Christian Bale Won't Work With TERMINATOR SALVATION Director Again
After starring in Christopher Nolan's The Dark Knight, Christian Bale ("Batman Begins") next appeared in Terminator Salvation. It wasn't a positive experience for Bale and in a new interview he says he'll never work with director McG again.
It doesn't bode well for a film when the most memorable things about Terminator Salvation are Christian Bale's epic meltdown on the set and a computer-generated version of a young Arnold Schwarzenegger as a T-800. The fourth installment in the Terminator film series performed the worst at the box office. It only grossed $125M, which is $25M less than 2003's Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines. Some have blamed its poor performance on its PG-13 rating as all of the previous Terminator films have been rated R. Though, that seems like a flimsy excuse.
Bale wasn't impressed with McG's filmography at that time, which included Charlie's Angels (2000), Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle (2003) and We Are Marshall (2006). Despite his apprehension he decided to give McG a shot, and signed on for Terminator Salvation, but in this new interview with the Wall Street Journal he says he won't make that mistake again.
WSJ: I read that when you first sat down with the director of that film, McG, you told him that nothing you’d seen in his filmography suggested that he had what it takes to do that movie.
CHRISTIAN BALE: Right.
WSJ: That’s brutal. Directors have egos.
CHRISTIAN BALE: Ah, yes. Yeah. But he goes, “Give me a chance. Everyone needs to evolve, and I need to turn over a new leaf. And please, you must’ve been in this position before yourself, when someone has taken a leap of faith on you,”— which I have—“please do that for me now; I promise you, I’m ready for it.”
WSJ: So what do you think, having given him a chance?
CHRISTIAN BALE: (Pause) There’s a lot of room for many approaches and many characters within the film industry. I won’t be working with him again, but I wish him very well. Okay?
In the aftermath of Judgment Day and the machine takeover, resistance leader John Connor must counter Skynet’s plan to terminate mankind. Rallying his underground street fighters for a last, desperate battle, he realizes that to save the future he must rescue his own father Kyle Reese. But the most shocking discovery comes with the arrival of Marcus Wright, a mysterious loner from the past who challenges Connor with an impossible choice and leads them both on a brutal journey into the heart of the enemy.
Terminator Salvation (2009) was directed by McG, from a screenplay written by John Brancato and Michael Ferris. The cast included: Christian Bale as John Connor, Sam Worthington as Marcus Wright, Anton Yelchin as Kyle Reese, Bryce Dallas Howard as Kate Connor, Common as Barnes, Helena Bonham Carter as Dr. Serena Kogan and Roland Kickinger as the T-800 Model 101 (Arnold Schwarzenegger's CGI facial likeness).
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