Lead us not into termination

The season of sequels and serial prequels continues apace with the latest installment in the Terminator franchise - the worst, so far, in this fairly thoughtless onslaught of continuing sagas (Star Trek being the one notable exception).

If you're jonesing to mainline more action, Terminator Salvation should serve as a quick fix. But for anyone hoping this film might come laced with some credible plotting or dialogue that transcends the pedestrian, you'll need to look elsewhere (and why not to the further adventures of the men and women of the Starship Enterprise?).

The cast of Terminator Salvation looks promising enough, so one could be forgiven for holding out some hope for the final results. Christian Bale (a flawed human who brilliantly created a flawed superhero in the last two Batman films) is cast as John Connor, the salvation-bringer to the humans that have survived "Judgment Day." Add Sam Worthington as a cyborg, Helena Bonham Carter as a nefarious scientist and Moon Bloodgood as a kick-ass chick, and it sounds worth one's time.

It isn't. The film, directed by McG (the tag above the title), is mired up to its steel kneecaps in clichés. The action does everything in its power to distract you from the risible lines and saccharine dramatics, but it's not enough.

For Terminator aficionados, Bale's Connor is part of a self-perpetuating father-and-son rescue mission. In the first Terminator, Resistance hero Connor dispatches a soldier named Kyle Reese into the past, so that he can protect Connor's mother, Sarah, against Skynets' killer robots. By protecting Sarah, Connor is assured his birth. But his father turns out to be Reese, who has a one-night fling with Sarah.

In Terminator Salvation, Connor is desperate to locate the teenaged Reese, whom he has never met, before said killer robots liquidate him. For if that were to happen, Connor couldn't send Reese back in time to inseminate his mother Sarah, and Connor wouldn't be born to then later track down Reese, so that he can be sent back - well, you get it.

The film opens in 2003, where the cancer-stricken Dr. Serena Kogan (Bonham Carter) arrives at a prison's death row to get a condemned man, Marcus Wright (Worthington), to sign his body over to her for the benefit of mad science. He consents for a kiss, which must have made some impact on the dying doctor, as she trails into the execution chamber to see him strapped up Christ-style for his lethal injection.

The last image is all you'll need to guess what this future cyborg will be like. This cold-blooded killer, a self-professed "bad man," will, like the good thief on Golgotha, have a change of heart (literally and figuratively) and insure that the "salvation" act of John Connor will go forth to lift up humanity in its hour of need.

Jump to 2018: The United States is pretty much a smoking ruin, with what's left of humanity fighting Skynet's evil machinery from desert redoubts and urban rat holes. After Connor leads a disastrous raid on a Skynet compound, Marcus Wright is awakened from his cryogenic nap. The executed man now finds himself in a world transformed, or at least in a Los Angeles that bears little resemblance to the one that actually exists outside the destructive imaginations of its resident film directors and screenwriters.

Wandering into the more concentrated hell of Downtown (rather than the spotty, two-level ruin one would find in West Hollywood or Silver Lake), he's immediately spotted by a terminator, which scans him and fires upon him (this exchange will simply not make sense from the middle of the film on, but continuity is not one of McG's strengths).

Unprepared for what's happening, he's saved by two kids, a cute little African-American girl who is deaf and, lo and behold, Kyle Reese (played by Anton Yelchin, who was the weakest link in Star Trek, as Chekhov). The three set out to find other Resistance fighters, their mission being to find John Connor (who, as a voice in the wilderness, hails them over ham radios).

From here, the action and the nonsense intensify, though the frequently glaring gaps in the script occasionally stir one's grey matter with questions. But the action is paramount, and things "blow up real good," as Farm Film Report's Big Jim McBob and Billy Saul Hurok used to enthuse on SCTV. There are even a few mushroom clouds for your amusement.

The acting is on the same level, with Bale quietly complaining through clenched teeth like a dystopian Dirty Harry. However, Worthington seems determined to raise the bar, and it's his story, not Bale's, that becomes this film's focus by default (and, it must be said again, this is also the season of films where the leading man becomes almost superfluous).

Even a bit of CGIed Schwarzenegger can't breathe life into this latest Hollywood floorshow of machinery. Though, with his political career tanking alongside this prequel, one has to wonder, might there be future romps with Arnie back and snarling?

Steffen Silvis can be reached at
ssilvis@praguepost.com