The Terminal Man (1974) Alienation and Loss of Identity in Los Angeles 

When David Lynch recently passed away, I ended up reflecting on my High School Film Studies teacher who introduced me to Mulholland Drive (2001) and sent me down the rabbit hole. That class was life-changing, a crash course in film history, where he had the freedom to draw out some of his personal favourites. One of the most memorable was Get Carter (1971). When Mike Hodges passed away in 2022, I had similar reflections. Hodges’ gangster film is one of the all-time greats of its genre, an uncompromising quest for revenge that boasts one of cinema’s most memorable finales. The way in which my teacher dissected the film with such passion made it a breakthrough film which helped me fall in love with older films, and it’s one that still means a great deal to me. 

Whereas I hunted down all of Lynch’s films, Hodges’ filmography largely remained a mystery to me. Shortly after his death I dug deeper and was slightly surprised to find that Hodges was such an eclectic filmmaker; the gloriously silly Flash Gordon (1980), the less successful The Black Rainbow (1989) and the excellent Croupier (1998) painted the picture of a versatile director. I jumped at the chance to watch Arrow’s Blu Ray release of The Terminal Man (1974), keen to become reacquired with a director I am so fond of, who had swapped the bleak North East England beaches for the sunny promise of LA. Hodges’ adaptation of Michael Crichton’s novel of the same name follows Harry Benson (George Segal), a brilliant computer scientist, who undergoes experimental surgery in order to prevent him from suffering seizures which induce blackouts and violent behaviour. However the surgery backfires, causing Harry to experience the seizures more often, with worsening severity. Harry escapes from hospital and, finding himself increasingly detached from the world around him, is compelled into a murderous rampage.

The Terminal Man is a methodical film about alienation, loss of humanity and a distrust of technology. Nearly half of the film’s runtime is taken up by Hodges’ rigorous filming of the preparation and execution of the medical procedure. The director was prohibited from shooting in Black & White, so he adopted a limited, muted colour palette, which makes the film strikingly cold. What’s immediately impressive about The Terminal Man is the care and craft that has been poured into the design and cinematography. Fred Harpman’s (Deliverance) hospital design is a hulking, soulless space devoid of colour and personality. It is populated by goal-driven doctors, gaggles of white indistinguishable coats, dismissive of the rare dissenting voice. 

Hodges was heavily influenced by Edward Hopper, whose work he felt perfectly captured the alienation of Urban America. Richard H. Cline’s (Soylent Green) cinematography similarly creates feelings of seclusion, framing its characters isolated within their environment. There are a number of striking frames which create an ever-present uneasiness, defined by a lack of warmth in the colour palette, and in its clinical framing which further alienate the audience. Hodges felt an affinity with Harry Benson. The director’s experience of overwhelming loneliness while living in L.A bleeds into the film’s sensibility, identifying with Benson’s growing feelings of disconnect and his erosion of a sense of self. The casting of Segal, known at the time for his comedic work, is particularly genius because watching him roam hospital corridors, devoid of light, reinforces the film’s theme of Benson having his humanity taken away from him. There is no sense of the charm and wit that audiences would see from Segal in Robert Altman’s California Split which was released in the same year. He is a shell. And I think it’s a very inspired piece of casting and an effective performance. The Terminal Man makes for a fascinating addition to a canon of cinema which frames America from an outsider’s lens. Although entirely different, it reminded me of the unique perspectives of Paris, Texas, Blueberry Nights and American Honey. 

While I appreciated Hodges’ intentions and poured over the craft, I found The Terminal Man a hard film to love on a first watch. I found that the surgery, which is documented in painstaking detail, took me away from the world I’d become immersed in. A film that is so outwardly alienating relies on you fully staying with it, and as the surgery dragged on, I found my mind wandering. I was willing myself to share in Hodges’ connection with Benson, but I found more meaning in the film’s aesthetics than I did the character and story. That said, it’s clear I took much more from the film than audiences did in 1974. The Terminal Man had a limited release after a disastrous preview screening which saw Warner Brothers heavily scale back its intentions in the USA and refuse to release the film entirely in the United Kingdom. Thankfully, it still found passionate champions in Stanley Kubrick and Terence Malick, who both adored it. 

I want to re-emphasise my experience of a first watch because I can feel myself being drawn back to The Terminal Man. The Arrow release includes some great special features which furthered my understanding of the film and the craft which went into it. What’s particularly exciting about this release is that it allows the opportunity for a maligned film to find an audience that will appreciate it. One of the special features is a visual essay by film scholar Josh Nelson entitled A (Misunderstood) Modernist Masterpiece. There are going to be people who watch The Terminal Man for the first time and see what Kubrick and Malick did in the 70’s. I think I could be one of them in the future. One of the things I enjoy most about writing for The Geek Show is that I get to live in the films I review after watching them. I’ve been pouring over every detail of The Terminal Man and I can feel myself being drawn further into Hodges’ distinctive world. It’s been a long time since my film studies teacher emphatically introduced me to Mike Hodges, and after this experience, I feel I’m finally getting a better grasp on who he was.

Jimmy’s Archive – The Terminal Man (1974)