Ridley Scott reveals he turned down a $20m offer to make Terminator 3

‘I can’t be bought,’ director said

Alien director Ridley Scott has said he is “proud” to have once turned down what he claims was a $20m (£14m) offer to make Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines.

The 87-year-old filmmaker said he was advised by a friend to ask for the same fee as the franchise’s star Arnold Schwarzenegger, and was floored when his request was granted by the production company.

“I can’t be bought,” Scott told The Guardian of his decision to decline, adding: “I thought: ‘F*** me.’ But I couldn’t do it. It’s not my thing.”

Scott likened the task of directing Terminator 3 to directing a James Bond film: “The essence of a Bond movie is fun and camp. Terminator is pure comic strip,” he said. “I would try to make it real.”

He added: “That’s why they’ve never asked me to do a Bond movie, because I would f*** it up.”

Avatar director James Cameron directed The Terminator and its sequel Terminator 2: Judgement Day – widely considered one of the greatest sci-fi films ever made – before stepping away from the franchise.

Cameron’s plans for Terminator 3 were scuppered shortly after the second film’s release when the production company that owned half of the rights filed for bankruptcy and the rights were sold off.

Ridley Scott has revealed he turned down £14m to make ‘Terminator 3’ (Getty Images for Paramount Pictures)

The director never revealed his initial plans for the franchise’s third instalment, and more than a decade passed before Jonathan Mostow replaced him to make 2003’s Rise of the Machines.

Elsewhere in the interview, Scott confirmed a third Gladiator film is “in process” following the box office success of Gladiator II, starring Paul Mescal, which was released last year.

When asked if he’d make another Alien film to follow Prometheus in 2012 Alien: Covenant in 2017, Scott said: “Another Alien prequel – yeah, if I get an idea, for sure.”

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Arnold Schwarzenegger in ‘The Terminator' (MGM)

Scott rose to fame with his film Alien in 1979. He has been nominated for three Academy Awards for Directing for Thelma & Louise (1991), Gladiator (2000) and Black Hawk Down (2002).

Most recently, he directed The Last Duel, his 2020 adaptation of Eric Jager’s book The Last Duel: A True Story of Crime, Scandal and Trial by Combat in Medieval France, starring Adam Driver, Matt Damon, Ben Affleck and Jodie Comer.

In her three star review, The Independent’s Clarisse Loughrey dubbed the film “a perfectly engrossing slice of historical intrigue” that “functions as broad entertainment”.