I'm not sure you could have lived in the U.S. in the last 20 years and *not* seen The Terminator. But it had been a long time since I'd watched it, and with the Sarah Connor Chronicles on TV I was interested in checking out the original again.
It's a great, simple concept. In the future, machines take over and rule humanity. One man leads humanity to fight back. So the machines build a time machine and travel back to kill the man's mother before he's born, ending the resistance before it begins.
Of course, there's gotta be complications. The resistance sends back a fighter to protect mom. And if this hadn't happened, would the child have been born, would he have been raised in a way that made him the man he was in the future?
Time travel paradoxes ... you've got to love them.
So you've got a good vs. evil conflict without a lot of gray (The Terminator is eeevil unstoppable) and a stellar script that elevates the film to classic status.
And what can you say? It's the ultimate Arnold Schwarenegger role. That's why they call him the governator.
Wonderful tension in the action scenes, wonderful lighting (much of the movie is in darkness or the soft light of dawn) and a great electronic score add to the perfection. Yes, some of the special effects are hokey by today's standards, but that's to be expected. And given the strength of the rest of the movie, easily forgiven.
Bonus: Look for Bill Paxton and the Alien Bounty Hunter from X-Files as the punks Arnie steals clothes from.
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