"Come with me if you want to live"

Rating: 8/10 (5 December 2011)

James Cameron wrote and directed some of the best action movies of the 80s, and in 1991 it seems he tried to fashion the ultimate action movie for the new decade. Terminator 2 draws together all the traditions of its predecessors for calculated effect.
Like the original 1984 movie, Terminator 2 has a plot that is holier than the pope's colander, with numerous contradictions and logical fallacies. Fans of the series have long argued over the plot holes and even theorised back-stories to explain them away. They are missing the point. Terminator 2's prime directive is to thrill and entertain, and the plot is a servant to this purpose. Does it, for example, seem remotely likely that John and Arnie and the T1000 would converge on the mental hospital not only at the same time as each other, but also at the exact point that Sarah Connor made her escape after years of incarceration? Of course it doesn't – but it makes for an exciting sequence in the movie. That's not to say the plot is dispensable. Even if it doesn't make technical sense, the motivations and development of characters must follow some kind of pattern. We need to accept Arnie as sympathetic, not scary as he was in the first movie. The fact that the first thing he does when he arrives in the present is beat up a load of cocky bikers endears us to him immediately.
James Cameron's direction is geared towards a continuous movement and activity. When we first see Linda Hamilton, he has the camera swoop in on the mental hospital, then cuts straight into a moving shot panning from the window over to her. It's more dynamic than a simple establishing shot followed by a cut to an interior, and it helps keep up that tense rhythm and show off her character as someone to be reckoned with. Often cars and other vehicles will drive straight into shot, sliding across the foreground to fill the frame, really making the audience feel involved in – or rather, jolted by – the action. There's some CGI of course, something I don't normally approve of, but the CGI here is neat because it stays within its own limitations. The main subject of computer animation is those liquid metal goo, and smooth blobs were about the only thing CGI could do convincingly back then. Having said that, the technical flawlessness of Terminator 2 is still not a patch on the rickety low-budget charm of the 1984 picture.
Speaking of things staying within their limitations, Terminator 2 sees the return of Arnold Schwarzenegger, playing the only role he could ever do convincingly – a robotic killing machine. As usual the awkward woodenness comes completely naturally. I wonder if he ever realised the irony of this? Robert Patrick makes a great contrast to the muscular Arnie; a lean, wiry frame like a metal spring, and a believable portrayal of a mechanical mind. Linda Hamilton is a little better than she was in the first movie, and certainly convinces as the tough cookie. By and large though the casting here is more about looks and body types than actual talent. This is not a movie that demands such depth.
Or is it? There is another strand running through Terminator 2 that was not present in the first picture, and that is its humanist streak. From the very opening moments – scenes of children in a playground – we are shown what is at stake. Something deeper is added to the simple people v. machines set-up by showing the robot being taught about humanity and acquiring emotion. It is ostensibly just the stuff of subplot, and yet by giving us something to believe in, by giving reason and sympathy to the heroes, it makes all the frenetic action worthwhile. It is this angle which really brings the movie to life.