Star Trek
Movie Review
"Star Trek"
Review by Eric D. Snider
Grade: A-
Rating: PG-13
Released: Friday, May 8, 2009
Directed by:
Cast:
Most of my knowledge of the "Star Trek" mythos comes not from watching the original series (which I've never done) or the films with the original cast (ditto), but simply by osmosis, living in a society where "Star Trek" is a huge part of pop culture. So while I'm not invested enough to care deeply about the quality of J.J. Abrams' highly anticipated new "Star Trek" reboot, I know enough to say with some confidence that he has gotten it almost exactly right.
How can Trekkies -- or, as they prefer to be called, Trekkie-Americans -- not love a film that re-imagines the characters' origins this cleverly, that incorporates so many of the familiar "Trek" details ("I'm a doctor, not a physicist!") into such a sleek, vigorous new story? Once you're past the initial heresy of anyone other than William Shatner playing Kirk, anyone other than Leonard Nimoy playing Spock, et cetera, what is there for "Trek" fans to complain about?
And for the rest of us, who don't care about the Starship Enterprise in particular and just want to see a good movie? We win, too. "Star Trek" is spectacularly entertaining -- fast-paced, glib, thrilling, and slickly produced. It's better than most summertime action romps even bother trying to be.
What emerges most is a sense of fun. Abrams and his writers, Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman (who also wrote the dimwitted "Transformers"), are respectful of the source material, but they don't let it stifle their creativity. Their allegiance, first and foremost, is to havin' a good time; if they must slightly alter some "Trek" characters' biographies in the process, so be it. And since Abrams and company are smart, the film avoids most of the lapses in logic and storytelling that make audiences scoff at a film like, say, "X-Men Origins: Wolverine."
(I'm having a hard time reconciling the fact that Orci and Kurtzman also wrote "Transformers." I have to assume that film's idiocy and this one's intelligence have to do with the difference in directors: Abrams, who created TV's "Alias" and "Lost," is savvy and self-aware; Michael Bay, who made "Transformers," is a moron.)
It is the 23rd century. Most of the familiar characters are cadets at Starfleet Academy, and the Enterprise is just coming off the assembly line. James T. Kirk (Chris Pine, comfortably adopting Shatner's inflections and mannerisms without impersonating him), the son of a starship commander, is almost parodically cocky and arrogant, having joined the academy only after Capt. Pike (Bruce Greenwood) convinced him he had the potential to do more than chase skirts in Iowa. He is smitten with Uhura (Zoe Saldana), a brilliant classmate and linguistics expert who won't give him the time of day, and best friends with Leonard McCoy (Karl Urban), a slightly older and frequently exasperated doctor.
Meanwhile, there is Spock (Zachary Quinto), an outcast on his own planet, Vulcan, because his mother was a human. Like all Vulcans, Spock is ruled by logic and reason, which puts him at odds with the reckless and hotheaded Kirk, once they meet. It doesn't help that they meet in the context of Kirk beating an impossible-to-beat simulation that Spock devised for Starfleet Academy.
When the planet Vulcan is threatened by an unknown enemy, the United Federation of Planets, its resources stretched thin, must call up its cadets and put the Enterprise into action earlier than expected. The threat, as it turns out, is from "a particularly troubled Romulan" named Nero (Eric Bana), who has a sinister agenda that relates to -- well, golly, it relates to everything. Just you wait and see.
The goal here was to devise a story that would bring the Enterprise crew together earlier than it happened in the original "Star Trek" timeline. (Wikipedia tells me that in the TV series, Spock had already served on the Enterprise, under Capt. Pike, for 10 years before Kirk arrived.) Without spoiling anything, I think Abrams, Orci, and Kurtzman have done this as plausibly as can be expected. (You already know that Leonard Nimoy appears as an elderly Spock, so the notion that the film might involve time travel shouldn't surprise you.) This is not a prequel, but a sort of alternate universe, where things happened this way instead of that way. And, of course, non-"Trek" aficionados don't care anyway.
