It’s seems like a strange thing to say but ‘The Terminator’ was and is essentially a ‘cult’ movie. And a damn fine one at that!

Due to the many increasingly poor sequels that followed ‘The Terminator’ is often misrepresented as something it isn’t. But re-watching it you’ll see that it’s actually a great sc-fi movie and a very unique one at that.

It tells the story of Sarah Connors, who unbeknownst to herself, will give birth to the leader of a future resistance movement named John Connors. John Connors is rebelling against a computer network named ‘Skynet’ that rules the future. Skynet sends a ‘Terminator’ back to 1984 to try and kill the mother of Connors. The resistance movement also send back their own emissary, Kyle Resse, to try and stop the Terminator and protect Sarah Connors.

Although a sc-fi flick it’s also a great chase movie with both future beings desperately trying to kill and protect Connors respectively. It’s unashamedly dark and very much of the 1980’s.

But the real star of the show in Arnold Schwarzenegger, who plays the eponymous ‘Terminator’. Although, James Cameron, the director originally didn’t want to hire him as the Kyle Reese character, when he meet Schwarzenegger he immediately saw him as the perfect actor for the Terminator. In a certain sense it was the role Schwarzenegger was born to play, a machine with no emotion. In fact he only has 16 lines but he’s incredible as the impassive killing machine.

Of course some see deeper things in the movie than a mere sc-fi chase movie. Some see it as a Biblical story; a man from the future comes to save us all. Kyle impregnates Sarah Connors and she becomes pregnant with a son who will be called John Connors, his initials being ‘J’ ‘C’. That might be stretching it a little?

It’s a great movie none the less... 

You can hear the whole chat between Shane and John here....