Jim Cameron On His Favourite Terminator Movie

I’ve watched them both recently and I see The Terminator as a creature of its moment and, for me, it doesn’t hold up… it’s too rough.  It’s fine for where I was at the time.  It’s fine given the state the industry was in at the time, but crude by present standards.  Still… it’s a cracking good story.  Terminator 2 I can stand behind. Even now, it competes, visually, with anything that’s being done now.  I mean, the CG is a tiny, tiny bit dated, but it was basically done pretty well.  And so often imitated that it feels a little clichéd, you know?  I still think it holds up.  I feel more proud of the second film as a film.

I feel proud of the first as a moment in history, in my development as a filmmaker, and as a piece of writing, and the accomplishment of a little scrappy team working under the radar.  But as a film there are a lot of cringes in terms of the end result.  For me, it’s a great idea poorly executed.

I wonder what Jim Cameron would say about Terminator: Genisys?  It would probably depend on what mood he was in.  I recall when he was originally asked for his opinion on Terminator 3 he spoke highly of it.  But then later recanted, saying the ‘soup has been pissed in’.  The soup is about to have nuclear waste dumped in it this summer.