I might quibble with the Jack Bauer-like speed with which people are promoted from prisoner to captain, or some characters' ability to master brand-new technology within seconds of being introduced to it, or the number of times Kirk is left dangling from a dangerous precipice. (And what's with all those catwalks not having guardrails?) But there's no sense dwelling on minor criticisms when, overall, the film is so gosh-darned enjoyable. Backup characters like Sulu (John Cho) and Chekov (Anton Yelchin) are given their moments to shine; Simon Pegg is a joy as cranky engineer Scotty; the villains are genuinely fearsome; the story is exciting, and it moves along at a breezy clip.
Then there is the spirited and humorous interplay between Pine, Quinto, and Urban as Kirk, Spock, and McCoy. All three actors give star-making performances -- where did this Chris Pine person come from?! -- while simultaneously reinventing a trio of beloved characters deftly but humbly. There is no sense that they wish to overshadow their predecessors. Indeed, I see no ego anywhere here -- just talented actors working hard to create vivid, complex characters that the audience will care about. They succeeded. Who's up for a sequel?
Grade: A-
Rated PG-13, a little mild profanity, brief mild sexuality, a lot of moderate action violence
2 hrs., 6 min.
Copyright © Eric D. Snider.
This work may not be transmitted via the Internet, nor reproduced in any other way, without written consent from Eric D. Snider.
This item has 38 comments
May 8, 2009 at 12:07 am
I seemed like it should have been named "Extreme Star Trek", but wow, they pulled off what could have turned out as hokey as "GI Joe" is looking to be. Good one, Abrams.
May 8, 2009 at 12:10 am
First.
No, seriously - an A- from Eric and 94% on RT = must. watch. movie.
May 8, 2009 at 12:11 am
Third.
May 8, 2009 at 12:23 am
Okay, I was just going to go see this because I love Chris Pine. Even in the schmaltzy "Princess Diaries 2" & the stupid one with Lindsay Lohan losing her luck to him, you could tell he was going to be a pretty good actor, given the right role. Plus there's that whole cute factor that I'm so fond of....
I haven't liked a Star Trek movie since "Wrath of Khan" (still have a horrible fear someone is going to stick a worm in my ear!), so I'm glad that they switched gears & made a good one! Now, I just have to wait out the Trekkie-Americans, so I can enjoy it! ;)
May 8, 2009 at 12:48 am
Brilliant movie. Thought I wouldn't be able to handle Sylar as my beloved Spock, but he was perfect. Everyone was perfect (how is that even possible?).
Can they make this a series AND make a sequel?
May 8, 2009 at 3:35 am
Andrew D, that was hilarious. Were you just reading the review and so your page wasn't refreshed when you left your comment? Really funny, 'cause that's happened to me before.
My brother has a good friend who's been saying how reluctant he is to see this movie because he was certain it was just going to be "Dawson's Creek in Space". Glad to hear how wrong he is.
May 8, 2009 at 4:53 am
Is this the first time ever a movie has come out in Europe before the US?
I saw this last night and it was quite a bit of fun. I recommend not brushing up on old star trek details before hand. It was great being reminded of all these characters as they unfolded.
SLIGHT SPOILER ALERT!
The most brilliant thing they did, though is by establishing the "alternate reality" concept they can make sequels however they want. They don't have to agree at all with anything established!
May 8, 2009 at 7:52 am
We saw it on Thursday night, and we were disappointed that we didn't see any geeks dressed up as Star Trek Characters. Seriously, what's the point of seeing a Trek Movie on Opening Night if I'm not going to be entertained by the Geeks?
The movie, however, did not disappoint. As we reached the climax, I glanced at my watch, and thought, "already?" It was a fast, thrilling ride, without a down moment.
But where was the heavy-handed message on tolerance?
May 8, 2009 at 8:33 am
Orci and Kurtzman's involvement with Michael Bay and the Transformers should not be held against them. They're hollywood screenwriters who have to feed their families. But I liked Transformers by the way.
As for Star Trek, I liked the movie too. I do however felt the movie at times tried a little too hard and nods and homages to the original series. But the movie did accomplish what it set out to do which was bring Star Trek to a whole new audience and get them to like it.
May 8, 2009 at 9:53 am
J.J. Abrams is a freakin' genius. This movie was very good. And I will love him forever for LOST.
May 8, 2009 at 10:12 am
Saw it last night --- LOVED IT!!!
