The ‘Ahnuld’ Index: How Schwarzenegger’s Movies Stack Up
Arnold Schwarzenegger‘s latest film Maggie opens this weekend, and it may feature his least characteristic role to date: The former “Austrian Oak” plays a mourning father who watches his teenage daughter slowly succumbing to a fatal zombie virus. No quips, no action sequences featuring him mowing down hundreds of people, not even any real gore – it’s a radical departure, even for an actor who has been known to play against type from time to time. In short, it’s an Arnold film with very little Ahnuld-ness in it.
Hardcore fans can rest easy, though. In two months, the former Governator will be back in his most iconic role — a T-800 robot — in the latest installment of the venerable man-versus-machine franchise, Terminator: Genisys. That means this year will probably have seen at least two films from Schwarzengger: one featuring his least typical role, and one featuring his most typical one. And that makes this the perfect time to look over the bodybuilding champion-cum-action movie superstar’s career, and assess what makes some of his films so essentially…his. Here are 15 of Arnold’s movies — some good, some bad, a few quite ugly — rated according to their abundance (or lack) of Ahnuld-osity.
Pumping Iron (1977)
The character: Arnold Schwarzenegger, renowned body-builder, as he trains for the 1975 Mister Olympia title. (It’s a documentary.)
Violence: There’s no violence in this movie, but we do see Arnold smoking pot at one point – which the future politician once considered a lot more troubling than the violence in his films.
Best Quip: On weight-lifting: “It’s as satisfying to me as coming is. Having sex with a woman and coming…Can you imagine how much in heaven I am?” (If only he had said this after he killed somebody.)
Most impressive physical feat: This entire movie is a physical feat, frankly.
Fun with Austrian accents: “Blood iz rushing indo your muscles, and dat’s what we call da pump.”
Ahnuld-o-meter Score: 5. Of course, this movie is Arnold, in all his bulging-biceps glory. But while Schwarzenegger’s charisma is already evident, it’s interesting to see how different the real man was from his later screen persona.