Terminator Salvation

Terminator Salvation is a 2009 American military science fiction action film. It is the fourth installment of the Terminator franchise, serving as a sequel to Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines. It is directed by McG and written by John Brancato and Michael Ferris. It is the only Terminator film to date not to feature Arnold Schwarzenegger, though his likeness briefly appears digitally. Instead, it stars Christian Bale and Sam Worthington with Anton Yelchin, Moon Bloodgood, Bryce Dallas Howard, Common, Michael Ironside, and Helena Bonham Carter in supporting roles. In a departure from the previous installments, Salvation is a post-apocalyptic film set in the year 2018. It focuses on the war between Skynet's machine network and humanity, as the remnants of the world's militaries have united to form the Resistance to fight against Skynet. Bale portrays John Connor, a Resistance fighter and central character, while Worthington portrays cyborg Marcus Wright. Yelchin plays a young Kyle Reese, a character first introduced in The Terminator, and the film depicts the origins of the T-800 Terminator.
After troubled pre-production, with the Halcyon Company acquiring the rights from Andrew G. Vajna and Mario Kassar, and with several writers working on the screenplay, filming began in May 2008 in New Mexico, and ran for 77 days.
Terminator Salvation was released on May 21, 2009, by Warner Bros. Pictures in the United States, and by Sony Pictures Releasing under its Columbia Pictures label internationally, and grossed over $371.4 million worldwide. While originally intended to be the first installment of a second Terminator trilogy, these plans were canceled following the Halcyon Company filing for bankruptcy after the film's release. The franchise rights were sold in 2012 to Annapurna Pictures, resulting in Terminator Genisys, a reboot of the series, being released in 2015 with Schwarzenegger reprising his role.

Plot

In 2003, Dr. Serena Kogan of Cyberdyne Systems convinces death row inmate Marcus Wright to sign over his body for medical research following his execution. Sometime later, the automated Skynet system is activated, becomes self-aware, and perceives humans as a threat to its existence, starting a nuclear holocaust known as "Judgment Day".
In 2018, John Connor leads an attack on a Skynet base where he discovers schematics of human prisoners being incorporated as living tissue for a new Terminator: the T-800. John survives a nuclear explosion on the base and proceeds to extraction. Following John's departure, Marcus emerges from the base's wreckage and begins heading toward Los Angeles.
John heads to the Resistance headquarters aboard a and confronts General Ashdown and the Resistance commanders. They reveal that the Resistance has discovered a hidden signal that they believe can shut down Skynet's machines and plans to launch an offensive against Skynet's headquarters in San Francisco in four days due to an intercepted kill list created by Skynet, which will eliminate the Resistance's leaders within the same time frame. John learns that he is second on this list, after Kyle Reese, realizing Skynet has learned that Kyle will eventually travel back in time and become his father.
Arriving in L.A., Marcus encounters Kyle and a mute child named Star during a skirmish with Skynet's machines. Kyle and Star are subsequently abducted and taken prisoner by Skynet. Two Resistance A-10 airplanes are shot down while trying to intercept a machine transport. Marcus rescues downed pilot Blair Williams, and they make their way to John's base, where a magnetic land mine wounds Marcus. Attempting to save his life, the Resistance discovers that Marcus is a cyborg, with a cybernetic endoskeleton and a partially artificial cerebral cortex. Although Marcus insists that he is human, John and his wife, Kate, suspect that Marcus has been sent to kill them, and John orders him to be executed. Blair helps Marcus escape. During the pursuit, Marcus saves John from Skynet's hydrobots, and the two make a bargain: Marcus will enter Skynet's headquarters in San Francisco to help John rescue Kyle and the other prisoners if he lets him live.
John pleads with Ashdown to delay the offensive so he can formulate a plan to extract the human captives, but Ashdown refuses and relieves John of his command. However, the Resistance disobeys Ashdown's orders and instead awaits John's signal. Marcus enters the base, interfaces with the computer, and disables perimeter defenses so that John can infiltrate and release the prisoners. Marcus learns from Skynet that he was resurrected to lure John to the base; when the Resistance launches its attack, John will be killed, achieving Skynet's goal. The hidden signal that the Resistance received earlier is revealed to be a ruse, and Skynet uses it to track down and destroy the Resistance command submarine.
Refusing to accept his fate, Marcus tears out the hardware linking him to Skynet and leaves to aid John. John locates Kyle and Star, but a T-800 Terminator ambushes them. As Kyle and Star escape, Marcus appears and fights the T-800, while John rigs together nuclear fuel cells to destroy the facility. Marcus is outmatched and temporarily disabled until John comes to his aid, after which John is stabbed through the chest by the T-800. Marcus destroys the T-800 by tearing its head off, and he, John, Kyle, and Star are airlifted out. John detonates the explosives, destroying the entire base.
John's injury is fatal as his heart was damaged, so Marcus offers his heart for transplantation, sacrificing himself to save John. As he recovers, John radios to the Resistance that, although this battle has been won, the war continues.

