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Saturday, October 26, 2024

Fortieth anniversary of The Terminator

It was forty years ago today, October 26th 1984, that James Cameron's science-fiction thriller (I'd also consider it horror) The Terminator was released.


Cameron was sick with food poisoning in Rome.  While convulsing in agony he had a fevered dream of a robot assassin with glowing red eyes hunting him down.  And that was the genesis of the Terminator.

This is a movie that has aged very well.  Including the design of the Terminator and the then-relatively distant future of the SkyNet-dominated 2029.  Ask a conceptual artist on a modern film to create an endoskeleton for a cyborg killing machine and it would be difficult not to envision something along the lines of the Cyberdyne Systems Model 101 Hunter-Killer.

I first saw The Terminator in 1986.  My best friend Chad had seen it on cable TV and was really raving about how good it was.  So I was able to rent it not long after.  I thought it was amazing.  It was definitely nightmare fuel for a twelve-year-old.  Especially that shot of the metal skeleton rising out of the wreckage to continue chasing down Sarah Connor.  I was like "Can't ANYTHING stop this guy?!?"

I've got this movie on DVD.  It's been awhile since I've seen it though.  Think I'll pop it in tonight.



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