James Cameron’s film The Terminator is a hybrid of genres
with action, science-fiction and horror being most notable. It contains many of
the generic conventions of each of these three genres. Producers use genre to
help sell their films, audiences use genre to help choose what films they will
watch and even the creative people behind the films use genre to help script
their films. Genres are about repetition and formula but they are also about
creating expectations and often subverting those expectations. Genre films have
to tread a fine line between being familiar enough to entice and audience but
also being too repetitive and predictable.
The Terminator ensures it will appeal to a wide ranging
audience by containing many conventions of different popular genres. This means
there will be much that is familiar to audiences about it but there will also
be a lot that is new to them as well. Generic conventions can be divided into
iconography, narrative and thematic. I will focus on the iconography of The
Terminator, analysing what conventions it uses to appeal to horror, action and
sci-fi fans as well as how it updates, changes and subverts expectations that
the audience might have.
Action movie
iconography
Although early in his career, Arnold Schwarzenegger was
already becoming typecast in American films by the time he starred in The
Terminator in 1984. He was known for his huge muscles, a physique crafted from
years of bodybuilding and for his Austrian accent. He has already starred in
fantasy action films such as Conan the Barbarian and looked like the kind of
alpha male hero Hollywood could feature in an action film. However Arnold
Schwarzenegger was cast as the villain in The Terminator to help make the hero
look like more of an underdog and therefore make the film more suspenseful and
exciting.
The early scenes of the film feature a fight between The
Terminator and some punk youths. This involves a knife which should be a
terrifying weapon. However the Terminator is not frightened by the youths,
their knife or hurt when he is stabbed. This sets him up as a dangerous villain
that will be hard to kill. The film also features lots of chases, both on foot
and in cars. These are fast paced and exciting for the audience and are shot,
edited and scored to make them appear tense and thrilling with the sound of
screeching tyres used to emphasise speed. Guns are often used and the sound of
gunshots can be heard which also adds excitement as guns can be used to hurt people
from a distance and they are a symbol of power and deadly force. The Terminator
also features fire and explosions which are major signifiers of destruction and
are caused by using weapons. The tension around an impending explosion is built
through intercutting between shots of the fuse burning and then shots of the
people who may be affected by the explosion as in the scene where Reese puts a
bomb in the tanker that Sarah is being chased by.
Police cars and police uniforms also feature in The Terminator
but they are not the heroes of the film, as is often typical with action films.
The hero is a plain clothed soldier from the future and to further subvert
expectations, the villain drives a police car at one point.
Science fiction
iconography
The Terminator also has many iconic conventions of the
science fiction film. It frequently uses special effects such as lasers that
fly across the screens, representing the firepower of futuristic weaponry. The
idea of a robot that looks human not something that has been invented yet and
is therefore futuristic. The audience is made aware that Schwarzenegger’s
Terminator is not human in a number of ways. There are point of view shots that
have a red tint and written data scrolling on screen and this is accompanied by
robotic noises so the viewer knows they are seeing what the robot sees.
Eventually it is revealed that beneath the skin, The Terminator has a metal
skeleton with bright red eyes. This signifies strength, anger and death and
makes him appear to be from the future and also dangerous and almost impossible
to kill.
There are also scenes set in 2029 when machines are hunting
and killing humans. The future is bleak with destruction everywhere and humans
living underground. The machinery looks unfamiliar to modern audiences and the
world is unrecognisable. The connotations of machinery that flies through the
sky shooting lasers while humans scurry around on the surface trying to fight
back is that technology has taken over the planet and has become more powerful
than humans. This is a typically dystopian vision of the future that is
reminiscent of other science fiction films such as The Matrix and even Jurassic
Park where technology allows people to re-create dinosaurs than then go on a
rampage.
Horror iconography
The Terminator also has elements of the horror film in its
iconography. James Cameron uses suspenseful music during chases to build the
idea of threat. Most of the film takes place at night with low key lighting.
The idea that only bad things happen at night and the poor visibility of night
time adds to the excitement and suspense. There is blood and gore and a focus
on injuries in some scenes. For example when The Terminator cuts his arm open
or takes his eye out, there is the kind of graphic detail that might be
expected in a horror film.
Though the killer uses a gun as his weapon of choice, he
also hunts down women who appear weaker and more innocent than he is. This
focus on female victims and also that we see from the killer’s point of view is
similar to slasher film conventions. The fact the killer murders his
defenceless victims in cold blood and never shows any remorse or emotion is
also similar to slasher film villains like Michael Myers and Jason Vorhees. The
Terminator is also occasionally shot from a low angle to make him look dominant
and Schwarzenegger’s face never changes to show that he is robotic, inhuman and
impossible to reason with... just like a slasher killer!
