Star Trek
Satirical website The Onion is currently running a highly amusing article entitled “Star Trek Fans Outraged New Film Is Exciting, Enjoyable”. It includes interviews with Trekkies complaining that there is no stiff acting, no heavy handed messages about tolerance and that the storyline made sense. For those like me who are of the opinion that latterly Star Trek degenerated into self-important politically correct pomposity, this is a blast of fresh air and a very tasty slice of summer blockbuster entertainment.
With Lost creator JJ Abrams at the helm, this isn’t merely another excuse to indulge in the current trend for origin stories (Casino Royale, Batman Begins and so on), but through a nifty piece of storytelling, totally rewrite the Star Trek universe. The film opens with James Kirk being born on a shuttle escaping from a gigantic Romulan starship that has come back through time to change the future. Kirk’s father then heroically saves those escaping, and gets himself killed in the process.
Thus, the entire history of Star Trek is thrown into a parallel universe. In the original, Kirk’s father lived to a ripe old age and saw his son become a starship captain. In this, having established the parallel timeline, Abrams goes on to make other major changes to Star Trek’s established chronology in a plot that is both delightfully satisfying and a bold act of defiance against stuffy fans.
To say too much more about the plot would spoil the fun, but the entire cast are a joy to watch. They all wisely avoid impersonations of the earlier cast, and instead make the characters their own. Chris Pine’s Kirk is a misguided rebellious youth who thinks nothing of taking on four men in a bar room brawl (“Get another two and it’ll be a fair fight” he taunts). Zachary Quinto (Sylar from Heroes) is an excellent young Spock not yet able to fully control his emotions. The film centres on their relationship, and how they go from hating each other to mutual respect with, ultimately, a great friendship ahead of them. In many ways, it’s a buddy pairing equal to Butch and Sundance.
The rest of the cast are all good in their supporting roles. Karl Urban’s grouchy Dr McCoy is slightly sidelined, but nevertheless enjoyable, especially in scenes where he clashes with Spock. This is of course was a vital ingredient in the original series, where Kirk has to navigate the middle ground between emotions (Dr McCoy) and logic (Spock). Elsewhere Zoe Saldana, John Cho and Anton Yelchin are all good as Uhura, Sulu and Chekhov respectively. Simon Pegg’s Scotty turns up late in the day, but provides some big laughs. Winona Ryder and Ben Cross play Spock’s mother and father respectively, and Eric Bana’s Romulan Nero provides a memorable, well motivated villain. Finally, Bruce Greenwood turns up as the original Enterprise Captain Pike (played by the excellent Jeffrey Hunter in the original TV series). Pike becomes a mentor to Kirk and although the timeline has changed, there is a good visual reference at the end to his ultimate fate that neatly ties back in with the original TV series.
Speaking of which, Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci’s screenplay does not entirely ignore fans either. There are some very good in-jokes (Sulu’s fencing skills for instance), and after years of dull prime directive obsessed characters who think it best to strike their enemies with a leaflet campaign, its great to see the politically incorrect, skirt-chasing, shoot-first-ask-questions-later Captain Kirk back in charge of the Enterprise. Speaking of political correctness, the film’s one concession to this is where the words “where no man has gone before” is changed to “where no one has gone before”.
On a technical level, Abram’s direction is surprisingly stylish, Michael Giacchino’s music score is appropriately epic and the special effects and sound effects are predictably fabulous. This really needs to be seen on the biggest screen possible and in the best sound systems (especially for the wonderful sonic booms of the Enterprise going to warp speed).
To be fair, there are some nits to be picked. A subplot involving a Ceti Eel (a nasty mind controlling parasite that first appeared in The Wrath of Khan) isn’t properly resolved, a critical meeting between Kirk and a character I won’t name for fear of spoiling the plot is too much of a co-incidence, and there is a romantic subplot between Uhura and Spock which I wasn’t sure was entirely in keeping with his character. That said, these are nits, and in no way spoil the experience.
I note with interest on the BBFC website that one of the reasons Star Trek has been given a 12 certificate is that “both positively and negatively presented characters often resolve conflict situations through violence”. Of all the sanctimonious, moralistic reasons to give a film a 12 rating, this has got to be one of the worst, and proves my point about how 12 has effectively become the new PG, as this film would easily have got a PG twenty years ago. Although it’s clearly not appropriate (or understandable) for small children, ten year olds will love it as much as adults.
In fact, even if you hate Star Trek, its worth giving this one a go. I personally still prefer The Wrath of Khan, but I would imagine almost everyone will disagree. At any rate, I haven’t come out of a Star Trek film thinking it was brilliant since The Voyage Home (the one about saving the whales) in 1987. In a time when filmmakers seem increasingly obsessed with making “dark” blockbuster films, this is colourful, exciting and ultimately about one thing: great fun.
Simon Dillon, May 2009.
Really keen to see this - might actually have to get a babysitter! Interestingly, just watched the last movie, Nemesis, for the first time last night (I think I am now up-to-date on Trek movies). The series desperately needed a breath of fresh air, let’s just say that!
Comment by Sparky — 11 May, 2009 @ 11:08 am
ooooooo! i do not dare to read you review. cant wait to see this. will read afterwords :>
Comment by smäm — 11 May, 2009 @ 3:09 pm
saw the movie yesterday. lovded it!
what happend to the new blog theme btw? have noticed you’ve changed back.
