T2 - Terminator 2
I like the Terminator movies. Arnold is just so perfect for that role. He has always had to work very hard at not appearing stiff and monosyllabic in his movies, but this role lets him just be who he is.
It has some good shocks and thrills. A few edge-of-the-seat moments for first time viewers. But I recently rented the DVD and was happy to find it is just as much fun watching it again.
For the 2 and a half people out there who do not know about the Terminator movies, here it is in a nutshell:
Robots take over the world in the future, guided by a self-aware computer network called Skynet. Humans are on the run, living as refugees in their own world. The humans are led by a fellow named John who is a great fighter and who seems to be a major thorn in the side of the robots. So the robots come up with a way to send a robot back in time to kill his mother before he is born... Simple, right?
The killer robot, named a "terminator" is covered with living human skin, so he looks and feels like the real thing. John finds out about the plot, steals the time travel technology, and sends his right-hand-man back to the past to warn and protect Sarah, John's mother. (Are you with me so far?)
In the first movie, the Terminator (played by Arnold) is a robot with a metal human skeleton. This becomes obvious as the movie progresses and bits of Arnold are blown off, or burned off. In the end, the sidekick impregnates Sarah and dies saving her, and Sarah lures the Terminator into a giant hydraulic press which eventually shuts him down. All that is left is his arm (which becomes important in the next movie).
In the second movie, T2, Sarah has had a baby, which is John, of course, and begins training him to be a fighter before she ends up locked up in the loony bin. In the meantime, the robots of the future send back another Terminator, and John sends back a protector. This time the robots have developed an even more advanced Terminator who is made out of liquid metal. The Protector John sends back is the older model Terminator (played by Arnold)... the same model that tried to kill Sarah in the last movie.
The twist is that the arm and other bits of the first Terminator have been examined by the Government and used to build a new computer technology... and something called Skynet... Do you see the paradox building here?
Anyway, the movie involves having the old Terminator protect Sara and young John from the new Terminator. Sarah and John also try to stop the scientist from finishing his work on Skynet and they try to steal back the old terminator bits.
Anyway, people die, terminators are melted, and the world is saved... or is it? There is a rumor of a T3... now wouldn't that be fun?
Go rent both 1 and 2 and make a night of it!
