Terminator
3
Rise of the Machines
Fahrenheit 451 on television, even before Network, saw the
dangers. Terminator 3 sees the Internet in the same way, paradoxically
dangerous when “self-aware” by dint of its merits.
Criticism has
prevaricated on this point, just as it did on Truffaut’s film. Television was
more agreeable, at that time.
The real basis of
the entire series is revealed at the end to be Logan’s Run as much as
anything else. The dramatic effect of this after so much sequelization is
profound, especially as the model for Michael Anderson’s film is Jack Shea’s The
Monitors.
Schwarzenegger’s
evocation of Karloff as Frankenstein’s monster (in the breakdown scene) is
brief and telling. The totalitarian aspect comes from Alphaville.
The natural enemy is books, Bradbury and Truffaut tell us. Cameron and still more Mostow demonstrate the new enemy is cinema (and by extension, television), a large percentage of this film being a computer-generated cartoon.