Sam Worthington as Marcus Wright in 'Terminator Salvation'
The Australians in Film Awards were held on Friday night and The Dish Rag managed to catch both James Cameron and Sam Worthington on the red carpet.
During the interview Cameron, who later presented Sam Worthington with the AIF Breakthrough Award, talks about Avatar and agrees that Worthington will be the next big movie star.
Watch it now:
Sam Worthington as Marcus Wright in 'Terminator Salvation'
Terminator Salvation director McG (Joseph McGinty Nichol) has told reporters that he originally approached Christian Bale for the role of Marcus Wright – but Bale wanted to play John Connor.
Originally the role of John Connor in the Terminator Salvation screenplay was a small one leaving the story to remain centered on the character of Marcus Wright. Since Bale was already a huge star, his desire to play Connor forced a rewrite of the movie.
The script became a “moving target” according to McG, who states he worked day and night with Bale to integrate him into it.
“A lot of the work was integrating (Connor) into scenes … and having that feel integral and sensible, as opposed to grafted on just because there was a star in the part,” John Brancato, a screenwriter on the film, told reporters.
Of course that meant finding a new actor for the role of Marcus Wright, an executed death row inmate who donates his body to science only to find himself re-emerging alive once the machines have taken over the world.
In Terminator Salvation both John Connor and Marcus Wright are equally important characters. Bale asked that he be consulted about who would play the character of Wright, and ultimately all agreed Australian Sam Worthington was the man for the job.
“There’s a benefit of currently a lot of people in the States not being familiar with him, and so you can really enjoy that performance that much more,” Bale said. “He’s got so many movies that are going to be coming out, because many other people have realized that he’s bloody good.”
In addition to Terminator Salvation, Bale was referring to James Cameron’s Avatar, the remake of Clash of the Titans and two lesser known movies Last Night and The Debt.
Terminator Salvation opens in theaters:
USA – May 21
Canada – May 22
UK – June 3
Australia – June 4
Source: THR
Back in April we learned from McG that the ending of Terminator Salvation isn’t a happy one and it will leave audiences divided.
“It’s not a happy little bow of an ending at all,” he said. “The ending is tough and requires reflection, and in some degrees it bifurcates the audience. You walk back to the car and one person thinks it means this, and the other person thinks it means that.”
Whilst we’ll have to wait until May 21 to see the ending for ourselves, we now know that whatever it is, it could have been tougher, unhappier and even more divisive. Recently McG spoke at a press roundtable where he served up insight on what the ending was going to be – before it was changed.
That was at a time when there was a very dark ending. There was a great irony in the way this film shook down. There was this leak that Connor dies and they put Connor’s face on top of the machine body of Marcus. Everybody went, “Booooooo, what’s that?” That’s half of it [the ending]. We had a jet-black ending. Connor dies, we’re in a room with all the people we care about. You take Connor’s likeness, you put it on the living machine of Marcus. He sits up, now looking like Christian Bale, takes a gun, kills Kate, kills Kyle, kills Star, kills everybody, eyes flare red, [snaps] the end.
Apparently the ending just described was actually filmed because McG is still deciding whether or not to include it on the DVD as an extra. Let’s hope he does, no matter how grim it is. It would be sad to hear about it and never get to see what could have been.
Terminator Salvation opens in theaters:
USA – May 21
Canada – May 22
UK – June 3
Australia – June 4
Source: io9
Christian Bale as John Connor in 'Terminator Salvation'
*Spoilers Below*
Although we’ve known for a while, Arnold Schwarzenegger’s appearance in Terminator Salvation was ‘officially’ confirmed in a press conference screening of the new film last Thursday.
In the film, Christian Bale (John Connor) faces off against a completely nude Arnold Schwarzenegger appearing as the T-800 Terminator he is so well known for.
“I get a thrill out of seeing the scene where Connor faces off against the original T-800,” Christian Bale said. “I didn’t meet [Schwarzenegger] on the set. He didn’t have to expend one second of time.”
His comments relate to the fact that Schwarzenegger’s appearance comes courtesy of CGI. Schwarzenegger couldn’t participate in the film due to his Governator duties, and so to include him required some visual effects wizardry. To make it work, his face was digitally added to the body of Austrian bodybuilder and actor Roland Kickinger. Kickinger is so similar to Schwarzenegger that he played him in a 2005 TV movie titled See Arnold Run. His similarities also scored him an appearance in Terminator Salvation as a prototype of the T-800.
Don’t get too excited though. Schwarzenegger’s T-800 only turns up for a moment before he gets mangled beyond recognition.
“I didn’t want the scene to go on,” said director McG. “I just wanted it to be a tip of the cap [to the original.] I think that’s a nice moment in the movie when that shows up.”
Watch the following interview from Collider with Terminator Salvation Direct McG in which he suggests 30-40 minutes of deleted scenes from the film may make it to the DVD. The scenes include long John Connor speeches, the topless scene with Moon Bloodgood, and an alternate ending.