Cast

Christian Bale as John Connor. Director McG deemed Bale "the most credible action star in the world" during development. McG wanted Bale for Marcus, but the actor—even though he "can't really remember why"—wanted to play John, and that led to the character's role getting expanded in rewrites of the script. Bale was the first person to be cast and signed on for the role in November 2007. McG talked extensively with Bale in the UK about the role while the latter was filming The Dark Knight, and they both agreed to proceed. Although a fan of the Terminator series, he was at first uninterested until McG convinced him the story would be character-based and not rely on special effects. They kept working on the story every day, along with Worthington. McG said Bale broke his hand punching a Terminator prop during filming. Bale spent six to eight hours each day with McG in the editing room to advise the finished product. In January 2018, Bale revealed he rejected the role three times before accepting it, in part to spite those who told him not to take the role.
Sam Worthington as Marcus Wright: A human-Terminator hybrid cyborg. Worthington compared Marcus to Dorothy and Alice due to being "this person waking up in another world tries to find himself". Terminator creator James Cameron personally recommended Worthington to McG. Russell Crowe also recommended him to McG. The director decided Worthington looked tougher than the "great many of today's young male actors". Worthington recalled Cameron told him "the Terminator to make is the one with the war". Worthington tore his intercostal muscles during the first weeks of filming but nevertheless insisted on performing his own stunts. McG once expressed interest in casting Christian Bale, Daniel Day-Lewis or Josh Brolin in the part. Brolin did talk to Bale and read a draft of the screenplay, which he found "interesting and dark; ultimately, though, I didn't think it felt right".
Anton Yelchin as Kyle Reese: A teenage refugee and admirer of John Connor and the Resistance. As portrayed by Michael Biehn in The Terminator, he was sent back in time to 1984 to protect Sarah Connor to ensure the survival of the human race, and fathered John with her. Yelchin said he wanted to portray Kyle as Biehn did and not make him appear weaker because it was a younger version of the character. The difference in his portrayal lies in showing Kyle as intense, but not concentrated until he joins the resistance proper. Yelchin tried to convey Kyle's intensity by focusing on how fast Biehn appeared when running in the original film.
Moon Bloodgood as Blair Williams: A "no-nonsense and battle-hardened" pilot of the Resistance who suffers from survivor's guilt and serves as a romantic interest for Marcus. McG characterizes her as continuing the feminine strength that has been prominent throughout the franchise.
Bryce Dallas Howard as Kate Connor: The wife of John Connor and daughter of Robert Brewster, who supervised the development of Skynet. Charlotte Gainsbourg was originally set to play the part, but left due to scheduling conflicts with another film. As portrayed by Claire Danes in the third film, Kate was a veterinarian; but in this film, she is now a physician. Howard suggested, as part of the character's backstory, that Kate studied medical books and interviewed many surviving doctors after the events of Judgment Day. The film's subject matter reminded her of developing countries, devastated by war and lacking basic supplies such as clean water, which "reflects things that are going on currently in this privileged world that we are living in where there hasn't been an apocalypse and robots haven't taken over the world. I think that's something definitely for us to reinvestigate and that we continue to make choices for our own future to take that into consideration". Howard focused on Kate "being accustomed to fear and loss" because the character was a military brat.
Common as Barnes: John's right-hand man. Common stated the character was not overly developed, being "only just a bad-ass character, you know, really the big heavy of the movie", before McG's intervention. Common agreed with this, as "I didn't want to just be the big, bulky guy there" and worked on the emotional side, "thinking about how it would be in a world that's post-apocalyptic, a world where, you know, things have been destroyed and we're really fighting for survival."
Jane Alexander as Virginia: The leader of a group of human refugees.
Helena Bonham Carter as Dr. Serena Kogan / Skynet: An ex-Cyberdyne scientist who convinces Marcus to donate his body for her research. Her face is later used by the Skynet computer to communicate with Marcus. Tilda Swinton was originally considered for the part, but Bonham Carter replaced her before filming. She accepted the part because her then-domestic partner, Tim Burton, was a Terminator fan. Her role was a "small but pivotal" one and would only require ten days of shooting. However, on July 20, 2008, Bonham Carter delayed filming by a day, and was given an indefinite leave due to the death of four of her family members in a minibus accident in South Africa.
Michael Ironside as General Ashdown: The leader of the Resistance.
Ivan G'Vera as General Losenko: A member of the Resistance.
Roland Kickinger as T-800: The first Terminator covered in living tissue. Bodybuilder and actor Kickinger, who previously portrayed Schwarzenegger in the 2005 biographical film See Arnold Run, was his physical double on set. When asked about his role, Kickinger said it is "Arnold's character in the first Terminator. That's basically my role, but 20 years before, so it establishes how the Terminator came about." Polish strongman athlete Mariusz Pudzianowski was also considered for doubling Schwarzenegger. If Schwarzenegger had decided not to lend his appearance to the film, then John would have shot the T-800's face off before the audience got a good look at him.
* Arnold Schwarzenegger's facial likeness was recreated with CGI, with a mold of his face made in 1984 scanned to create the digital makeup. Schwarzenegger gave his consent to appear this way, due to being unavailable because he was serving as the Governor of California.
Jadagrace Berry as Star: An 8-year-old girl in Kyle's care. Born after Judgment Day, Star is mute due to the trauma of the post-apocalyptic world. Therefore, this has given her the unnatural ability to sense when a Skynet unit is approaching.
Brian Steele as the T-600.
Linda Hamilton as the voice of Sarah Connor: John's mother who died years ago of leukemia. In two scenes of the film, John plays Sarah's recorded cassette tapes for more information regarding Kyle Reese, Marcus Wright and Skynet's Terminators. Hamilton was uncredited for the role, and was the only actor from previous films to return.