I am forbidden from getting too specific about my reaction to Terminator Salvation. But I think you’ll glean from my conversation with McG that I enjoyed myself. This is not the first time I’ve talked with the man, so I knew to prepare for enthusiasm and F bombs. He’d been doing a lot of press by the time I spoke to him and I think he may’ve been worn down. I hardly had to edit out that many expletives for this transcription. Below, then, is a record of our conversation wherein we discuss long takes, sound design, future projects, the Governor of California and the sex organs of famous film directors.
McG: Hey, it’s McG.
Jordan Hoffman: McG! Hold on a second, I want you to hear something. (soud of applause.) This is the sound I made at the conclusion of Terminator Salvation.
McG: That is the most glorious sound I’ve ever heard. I’m glad to hear it. We’re just getting it out in front of some fans and I am delighted that that was your response.
Jordan Hoffman: It was. And it’s weird, I saw it very early in the day, small screening in New York, lots of suits in there.
McG: What’s that all about?!
Jordan Hoffman: So not a lot of the typical boorish behavior you can expect from the “online reporter crowd,” if you will. In other words, I almost censored myself before letting out some of that Saturday Night Union Square “Yeaaaaagh!”
McG: Yes! Do it anyway! And I’m so glad to hear it.
Jordan Hoffman: And particularly, and I don’t want to give too much away, but the scene involving, uh, you know, a well-known Sacramento resident. But –
McG: Yeah, that came out pretty cool, huh? Those ILM guys. . .
Jordan Hoffman: Wait, wait, wait, we’ll get to that.
McG: Okay.
Jordan Hoffman: Let’s talk, quickly, about your di*k, because it is now, particularly vis-à-vis Michael Bay’s di*k, a cultural meme. But leave that aside – let’s talk about film history. Which director in all of history has had the biggest di*k?
McG: Indeed, I am told, it is Michael Bay. He’s packing the duraflame.
Jordan Hoffman: I’m talking about going back to the Lumiere Brothers?
McG: I understand. I hear Milton Berle and then Bay.
Jordan Hoffman: Fair enough.
McG: And, you know, jokes aside, that was meant to be ironic. Someone asked whose robots were bigger and I said, “That’s like asking who’s got a bigger co*k” and I thought that by the “Spartacus steps and midnight” reference people would know I was kidding. But things get lost in translation. But, hey, it won’t be the last time I say something that makes me sound like a complete jerk. I won’t give up my “fiery spirit.”
Jordan Hoffman: Absolutely. Okay, so I want to talk about a few scenes in Terminator Salvation that just knocked me out. The first one: Worthington and Moon Bloodgood are breaking out. They’re breaking out through the minefield and there is shrapnel flying in every direction, it’s hard to see, it’s total chaos, and, I didn’t realize this until after the sequence was over, was that there were a lot of really elaborate long takes –
McG: Oh, I’m so happy to hear that that registered.
Jordan Hoffman: But the thing is, it didn’t sink in until afterwards. I wasn’t sitting there thinking, “My, what complicated camerawork and choreography” I was more focused on, “Holy crap, how the hell are they gonna’ get out of there.” A really terrific battle scene. So, I was wondering where you took inspiration for this sequence – what some of your favorite battle scenes are?
McG: The inspiration for that sequence was Stanley Kubrick’s Paths of Glory. But the idea for much of the action in the picture is that I didn’t want to rely on cuts to create the action. I think that is a cop-out. I feel that through clever staging, blocking, rehearsal and planning you can inject a great deal of energy and action without cutting. And most importantly, when you don’t cut, or if you can do so without anyone noticing, as you just articulated, you don’t let the audience off the hook. The cut lets the audience off the hook, and that’s a bad thing if you are trying to get the audience to relate to the peril that the characters are experiencing. So we do it there and with regularity throughout the picture. Also at the beginning, when Christian is coming out of that hole.
Jordan Hoffman: With the helicopter? Yeah, that was insane! How the hell did you do that?
McG: We go all the way into a the helicopter, then up with the helicopter, then we crash it back down to Earth and there’s a mushroom cloud. . .
Jordan Hoffman: Yeah, it was a headscratcher. I was thinking about the Children of Men motorcycle assault sequence a lot. How long did it take to stage that sequence?
McG: A long time. And it was an amalgam of being out in the desert in New Mexico, we were in the parking lot of the studio where we built a 360 degree cyclorama greenscreen with a Huey helicopter on a gimbal rotating 360 degrees and then back out in the desert again. It was a synthesis of a number of shots coming together and we did a little bit of the Alfred Hitchcock Rope trick where we hid the cuts and, ultimately, we were able to stitch that scene together and I think it makes for a more breathtaking experience where you don’t cut and don’t let the audience off the hook.
Jordan Hoffman: Well, what delighted me so much about the whole movie was, you know, going back to T2 in 1991, T2 was a movie that is so shocking in that it doesn’t let up with the action. It just doesn’t stop. Terminator Salvation is different because you are not following a cyborg who is on a trail, you aren’t following so much one main character, but in terms of the pace, this is certainly in line with the rest of the Terminator franchise.
McG: We worked really hard to find that line. To keep enough character development and action. Because if it is too action-intensive, then it just becomes noise. If the action isn’t in service of propelling story and propelling character it doesn’t resonate. But, heck, by the same token, if it is all talking heads, guys like you and I woulda said, “this isn’t what I signed up for. Where’s my Terminator? Where’s the velocity? Where’s my fun?” So you need the balance and that’s where we’re so lucky to have the talents of Christian Bale and the breakout performance of Sam Worthington.