I think the set-up was pure genius, because now if they want to, they can create a whole new universe of possibilities without constantly running into the wall of "Does this work with the Original Series?"
Such a fun, fun film! I want to see it again!
May 8, 2009 at 10:59 am
Orci and Kurtzman wrote Bay's crap-tacular "The Island," too. They worked with Abrams for years on "Alias," and also wrote "Mission: Impossible III" for him, so there's ample evidence that he knows how to get the best that can be gotten out of them. Michael Bay never met a screenplay he couldn't make worse, but Orci and Kurtzman also wrote the middling-to-lame second Antonio Banderas Zorro movie, "The Legend of Zorro," so there's also evidence that they can suck without any assistance from Michael Bay.
May 8, 2009 at 11:13 am
I'm excited to see the new movie now, if only a bit disappointed for a single reason. No one has mentioned anything of a sci-fi theme in this movie, you know, some sort of idea to take home and think about. Is there any of that? I know that Star Trek isn't "The Day the Earth Stood Still" (original) or "2001," but sometimes it brings similar ideas to the table. Is it mostly Spock vs. Emotions type stuff? Or are there just more general humanity/relationship themes here? Or would revealing the themes be some sort of spoiler?
My favorite Star Trek film so far has been "The Undiscovered Country." There were blatant parallels to Chernobyl and the fall of the Soviet Union. I know the racism ideas were mostly broad and uninspired, at least by today's standards, but the grandeur of the film seemed to make it feel more important. The movie starts with a bang (literally), moves through wonderfully atmospheric scenes of frantic over-populated ships and lonely, barren tundra, climaxes with a bit of a whimper, and ends with strong nostalgia. But the feelings it evoked the first few times I watched it made it worth it. I don't know, maybe I'm just a sucker for grandiose music, well-choreographed steadicam shots, and long-winded Shakespeare quote-fests.
Either way, most people won't mind the exclusion of a "moral," especially in a feature-length film with a good story-arc, good characters, and a good villain. And I know the film could even create good themes as by-product of just being a well-written story. So I'll see it and hopefully will enjoy it either way.
May 8, 2009 at 11:20 am
Oh, also, if you haven't seen the Onion video on "Star Trek" yet, you should. It's hilarious, and makes fun of me for wanting the "endless debating of intergalactic policy around a long table." I'm cool with that. Here's the link:
http://www.theonion.com/content/video/trekkies_bash_new_star_trek_film
(Warning: this video is clean, but some stuff on this website is riddled with swears)
May 8, 2009 at 11:20 am
"Star Trek" has been reborn. Happy birthday and many more to come.
May 8, 2009 at 12:38 pm
If you like Abrams:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpjVgF5JDq8
May 8, 2009 at 9:43 pm
Saw it this evening. Fantastically entertaining. As I was leaving the theater, I was already impatient for the *next* Star Trek movie to be out...which is a thought I can't recall ever thinking before in my life. You rock, J. J. Abrams!
May 9, 2009 at 4:05 pm
Such a great movie! I actually want to see it again while it's in the theater. I haven't liked a movie in the theater this much since, dare I say, the Lord of the Rings trilogy. And I'm not even too much of a Star Trek fan (though watching "Star Trek: The Next Generation" was a Sunday evening family activity while growing up.)
Also, the lack of guardrails was kind of funny. I had a nerdy legal moment while in the theater, wondering what their Workers' Comp rates would be. (Yeah, I'm a dork.)
May 9, 2009 at 9:50 pm
This film is beautiful. I am going to propose new legislation which will allow me to marry this movie. ;)
Seriously, is there nothing that has not turned to gold at J.J. Abrams' touch?
May 9, 2009 at 11:16 pm
Hm. "Nothing" should be "anything" in my previous post, shouldn't it? Argh!
May 10, 2009 at 12:27 am
Great movie! I'm just glad they didn't include that awful slapstick scene with the rubber lobster. (Ugh!)
May 10, 2009 at 2:37 am
something that really sets this new Star Trek apart from the oldies (though they are still goodies) is the total lack of drag. When I watch those old Star Treks I inevitably get the feeling that this or that scene is being drawn out way too much
May 10, 2009 at 9:43 pm
I've never seen Star Trek, but this movie made me want to go back and watch the entire series, from the original onwards. And I'm not the only newbie who feels this way--lots of other people I know have a sudden urge to convert to Trekkieism.
