Story of movie True Lies : True Lies is a 1994 American action spy film written, directed and co-produced by James Cameron. It stars Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jamie Lee Curtis, Tom Arnold, Art Malik, Tia Carrere, Bill Paxton, Eliza Dushku, Grant Heslov and Charlton Heston. It is a remake of the 1991 French comedy film La Totale! The film follows U.S. government agent Harry Tasker (Schwarzenegger), who struggles to balance his life as a spy with his familial duties.
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| Directed by | James Cameron |
| Produced by |
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| Screenplay by | James Cameron |
| Story by |
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| Based on | La Totale! by Claude Zidi Simon Michaël Didier Kaminka |
| Starring |
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| Music by | Brad Fiedel |
| Cinematography | Russell Carpenter |
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Production company | Lightstorm Entertainment |
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Release date |
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Running time | 141 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $100–120 million |
| Box office | $378.9 million |
True Lies was the first Lightstorm Entertainment project to be distributed under Cameron's multimillion-dollar production deal with 20th Century Fox, as well as the first major production for the visual effects company Digital Domain, which was co-founded by Cameron.
For her performance, Curtis won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy and the Saturn Award for Best Actress, while Cameron won the Saturn Award for Best Director. The film ultimately grossed $378 million worldwide at the box-office and was also nominated at the Academy Awards and BAFTAs in the Best Visual Effect category, and also for seven Saturn Awards.
Screenplay
Harry Tasker leads a double life: to his wife Helen and his daughter Dana, he is a computer salesman often away on business trips, while in reality he is a covert operative for a U.S. counter-terrorism task force called "Omega Sector". Harry and fellow Agents Albert "Gib" Gibson and Faisal infiltrate a party in Switzerland, where they learn of the existence of a terrorist group known as the "Crimson Jihad", led by Salim Abu Aziz. Harry suspects that American antiques dealer Juno Skinner has ties to Aziz, and visits her undercover as a corporate art consultant. Suspicious, Aziz and his men attempt to kill him, but Harry fights them off and loses Aziz in a pursuit; as a result, he misses the birthday party that his wife and daughter have arranged for him.
Harry heads to Helen's office the next day to surprise her for lunch, but overhears her talking to a man named Simon. He uses Omega Sector resources to learn that Simon is a used car salesman, who pretends to be a covert agent to flirt with Helen. Harry and other Omega agents, disguised, kidnap Helen while she is at Simon's trailer, and then frighten Simon into staying away from her. Using a voice masking device, Harry interrogates Helen and learns that due to his constant absence, she is desperately seeking adventure. Harry thus arranges for Helen to participate in a staged spy mission, where she is to seduce a mysterious figure (who is actually Harry himself) and plant a bug in his hotel room. Aziz's men suddenly burst in, kidnap the couple, and take them to an island in the Florida Keys.
Aziz reveals he has smuggled stolen MIRV nuclear warheads into the country via antique statues shipped by Juno, and threatens to detonate them in major U.S. cities unless the U.S. military leaves the Persian Gulf. He then orders the couple to be tortured; Harry (under a truth serum) finally confesses his double life to Helen, and then they escape to watch as Aziz has the warheads loaded onto vehicles. Harry leaves Helen to hide as he attacks Aziz's men, but Helen is captured by Juno and taken with the convoy on the Overseas Highway. Harry is rescued by Omega agents and pursues the convoy, sending two Harrier Jump Jets to stop it and destroy part of the bridge. Harry rescues Helen from Juno's limo before it careens into the ocean below.
Upon returning safely to the mainland, they quickly learn that Aziz and his men have taken control of a downtown Miami skyscraper and have kidnapped Dana, threatening to detonate the remaining bomb. Harry commandeers one of the jets to rescue his daughter. Faisal poses as part of a news team requested by Aziz, providing enough distraction for Dana to steal the ignition key and flee the room. Aziz chases Dana onto a tower crane when Harry arrives. Harry is able to rescue Dana, and after a tense struggle with Aziz, Harry eventually has him ensnared on the end of one of the plane's missiles, which Harry fires at a passing terrorist helicopter, killing Aziz and the renmants of his terrorist gang. Harry, Helen, and Dana are then safely reunited.
A year later, the Tasker's family integrity has been restored, and Helen has become another Omega Sector agent. Harry and Helen embark on a new mission together at a formal party, where they encounter Simon seducing one of the female guests. Helen and Harry intimidate Simon into fleeing, and the film ends with the couple dancing tango in celebration.
- Arnold Schwarzenegger as Harry Tasker
- Jamie Lee Curtis as Helen Tasker
- Tom Arnold as Albert 'Gib' Gibson
- Bill Paxton as Simon
- Art Malik as Salim Abu Aziz
- Tia Carrere as Juno Skinner
- Eliza Dushku as Dana Tasker
- Grant Heslov as Faisal
- Charlton Heston as Director Spencer Trilby
- Marshall Manesh as Jamal Khaled
- James Allen as Colonel
- Ofer Samra as Yusef
Schwarzenegger stated that while filming a scene with a horse, a camera boom hit the horse and "it went crazy, spinning and rearing" near a drop of 90 feet. Schwarzenegger quickly slid off the horse and stuntman Billy D. Lucas (who was one of Arnold's main doubles and closest friends) caught him; he concluded, " why I will always love stunt people". Costing $100–120 million to produce, True Lies was the first film with a production budget of over $100 million. It was filmed over a seven-month schedule.
Of the many locations that were used in the film, the Rosecliff Mansion was used for the ballroom tango scenes in the beginning of the film and the exterior of the Swiss chalet that Harry Tasker infiltrates is Ochre Court. The ballroom dancing scene that closes the film, as well as the scenes in the lobby of the fictional Hotel Marquis in Washington, take place in the Crystal Ballroom of the Millennium Biltmore Hotel in downtown Los Angeles. The outdoor structures used by Azis's smuggling ring as a base of operations were a series of custom made Alaska Structures fabric buildings, leased to the production crew during filming.
Box office
Opening in 2,368 theaters in the United States, True Lies ranked #1 in its opening weekend, earning $25,869,770. True Lies was a box-office success, earning $146,282,411 in the United States and $232,600,000 in the rest of world, totaling $378,882,411 worldwide, making it third best-grossing movie of 1994.
Critical reception
On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 72% based on 47 reviews, and an average rating of 6.6/10. The website's consensus states, "If it doesn't reach the heights of director James Cameron's and star Arnold Schwarzenegger's previous collaborations, True Lies still packs enough action and humor into its sometimes absurd plot to entertain". On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 63 out of 100, based on 17 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A" on an A+ to F scale.
Despite the positive reviews, the film was criticized by the National Review as sexist, cruel, or even misogynistic, for its treatment of female characters, such as the hero (Schwarzenegger) using his agency's resources to stalk and frighten his wife. Some Muslims perceived the film as conveying a strong anti-Arab or anti-Muslim prejudice.
In a negative review, Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times wrote:
| “ | Taken individually, the cruder and childish things about this film, its determination to use caricatured unshaven Arabs as terrorists, the pleasure it takes in continually mortifying a weasely used-car salesman (Bill Paxton) in the most personal ways, might be overlooked, but added together they leave a sour taste. | ” |
Accolades
For her performance, Jamie Lee Curtis received a 1994 Golden Globe for Best Actress in a Musical/Comedy.
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