Jordan Hoffman: And Yelchin. It’s the Summer of Yelchin!
McG: It’s the Summer of Yelchin! Exactly. Every time I look at that kid’s face I feel like I’m looking at The Tin Drum.
Jordan Hoffman: I hadn’t thought of that before, but. . .
McG: Think about it, he’s got that gaunt, Slavic face.
Jordan Hoffman: He’s dynamite. I mean, Christian Bale is fantastic, but I know Christian Bale. Sam Worthington comes out of nowhere and I never saw Yelchin before Star Trek which was only a week ago. And he’s great and funny and cute as Chekov, but, this role is so different and he’s great in it, too.
McG: I love the “becoming” story. You look at Kyle Reese and we know how great of a job Michael Beihn did in the first one, but you see “hey, that’s where he learned that. That’s where he gets that holster from. 'Come with me if you want to live.’” And lots of other things. There were more little things that were in the original script, lines that echoed the original film, but ultimately I trimmed that back to make sure this film lived on its own.
Jordan Hoffman: Yeah, I thought the “fan service” was a good balance. When Christian Bale [SPOILER WARNING] says “I’ll be back” –
McG: And the Guns N Roses song.. . .
Jordan Hoffman: Yeah, but by the time we got toward the end of the film and got to that stuff I was like, “Oh, yeah. . .forgot about that.” I mean, I was thinking a lot about the other Terminator films at the beginning, but by the time we get into the meat of this story, I was, as they say, in the moment, and wasn’t doing comparisons.
McG: Well, heck, that’s really kind of you to say and I’m very happy that was your experience.
Jordan Hoffman: “I’ll be back” was a little cherry on top. But the thing that frickin’ blew my mind, well the gold medal scene was the Governor, we’ll get to that, but the silver medal scene – and I don’t know what you call them in the mythology – but those giant monster cyborgs that pick you up and put you in the train to Robo-Auschwitz. . .whatever they are called?
McG: Ha! Well, in the spirit of Spielberg if you want to go archetype of evil, go Nazi.
Jordan Hoffman: Okay, the giant Robo-Nazis that appear at the gas station scene. The SOUND those dudes made. That electronic horror noise – that was some of the most effective, visceral sound design I’ve ever heard.
McG: I wanted it to be Pavlovian.
Jordan Hoffman: It’s among the coolest robot sounds I’ve ever heard. What is the process of selecting that specific effect? I imagine the designers gave you a bunch of options and . . .
McG: I wanted it to be the sound of horror. The sound of the gears working. Like John Williams’ cue in Jaws. Shake the can of dog food and the dog will salivate at the sound – I wanted to tap into something very basic.
Jordan Hoffman: If I was thirteen years old seeing this movie with my buddies I’d be making that noise all afternoon.
McG: Awesome.
Jordan Hoffman: So, okay, going into the film, [SPOILER WARNING!] I had heard that there would be some sort of Arnold rendering. I figured that maybe we’d see his face on a computer monitor or some kinda graphic display. Can you just imagine the losing-of-sh*t that people are going to have, when we cut to those feet, and we pan up, right past his unit and then BLAM a full on fight scene with Arnold. So. . . .how the hell did this happen? To what extent was he involved?
McG: As you know, I spoke to Jim Cameron before I made the film and we went over what I was trying to achieve and he never gave his blessing, but he said he’d prefer the film was good instead of bad. And I said I’d prefer Avatar was good to bad and we laughed about this and he told me about following Ridley Scott after Alien when he made Aliens. So, after this, naturally, I reached out to Schwarzenegger. And I said I can’t do this without you being aware about it and I can’t do it if you are against it. And he was supportive and we stayed in touch throughout pre-production and physical production and post-production. And all he said was, “just show it to me.” He never said “yes” until we showed him a very high resolution version of what we were cookin’ up with the guys at ILM. So, he was cooperative, but it wasn’t until he saw what was very close to the finished product and looking very good, it wasn’t until he was confident that we could make it clear to the people of California that he never left his responsibilities in the State House to go hang out at craft services and mess around on a movie set that he ultimately said “yes.” And now he’s been effusive in his praise and it feels good. But most importantly, I wanted to have our movie stand on its own two feet and be independent of Arnold Schwarzenegger. So once we achieved that, and I feel that we did, we were free to use him in the movie and make a good union. But you tell me!
Jordan Hoffman: I did not expect a full throw-down. People are going to lose their freaking minds. I can’t wait to hear that Ziegfeld audience or Union Square audience opening night and hear people go insane. They should. And if they don’t, screw 'em.
McG: This has been. . .a pleasant conversation. I wish we could watch it together and talk about more specific stuff. We’re having another screening in New York, make sure you are there.
Jordan Hoffman: I’ll do what I can. Last question: 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea first, or Terminator 5?
McG: Don’t know yet. Depends on the reaction to this one. My heart is with Terminator, I’ve got the story arc’d out – and the one after that, too – but it is in the hands of the fans now. If people are passionate we’ll be ready to go. But I don’t want to continue a franchise that’s run out of gas, so we have to see the reaction.
Jordan Hoffman: So right now you temporarily unemployed.
McG: Well, I’m working on Spring Awakening and 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea. And on TV there’s Chuck and Supernatural and hopefully Human Target, the comic property from DC.
Jordan Hoffman: What movie are you dying to see this summer?
McG: Star Trek.
Jordan Hoffman: You haven’t seen it? Summer of Yelchin! What’s the matter with you?
McG: I hear it is terrific.
Jordan Hoffman: Go to UGO and read my review.
McG: I will.