May 10, 2009 at 11:32 pm
Bryce, I think we're clones. You took the words right out of my mouth.
May 10, 2009 at 11:56 pm
#21.
I am so Frakking glad to hear that. Many of us trekkies were sore afraid that the franchise was completely dead after the "Enterprise" debacle. That series was a complete tank that almost destroyed the universe (the Star Trek universe that is). When I heard that they were making another prequel with the 10th (yes tenth) movie, I was getting ready to start writing the epitaph on the Star Trek grave stone. But, alas, I was wrong. This movie rocked in so many ways. This movie was well written, good acting and lots of fun. On top of that, from a trekkie point of view, this movie was successful in a few ways.
1. It satisfied the trekkie crowd who wanted to see what happened in the Star Trek universe we know and love. We got that. Others wanted to know what happened to Spock. The last movie that dealt with Romulons had nary a mention of Spock. That pissed off a few fans, including myself. There were plenty of ways they could have brought him into the story.
2. Fans didn't want to see a prequel ruin the original time line. Not just the time line, but also they didn't want to see any Trek Lore stepped on. Enterprise was riddled with that.
The way that this movie was made eliminated both of those potential problems. Also, by eliminating those two problems, they could then deal with the big problem, how to get a wider audience without having to worry about the Trekkies. They did just that.
I kind of hope they do a sequel to this movie, and maybe it can spur another show, possibly in the old Trek universe. There are still questions to answer there.
Live long and prosper. :-)
May 11, 2009 at 8:55 am
I can't believe no one mentioned the death of the unnamed redshirt! It was classic! I turned to my companion and whispered, "The guy in the red suit is going to die. We don't know anything about him and he's wearing red!"
Lo, it came to pass. And I was much amused.
May 11, 2009 at 11:08 am
@ #26, I started cracking up when I saw Kirk, Sulu, and red suit getting ready in the shuttle. I said the same thing to my wife, but I don't think she got the reference.
May 11, 2009 at 1:09 pm
Wow, this movie came from the same people that wrote Transformers??? Are we sure??? Star Trek rocked! And I have watched all the old episodes, been to the conventions, watched the new shows and seen all the movies(even the really bad ones-looking at you, Final Frontier). I'm sure because Bad Robot productions had a hand in the movie, it was so much that we hoped for and more. There isn't enough I can say about it-it was just that great of a movie.
May 11, 2009 at 2:40 pm
The two things I didn't line were the number of times Kirk was strangled nearly to death and the blue and pink streaks of light that I thought were a projector malfunction until I saw it a second time at a different theater (I am not a diehard, friends wanted to see it and I liked it enough to see it a second time).
I really liked the movie as a whole but I particularly liked some of the campy stuff like the old fashioned sounding beeps and bloops aboard the USS Enterprise. And I LOVE that the scary monster was scared off by a simple flame atop a stick. And, isn't "Mouth Breather" a Seinfeldism? Could it still be a part of the vernacular in a couple of hundred years? One can only hope!
May 11, 2009 at 3:47 pm
"Mouth-breather" a Seinfeldism? Most assuredly not.
http://www.doubletongued.org/index.php/dictionary/mouth_breather/
May 11, 2009 at 7:35 pm
Such a good movie. So surprised it had anything to do with anyone related with Transformers. It's like comparing night and day. Best movie I've seen all year.
May 11, 2009 at 11:04 pm
Definitely agree with everything in this review, and I encourage everyone to give this a shot.
I got dragged along to see this with some guy friends, and was expecting to be bored out of my skull as I knew nothing about Star Trek other than, "my dad liked it back in the day."
Happily, this actually turned out to be a genuinely fun, enjoyable movie, and didn't hold my lack of Trekkie knowledge against me. If they do make a sequel, I'll be there at midnight to see it.
