot hand) involves hulking Terminators, motorcycles chasing a wrecker truck, a spaceship, an exploding bridge, and as much action as you will find anywhere.  That alone was almost worth the price of admission.

Christian Bale growls and chews the scenery to ill-effect, but it is his counterpart Marcus, played by Australian newcomer Sam Worthington who is the revelation here.  He creates the only character that you care about in the entire film and he has screen presence aplenty.  This guy is definitely going to be a star.  You'll see him next in James Cameron's Avatar, which should be a huge film later this year. 

The whole film plays like a big video game (there's even Michael Ironside, the voice of Sam Fisher in the hugely popular Splinter Cell series, as the crusty old General), punctuated by times when the actors get all angsty and pensive.  These ACTING moments carry about as much emotional weight as a video game cut scene.

The actorly scenes with Bale and others don't work (with Worthington as the notable exception most of the time), the story doesn't really work, but the action scenes are really really good.  If you like a good action film, you'll enjoy this.  It's a more fun movie than it is a good movie. (B)