Terminator III : Rise Of The Machines
Can I mention here and now that I really liked this third installment ? At first it seemed to doubt where to go with the story, but then it quickly jumped into overdrive with just enough T2-like actionscenes. Heavy truckdriving, a carchase and crashing into buildings. It's always enjoyable to watch Arnie crash into stuff, wearing dark sunglasses and a leather jacket. The man may be 56, but he still kicks ass. After the thrillride in the beginning - just before you start thinking "hey, is this a remake of the second one ?" - they switch to a more grim view of the proceedings with less big-budget action and more old school fighting-scenes and stunts which aren't necessarily CGI-based. Sorta like in the first one. This gives the movie a short, needed resting point while still keeping the plot going, building up to a semi-surprising (unless you're a very big fan) ending filled with (CGI) explosions, gunshots, utter grimness and a bleak worldview fitting the whole Terminator-world ... The ending deserves a two thumbs up.
Being a trilogy, there are some winks to the two previous ones (some cameos, references in sayings and mostly wearable accessories), sprinkled with just the right amount of humour. There has been a lot written about the amount of humour (being too much), but at least some people remember lots of funny scenes in T2 and in a smaller extent in T1. It's not totally out of order here. Sure, some stuff could be skipped, but usually it has some sort of meaning.
One big mistake though is to let go of the hugely recognisable theme song (dum dum dum dedum), it's in there, but only over the credits and slightly altered. It's sorely missed during the film because in the other two it enhanced the fear some characters seemed to have for that metallic beast slowly but patiently coming their way. Next to the theme from Jaws it must've been one of the best themes in movie-history - adding meat to the story instead of just bouncing funky through the speakers.
Maybe the theme was dropped because of budget-reasons ? A budget which might have been less of a factor if James Cameron would have directed it instead of Jonathan (U-571) Mostow ? Maybe that made it a case of "lesser known name, less money" ? Mostow did a decent job (especially in setting the grim tone and adding the new characters) but he's not the action-master that Cameron is. With him explosions would have been bigger, the pace more evenly quick, the plot-development a bit more leveled, maybe even a longer ending ? Off course it's already rumoured that there are more scenes which will be featured on the DVD (special edition ? deluxe edition ? ultimate edition ? or extreme edition ?) extending the length of the movie ... on that DVD we'll probably have a lot of extra scenes adding the character-development, evening the pace, lessing the humouristic impact ? It's all possible.

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