There’s few that would have thought that an Austrian lad with a vowel mangling accent and an unpronounceable surname would have been so successful in vastly differing careers namely bodybuilding, films and politics and yet that’s exactly what Arnold Schwarzenegger did. Having made notable appearances in Conan the Barbarian and making a name for himself in what would be his signature role in 1984’s The Terminator he would spend the rest of the 1980’s as cinemas No 1 box office star ousting Eddie Murphy from the top spot. Predator,Twins, Total Recall but especially Terminator 2 would secure his place as the most dependable box office star….at least for a while.
Things slipped with the underrated the meta antics of Last Action Hero – it didn’t help going up against some dinosaur film called Jurassic Park – but True Lies would be a temporary return to form but from then on he was in decline. 1994’s comedy ‘Junior’ followed by Jingle all the way saw a softening of the Arnold image and just about broke even. Batman & Robin was a kitsch mess that saw the preview audience shotuingm ‘Death to (director) Joel Schumacher!’ and saw a temporary end to the franchise till Christopher Nolan came along. But then disaster followed – End of Days, The 6th Day and Collateral Damage bombed losing money for the first time I his career. It necessitated a return to Terminator to resuscitate his career and did so to the tune of $433m but the writing was on the wall and his interest in politics was already spiked and saw him elected and re-elected as Governor of California from 2003 – 2011. His success would have made him a front runner to have become a Republican candidate for the US presidency if his citizenship had not barred film.
Instead he returned to film but that eight year period, thought he had made the occasional cameo appearance in films such as Around the World in 80 Fays, The Kid and I and far more entertainingly The Expendables and its first sequel. But those eight years had seen pretenders to the throne rise and overtake him. Jason Statham was on the rise (and they would appear in The Expendables with Arnie), Liam Neeson’s career was relaunched as an action man with ‘Taken’, Keanu was hot with The Matrix films and later John Wick, there was a new Bond drawing acclaim, Tom Cruise would be the man who would do his own insane stunts in a rejuvenated ‘Mission Impossible’ in 2011 and of course Arnie’s natural heir, Dwayne ‘the Rock ‘ Johnson, had filled the 80s action stars shoes adopting the career plan of alternating action films like ‘Fast and Furious 5’ with family friendly fare like ‘The Tooth Fairy’ and by 2016 he was the world’s highest earing move star.
By 2011 Arnold was 64 years of age and still had quite the physique and made what would be his comeback lead role in The Last Stand alongside Johnny Knoxville in a run of the mill actioner that disappointed both fans and box office earning a mere $48m from a film that had cost $45m. The films box office was hardly helped by the bombshell revelation that despite being married to Maria Shriver he had been having a ten year affair with a housekeeper during which he had fathered a son.
His next film would see him team up with his old action rival Sylvester Stallone saw them appear together in Escape Plan that made a healthy $137m. That was as good as it would now get. 2014’s muddled ‘Sabotage’ took only $22m. The zombie horror, ‘Maggie’ would actually turn out to be a melancholy character study of a man looking after his infected daughter instead of what should have been a great zombie actioner and consequently it made a paltry $1.6m. It’s little wonder that the appeal of a fifth Terminator film ( the fourth has seen his image only used in a cameo) and was a return to form with the film earning $440m despite a convoluted plot and the films big surprise twist being given away in the trailer. But after 2015 things went back to tanking again. 2017’s ‘Aftermath’, again a drama but here based on a true story barely scraped a million dollars and deserved to do far better. But by now his career in straight to video fodder was assured with 2017’s ‘Killing Gunther’ ‘s limited release saw it earn barely $200k and another return to his signature role was needed with Terminator Dark that was under rated and was a first in the franchise in that despite it making $261m dollars at the box office it cost $185m meaning that after marketing costs, distribution and such were taken into account.
The film made a loss and seemingly put an end to the franchise once and for all. It also saw Arnold who by then was 72 years old and. OK Harrison Ford might have been 80 years of age when he made his last Indiana Jones film but the action in those paled to that which audiences expected from Arnie.
Since then his career was been at something of a nadir having provided voices for video games, and made a Netflix TV series ‘Fubar’ which despite its action theme was never going to see him do what he had been doing 40 years previously and after the rise of the stuntman director such as Chad Stahelski with his John Wick franchise and director Gareth Evans whose The Raid films to date remain a benchmark for the genre raising the bar to an almost impossible to beat level
2027 will see Arnold hit 80 years of age and his action days would now seem to be firmly in the rear view mirror with family friendly comedies now more likely with him next appearing as Santa in 2025’s The Man with the Bag.
…….and as for more Terminator films, he wont be back!
related feature : Why Terminator 3 is better than you think…..
related feature : Nick Stahl chats about his dark new film, ‘What Josiah Saw’ as well as his role in Terminator 3
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