The Terminator Returns

In the late 70s Leslie Halliwell, iconic film critic and author of what was once regarded as the definitive film guide, predicted that the film industry was only a few years from ‘perdition and catastrophe’.

 For those of us with fond memories of hostile aliens, high school slackers, time-travelling DeLoreans, incompetent paranormal investigators, and feuding ‘wiseguys,’ Mr Halliwell’s prediction was considerably wide of the mark. However, towards the end of the twentieth century, cinema finally hurtled towards its anticipated nadir and settled at the bottom of a cultural shit-bed where it still menacingly squats. The impending return of one of the major forces who helped put it there signifies considerably more than a film comeback…

Early next year Arnold Schwarzenegger, after cameo appearances in the Expendables films, will make his big screen return in The Last Stand with his first leading role in almost ten years. The film’s trailer focuses on three essential elements:

1) Arnie is old.

2) Arnie is tired.

3) Arnie is as hard as fuck.

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It’s almost inconceivable to imagine that he is now more recognisable to many people as the ex-governor of California, rather than the gargantuan film star who, along with Sylvester Stallone and Bruce Willis, bestrode the action film genre of the late 80s and 90s like a cinematic colossus, shooting lasers out of his eyes and bullets out of his arse. The majority of his body of work reads like a roll call that heralded the death of intelligent cinema: Commando (1985), Raw Deal (1986), Twins (1988), Kindergarten Cop (1990), Last Action Hero (1993), Junior (1994)… I could go on. He did not, of course, initiate cinema’s decline single handedly, but, as the highest paid and biggest star of his generation, his contribution was profound.

So, like a villain planning his bloody return to the town where he once wreaked havoc, he now stands like a shadowy figure on the horizon; the younglings will ask the elders to explain the nature of the carnage because, as members of a generation who view films as just another immediate sensory experience and have never compared imaginary scars, nor splashed around in puddles, nor kicked an obnoxious mob boss to within an inch of his life and dumped him in the boot of their car, they don’t understand. We can explain it thus: the cinematic apocalypse is upon us, the last and most frightening of the Four Horsemen has saddled up and, flanked by Ryan Reynolds, Jason Statham and Adam Sandler, he is summoning the rest of his dark army for the final battle. The occasional flurry of an Indie gem, an accessible art house film, an original thriller and a watchable, funny comedy in the current ratio (1:50) will be no match for any of them.

Many of the qualities that once defined the best cinema had to offer can be found on TV. So the next time Mr. Freeze sinks a movie, at least we will have HBO as a life raft.

He’s back.

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