Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines

With a reported $170-million budget, the third Terminator movie buys its way into public affection. Accordingly, this addition to the saga is bigger, louder and, in terms of its forthcoming apocalypse, darker. As soon as Arnold Schwarzenegger's T-101 cyborg arrives in the present to protect future saviour of the human race John Connor (an unprepossessing Nick Stahl), then we are propelled into an overlong car chase involving a truck, an industrial crane and an ambulance. The twist here is that the TX killing machine sent to eliminate Connor takes telepathic female form (a poised performance from former model Kristanna Loken). Other than that it's more of the same - the thrills are expensive, the chase highly charged and Arnie's one-liners suitably wry.