May 12, 2009 at 2:46 pm
Mouth Breather--you have to admit, it DOES sound like something Seinfeld would have coined. I guess not ALL of his clever quips were originals :)
May 13, 2009 at 8:43 pm
Okay, here goes:
Well...I will allow for perhaps having to see this "Star Trek" again to truly judge it. As a story, it is way too dependent on "Dr. Brown at the blackboard" exposition a la "Back to the Future." I mean, all Old Spock does is exposit. And why is he hiding in that ice cave when he could walk twenty minutes to a Federation outpost where it's warm? One more reason this re-imagining doesn't work.
Another reason being that this one incident (Nero's ship appearing, Kirk's father destroying the Kelvin and seeming to cripple Nero's ship at least for a while) seems to have acted as a complete re-setting of the entire Trek universe, and was it THAT important? There were times when I sat there going, "They can't do that!" such as the destruction of Vulcan, and that Uhura/Spock/Kirk love triangle. It also strained credulity that Starfleet basically puts Kirk on suspension at the start of the mission, McCoy has to smuggle him onboard, but he ends it as a Captain (of the federation flagship, no less) The Federation must be one easy gig!
Yeah, part of me says, "It's a movie, you dope, go with it," but I can't..seem...to...do it! (sorry, uncontrollable Shatner pause)
It bugged me that Nero's ship is a mining ship, but is better armed than anything in the Romulan fleet. Why does a mining ship have such kick-ass defenses that it can outgun and easily destroy a federation gunship like the Kelvin? That's like saying that a tanker like the Exxon Valdiz going up against the U.S.S. Nimitz would destroy the Nimitz. Why is a Romulan mining ship as deadly as a Borg cube and as huge as the Doomsday Machine? If their mining ships are designed that way, they should have had the Federation for lunch a long time ago. Our mining ships aren't huge, deadly over-gunned monstrosities, because we don't send them anywhere where we don't have destroyers and aircraft carriers to defend them.
And...let's face it, if you have a space faring society, and you have "Red Matter," giving someone the ability to create a black hole (with only a drop of the stuff!) you are talking about the ultimate weapon, it would be the most regulated material in the galaxy. So how did Spock get a TON of the stuff, when it appears a drop of it will do the trick? To talk about this in a "real world" sort of a way, if Colin Powell (or someone as respected) said we needed to explode a nuclear device off the coast of Libya to avoid a natural disaster, they wouldn't just give him a warhead and say, "go to it!" there'd be a whole armada out there with him to make sure it didn't fall into the wrong hands. And why would Spock take a metric ton of the stuff with him into this unstable environment where a black hole is about to be created? Spock would never do that, he's too smart. Or he's supposed to be. The only reason his does it is because Nero had to get the Red Matter somehow in order to satisfy plot machinations, and that's not good enough.
I think a lot of what bothered me about this film was that they're supposedly re-setting the franchise, but they're doing it with the same old tropes, all they did was take the tripod away from the cinematographer so you got a lot of shaky camera shots. In the end, someone's traveling through time, someone has a plan to DESTROY THE EARTH, starting, of course, with San Francisco. We get all the usual blather about Emotion Vs. Logic, (Spock you damn Vulcan, where are your emotions?) But Spock's emotions are EVERYWHERE, he's pretty much Emo-Spock! We get the old Trek argument of Fate vs. Free will, we get little space slugs dropped into inappropriate body cavities to make you prone to suggestion...when, exactly, did they hit re-boot?
I want to say that "Trek" was perhaps of it's time, but then I saw "Wrath of Khan" again a few weeks ago, and, when you take all the spaceships and phaser battles out of that movie, you have a film about a guy confronting (and not very well) a shrieking midlife crisis. And it might sound funny, but on that level? I mean, as a film about a midlife crisis? I'd unashamedly put it up against something like "American Beauty," a film I greatly admire. When you take away all the phasers and things on "Undiscovered Country," you have a film about the collapse of the Soviet Union and people wondering (as we all did) what our place is exactly, without our beloved enemy, and I don't mean beloved in a Christian sense, but beloved because we could define ourselves by them. We were good before, because they were evil. But with them suing for peace, what are we now? And that script was pretty politically sophisticated in its way, in that the threat of peace always seems to make allies of the fanatics on either side of a conflict.
So...take away the phaser battles and spaceships from this one and what do you have? Good looking people using Space Travel as an extreme sport.
