Arnie Love: Part 1

I will never apologize for knowing every-line of “Commando” by heart. I’m a ripped wife-beater wearing member of the cult of the Austrian Giant. I’ll be the first in line if Ah-Nold is holding a giant (metaphorically throbbing) gun on the cover, smiling his muscle bound grin and seconds away from spitting out a one liner that could decapitate an army of giant killer serpents. The only problem I have with the ‘Nold (Other then having him kick sand in my face) is the way his career watered itself down to nothing as the years took their toll. In the 80’s a Schwarzenegger was a chunk of raw meat cut off in it a helpless baby animal with a bone saw. In the late 90’s it was canned meat that had been sitting on the shelf too long. During this period, sometimes with the right person nudging him along he’d hit one out of the park (Mostly James Cameron: Terminator 2, True Lies) but everything else was bewildering stuff to say the least (Junior, Twins, Jingle All The Way). Finally, the turn of the millennium was not kind to the one *coughgreatcough* actor: Collateral Damage, Terminator 3, The 6th Day. All of themsteaming piles of doo-doo that is better And while the satan V.S The Undefeatable Man-Granite was entertaining for having our hero knock an 80 year old woman through a glass table it was still a pale initiation of what has come before.

This was supposed to be a review of “Total Recall” but I got so caught up in writing the introduction that I’m going to rant and rave about few of Arnold’s films (in no particular order) and highlight why I hold these close to my heart every night I drift off into a world filled with “YARRRRRRRRRR”

Terminator - Arnie comes from the future to kill the mother of a soon to be born revolutionary, or something, the 80's dazzle was too blinding. Lots of people die! They fall through glass thing as our hero...Oh...Arnie's the villain? Whatever. He's the hero. Okay. When the HERO shoots everyone falls through giant glass things. Then Arnold glowers. He glowers a lot in this movie. It quickly became the first piece of his acting chops. It went from glowering, to squinting and finally to wide eyed suprise, then more glowering to spice things up. Arnie wears a cool leather jacket. We learn that he’s really a robot. Surprise?

Commando - Arnie needs to save his daughter so shit gets blown up. Not enough people have their arms sliced off by buzz saw balde (Only One?). Arnie can seemingly psychically deflect bullets and make them his friends (Something that he’s used throughout his career). He can get machinery to start with the threat of violence. He lies and as a result people to their death. Laws of physics don’t apply because he IS A LAW OF PHYSIC. “

Totall Recall – Arnie goes to Mars and sees a girl with three breasts. He saves people, I think, I was too busy being freaked out of my mind by the expression “They’re eyes popped out of their skull!” being taken bloody literally. It made me believe we all have a little deformed midget psychic siamese brother named Klattu in all of us. It also illustrated to me that when people get shot half of their body exits with the bullet.