Comment by smäm — 13 May, 2009 @ 12:21 pm
I’m not sure about the blog design. It changed, as you said (and I liked the change) then it changed back. I assumed Mark changed it in both cases.
Mark - please could you change it back? I’m actually not that keen on the current format either.
Comment by Simon — 13 May, 2009 @ 3:51 pm
yes mark, please.
Comment by smäm — 14 May, 2009 @ 8:55 am
I think we need photos of Simon and Marky-Sparky on the site so we can get to know the reviewers. Also i think Simon needs a new reviewer name as Marky-Sparky is such a cool name compared to Simon. Also can someone do something about the search function on this website as it is very hard to navigate the site.
With a rebranding of the design I think you also need to do a promotion drive as trying to find the website on google is harder than finding sand on the beach.
Comment by Adam — 14 May, 2009 @ 9:43 am
I’m with Adam on this one, I tried looking for the Gran Torino review and ended up finding a review for a gay porno ‘Poke Back Mountain’ or something like that.
Wasn’t impressed to find on ‘moviesforchristians’.
Cheers
Tom
Comment by Tom Jacobs — 14 May, 2009 @ 9:50 am
Yes, I know I changed it and then changed it back, and I apologise, cos I know this one is boring. However, I get very frustrated by blog designs where there are massive gaps on both sides of the screen - with this one you can see plenty of the text, and I like having just one sidebar rather than two. Sadly the range of themes available on blogsome hasn’t improved since I set up the blog nearly 4 years ago (wow - long time!)
I’d have no problem having photos of us reviewers, but again, I don’t know of a way to do it using this theme and layout - maybe I can investigate.
The other option, Simon, is to set up the blog on another blog provider, such as Wordpress (where I have my Bible reading blog at http://biblesoap.wordpress.com/) which has a far more funky range of layouts, and I could gradually transfer all the reviews across.
I’m afraid I can’t do anything about the search facility on the site itself - all in blogsome’s hands, that one.
Comment by Sparky — 14 May, 2009 @ 8:39 pm
Surely you can fiddle with the templates, Mark? Or *someone* could, if *someone* were given admin rights
Blogsome is based on Wordpress and as such you ought to be able to export the files easily if you wanted to change blog provider. But any free blogging platform will have limitations, the only way to really improve it is to buy a domain name and install Wordpress yourself. Which might be worth doing?
Comment by Sarah — 14 May, 2009 @ 8:56 pm
Annnyyyway….back to Star Trek.
I fear, Simon, that your usual objectivity has been lessened somewhat by your love of the original series. I saw this last night, and I will say from the outset that I enjoyed the film and found it in parts very exciting. However, the movie doesn’t really push the envelope, making use of well-worn plots concerning the use of time travel, worm holes and the good old paralell universe.
I disagree with your comment that the cast are avoiding impersonating their predecessors. I hold the opposite view and felt there was too much impersonating for my liking (citing Bones in particular, and also Kirk with his-occasional-lapse-into-staccato-speech and Shatner-esque inflection).
As for the brave decision to re-invent the Star Trek universe by re-writing history? I suspect this to be more of a commercial decision to allow more freedom with the doubtless plethora of sequels. This film felt in places like the director was merely setting the scence for what is to follow, which whilst this is understandable when undertaking a product so large as this, I just wanted more bang for my buck.
I think this a film worth seeing, but if you are not familiar with the characters be prepared to sit confused whilst the rest of the audience bathes in a sea of in-jokes. Sorry to burst the bubble. Enjoyable? Yes. Brilliant? No.
Comment by Jaimie — 15 May, 2009 @ 8:50 am
Hi Jaimie - I would actually argue that this is a Star Trek film that non-Trekkies can enjoy. The in-jokes would go over their heads, but critically the film doesn’t depend on them or knowledge of Trek lore for enjoyment. In fact, I know several people who have never watched Star Trek in their lives, went into this film expecting to hate it, and came out loving it.
Comment by Simon — 15 May, 2009 @ 12:29 pm
Isn’t Star Trek just for geeks?
I understand that if real life isn’t great for you, then you wallow in a make believe world of star ships etc and forget about your meaningless, painful existence, rather than crying yourself to sleep year in year out.
Or is that not the case?
Comment by Tim — 15 May, 2009 @ 1:14 pm
I think you should start your own movie blog jamie nothing like a good bit of competition to make you both up your game and i think us movies fans need a bit of variety and choice in our selection of reviews.
Comment by Adam — 16 May, 2009 @ 7:08 pm
Hi Adam,
Yet again, you have made a brilliant point. Have you ever thought about writing reviews? I think you’d be great as you seem to have a very good understanding but also seem a bit more down to earth and non-bias that some of the writers on here.
How old are you and where do you live? Fancy a coffee some time?
X
Comment by Adam LOVER — 19 May, 2009 @ 8:51 am
A coffee what a splendid idea, maybe we could chat about the greatest film reviewer of all time mark kermode over a nice hot beverage. I think my reviews would be a great contrast to the ones on the site, they would no waffle one liners like - Star Trek: they discuss tim travel in it how cool!
Comment by Adam — 19 May, 2009 @ 8:58 am
Great, I’ll message you my details.
Do you know anything about this Simon guy? It’s hard to work out what sort of person he is. Is he a Christian?
Sarah
Comment by Sarah AKA Adam LOVER — 19 May, 2009 @ 9:15 am