Don’t watch the interview if you don’t want to hear spoilers!
Source: Collider
We’ll call today Terminator Salvation day! A whole heap of clips from Terminator Salvation have hit YouTube. They will probably be pulled, but until then we’ve embedded three of them below. You can also visit user HeezNeez to see the rest. Also, Warner Bros. have released a ton of new images from the film. We’ve sorted through them to select the ones that are new. You can see those in the gallery below.
Whatever you need:
Sam Worthington in 'Terminator Salvation'
IESB have posted an excellent run down on a press interview with Sam Worthington on the Terminator Salvation promotion trail. If you didn’t already know, Worthington is the 32 year old Australian bricklayer turned actor who is about to take the world by storm with his roles in three blockbusters: Terminator Salvation, Avatar, and Clash of the Titans…and maybe a fourth in The Green Lantern.
Here’s a selection of excerpts from the interview categorized by film. For the full interview, head on over to IESB.
Terminator Salvation
Q: What was your take on your character? How did you see this guy?
Sam: To be honest, I looked at him as Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz. That was always stuck in my head, about this person waking up in another world and finds himself as they go on this yellow brick road and find the heart, the brain, the sensitivity, and all these characters you meet. And, he’s going to Skynet, which is Oz, to ask the question, “Why am I not fuckin’ dead?” That’s how I looked at it. That’s why I’m wearing a blue coat. Dorothy wears a blue dress. Things like that were stuck into it. Alice in Wonderland, same thing. That’s how I approached the character. I also wanted to be a robot that felt pain, not only physical, mental and emotional, but here’s a guy who wanted to die for his sins and the irony is that he wakes up and he can’t die. He’s stuck and his penance is to suffer, until he transforms and becomes a better human being.
Q: Did James Cameron say anything to you about being in Terminator?
Sam: I told him that they wanted me to do it, and I said, “Here’s my take on the character and here’s what I want to do with it,” and he told me, “Just don’t fuck it up!” That was about it. And then, he went back to filming Avatar. As Jim said, he wants to look at it, as a fan.
Historically the Terminator movies have received R-Ratings in the US, so when Terminator Salvation was announced with a PG-13 a few fans became a little upset with some even calling for the film to be blacklisted.
In a recent interview with Sci Fi Wire, McG attempted to clarify the story behind the rating.
“We shot an R movie,” McG says, “and at the end of the day we found that if we just cut back one shot of the Marcus character stabbing a screwdriver through the shoulder of one of these thugs it would warrant a PG-13. We thought, ‘Well, that would be ridiculous to make it tough for kids to go see this movie.’ We were inspired by The Dark Knight getting a PG-13 and being a film without any compromises. So we took the rating we got and ran for it. We never had to shoot for a rating. We were liberated by [Warner Brothers president of production] Jeff Robinov from day one, and I give you my word that there’s no way that Christian or Sam or I, for that matter, would shoot a picture aiming for a rating. We never cared. We just shot what we thought was best, and, short of gratuitous gore, which I don’t think furthers the story or furthers the characters, we didn’t really have a problem with it.
Check out this four-minute long trailer for Terminator Salvation featuring never before seen footage and dialogue from the film. A word of warning: there’s a lot of footage in this trailer. If you want to enjoy the movie to the maximum, it wouldn’t hurt to skip the trailer. That said, we’ve watched it numerous times and it hasn’t dampened our spirits!
Terminator Salvation opens in theaters:
USA – May 21
Canada – May 22
UK – June 3
Australia – June 4
Warner Bros. has released full production notes on Terminator Salvation. The production notes are detailed and provide excellent insight into not only the production of the film, but also a very detailed synopsis of the storyline. We’ve mixed it up with concept art and stills from the film to help make it easier on the eye as its very long.
*Warning: Spoilers Galore*
EXTENDED STORY SYNOPSIS
The year is 2018. Judgment Day has come and gone, leveling modern civilization. An army of Terminators roams the post-apocalyptic landscape, killing or collecting humans where they hide in the desolate cities and deserts. But small groups of survivors have organized into a Resistance, hiding in underground bunkers and striking when they can against an enemy force that vastly outnumbers them.
Controlling the Terminators is the artificial intelligence network Skynet, which became self-aware 14 years earlier and, in the blink of an eye, turned on its creators, unleashing nuclear annihilation on an unsuspecting world.
Only one man saw Judgment Day coming. One man, whose destiny has always been intertwined with the fate of human existence: John Connor (Christian Bale).
Now the world is on the brink of the future that Connor has been warned about all his life. But something totally new has shaken his belief that humanity stands a chance of winning this war: the appearance of Marcus Wright (Sam Worthington), a stranger from the past whose last memory is of being on death row before awakening in this strange, new world.
Connor must decide whether Marcus can be trusted.
But as Skynet adapts new strategies to end the Resistance forever, Connor and Marcus must find common ground to take a stand against the onslaught—to infiltrate Skynet and meet the enemy head-on.
