This is where it all started. The original and best.

Rating: 10/10 (3 November 2019)

There's a tone to this Terminator that it's successors have never been able to really replicate. It's gritty, it's dark, it's relentless and intense. The 80's creating a perfect backdrop for the machine from the future to wreck havoc.
When we first meet Sarah Connor she's the naive girl next door. By the end of the film she's been transformed, and that transformation continues through T2 and now Dark Fate.
Arnold as the Terminator is something that we're now all too familiar with and it's hard to look back with fresh eyes, but really this performance as the cold relentless killing machine from the future hasn't been equaled. There's an edge to him that has been rounded off over the subsequent sequels so the films could appeal to a wider (and younger) audience. This Terminator had no issue taking out a police station full of cops with an unflinching menace. No wise cracks here, this T-800 is a pure thing from your nightmares.
Kyle Reese as the protector sent back to save Sarah Connor, is the outgunned (in this time) soldier from the future. The core of this film is actually his love for Sarah Connor, that's why he took this one way trip through time, to meet and protect the love of his life. Yes, a love story at the heart of a dark sci-fi film! The sequels have never tapped into this emotional core as well as the original.
No review would be complete without mentioning the effects and the score. Terminator wouldn't be Terminator without the dark industrial score that underpins all the action. The special effects even though dated by today's high cgi standards still carry weight and gravitas, and Stan Winston's skill is undeniable. You really believe that there's a machine under Arnold's muscular frame. I remember the very first time I saw the film and just when you think it's over the chrome endoskeleton emerges from the fire.... immense.
There'll never be a Terminator film like this one, but largely that's because it was of its time, it was original and new. However I do believe that we could learn something of its tone and grit and it's emotional core if this franchise is to move forward after Dark Fate.
If you haven't seen this film it's the original and best and stands up as one of the best sci fi films of all time.