Terminator: Salvation

TheJoe and I caught this on Friday. Amidst a very geeky summer of movies, another popular franchise is given another chance to captivate a new audience. Which it completely fails to do.

It’s a real shame because all the elements are there. McG does a very good job of directing and utilizing today’s technology to bring to life a man vs. machine war that could only be glimpsed in the previous movies. The action sequences are very well-done with some very excellent long one-shot sequences that give a very cool cinema verité quality to them.

The actors are all soild. Christian Bale takes on another iconic geek role as John Conner and plays him very well. Anton Yelchin (Chekov in the just released Star Trek) also admirably takes on a second sci-fi icon as Kyle Reese. I actually didn’t quite recognize him at first; a testament to his acting as well as to his skill at accents. Helena Bohnam Carter (Marla Singer in Fight Club, Beatrix Lestrange in the Harry Potter series) give a good turn as Dr. Serena Kogan; a doctor whose fight to save her own life as well as humanity’s resonates into future more than she could imagine.

The story, which I find to be one of the weakest elements in a movie this deep in the sequels, is actually well done and quite cohesive, if a bit predictable (I think it’s thanks to the trailers and billboards that I could see twists through my plot telescope early on).

So all the elements are there, but it’s just not compelling. All these good elements didn’t add up to a good movie experience for me. I could follow the story, I could dig the action, but it just felt like business as usual. It didn’t really add anything new to the franchise. Man fights machine, machines develop new ways to fight man, John Conner is a prime target for Skynet… These plot points have all been covered before. It might even be less compelling since the novelty of time travel to the past to kill John has been taken away.

I can’t really recommend seeing this in the theater. It’s maybe worth a rental or download when it comes out that way. In the battle of the technique versus the soul of movie storytelling, in this case the machine have unfortunately won.

Does It Play On a Mac? – Command & Conquer and Red Alert

For the first time, I look at a game suggested by one of my viewers. Not only are both of these games classics that helped popularize the real-time strategy genre, but they are now also both free to download as legal DRM-free ISO images.

Star Trek

Usually when the term “reboot” or “re-imagined” is applied to a new entry in a franchise, I tend to wince a bit. It usually means that whoever owns the property is simply slapping a new coat of paint on it the color of “whatever-will-get-those-with-money-to-pay-up-and-watch-this-old-stuff-again”. There might actually be some good ideas and concepts in the re-make, but it usually pales in comparison the the vision of the original. Or it just sucks hard.

I say this so you can understand the weight of when I say that J.J. Abrams reboot of Star Trek is pretty much the gold standard of how to reboot an old and cherished property.

This movie rocks. It’s a very well done, fast and funny action movie. The story not steeped in the series usual heavy allegory and metaphor. But this doesn’t make it light fluff either, since the depth and heart of the film comes from the origins of the main characters and relationships. This choice and mix of material manages the highly tricky feat of being able to appeal to both the Trekkie and the non-Trekkie.

While the humor does nod to the show’s various conventions and some famous lines and phrases, it never stoops to parody. This film manages to be even funnier than Trek IV!

The acting and cast are dead on for everyone with a special nod to Chris Pine, who pulls off the amazing acting feat of channeling James T. Kirk without invoking William Shatner. Zachary Qunito not only looks the part of Spock completely, but deftly conveys the character’s struggle of logical versus emotional quite vividly. This really carries to all the main cast, who take these classic characters and make them their own.

I could really go on, but the point is: see it! Without question: see it. TheJoe and I saw this in IMAX and not only do I feel it was worth seeing in that format, I would see it again in the theater. See it.