However, Simon Pegg is great as Scotty, (and I liked Scotty's little dwarf guy) Karl Urban is great as McCoy, and I actually kind of liked the new Chekhov, he seemed like some Russian who was really great at doing certain things but had been raised in a basement somewhere in Moscow with zero people skills. I liked Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto well enough, they certainly do what's required of them, and Zoe Saldana is beyond hot...
But...I don't know why this feels different from a new Bond or a new Sherlock Holmes or a new Batman, but somehow, it does. Maybe because this just wasn't the way I wanted to see James Kirk get the Enterprise. He doesn't really work for it, it's handed to him as the result of a crisis, and he doesn't seem to particularly appreciate it, either, he treats it the way he treat the sports car he destroys and the motorcycle he abandons, just one more toy. Most of what makes "Star Trek" work is that Kirk LOVES the Enterprise the way he loves a woman, probably more.
And what are Kirk and Spock doing firing on Nero's ship as it collapses at the end? Those guys just wouldn't do that no matter what Nero did, particularly when doing so would endanger the Enterprise by keeping it nearer the black hole for longer than it needed to be, and indeed, they almost lose the ship as a result. "Star Trek" is not about the heroes indulging their worst impulses, it's not "Dirty Harry" in space, it's about people controlling themselves, coming up with theories, seeing if they work, figuring stuff out. Absent that, you may as well surrender it to George Lucas and let him put in some cute robots.
I love Abram's work, I thought "Cloverfield" was great, I think "Lost" and "Fringe" are terrific...I went in thinking "Wow, two great things (Arams and Trek) that should go great together," but they didn't, at all, not for me. I can't believe that a guy who could navigate something as complex as "Lost" would go with such a lazy, sloppily written pastiche of a script. What a major disappointment.
May 15, 2009 at 11:10 pm
Loved it! Can we say sequel? Bring on the Klingons!
May 18, 2009 at 7:47 pm
"But...I don't know why this feels different from a new Bond or a new Sherlock Holmes or a new Batman, but somehow, it does. Maybe because this just wasn't the way I wanted to see James Kirk get the Enterprise. He doesn't really work for it, it's handed to him as the result of a crisis, and he doesn't seem to particularly appreciate it, either, he treats it the way he treat the sports car he destroys and the motorcycle he abandons, just one more toy. Most of what makes "Star Trek" work is that Kirk LOVES the Enterprise the way he loves a woman, probably more."
#35, this is EXACTLY what bothered me about the movie. At the end I went out hating Kirk.
As a disclaimer, I'm not a trekkie... I watched a few episodes w/ my parents as a kid, but I don't remember it really.
As I said, I came out very annoyed with Kirk. He reminded me of the boys I hated in high school; arrogant, cocky, unappreciative, really good at everything they do, but a big egotistical jerk.
I didn't love the movie like I loved Batman Begins or Casino Royale and I put it down to that reason. I didn't identify with Kirk at all; I thought he was a slimebucket jerk. I was annoyed that everyone just accepted him that way at the end and he didn't change the way he was at all. I identified and cared much more for the Spock character (no emotions? Whatever! He had more normal emotions than Kirk did.) and I don't think that's the way it was supposed to be. If Kirk had been a little more human or at least learned a lesson, I probably would have loved the movie.
Sad sad sad. I had high hopes that this would be another BB or Casino Royale, but no such thing. :(
May 19, 2009 at 7:17 am
I thought this was the best Trek since the Undiscovered Country and easily the coolest Trek of them all. It was suprizing when it ended.
#34-Saying that a Federation ship should be able to take on a miner from 200 years in the future is like saying that HMS Victory should be able to take on a machine gun armed tanker from today.
I also love that Leonard Nimoy came back and reset the Star Trek universe. Scotty was wonderful (I'll have to watch some Simon Pegg movies) and was suprized by how enjoyable Chekov was.
Great movie, and, as is Star Trek in general, a very hopeful vision of things to come.
May 27, 2009 at 5:50 pm
Zack Quinto Sounded and looked Just like Spock. Zack is Awsome in Heroes also. If you liked Star Wars you will like The Star Trek Revamp. I should know I'm a Star Wars Fan.