SmartRemarks

My reaction to the new Star Trek movie led me to ask myself this unavoidable question. Yes, it’s certainly received a warm response—96% on the Tomatometer (which is phenomenal, even allowing that they inevitably mis-count some reviews like, e.g., the negative J.R. Jones piece I linked the other day) and a $76 million weekend box office—but I trust my critical sensibilities regardless of what the bandwagon says. My reasons for liking and valuing Star Trek have always been its intelligent storytelling and its social conscience—and this movie has neither. As Roger Ebert wrote,

The Gene Roddenberry years, when stories might play with questions of science, ideals or philosophy, have been replaced by stories reduced to loud and colorful action. Like so many franchises, it’s more concerned with repeating a successful formula than going boldly where no “Star Trek” has gone before.

The online discussion thus far among fans seems to have found an emerging consensus that the cast all did at least good and sometimes great jobs living up to their familiar characters, and that the production values admirably reflect the film’s $150 million budget… but also that the story is, to put it charitably, more than little flimsy. The real dividing line is between the majority who say that story problems don’t matter so long as it looks impressive and feels exciting… and the minority who say it doesn’t matter how much of an adrenaline rush it gives if the story insults the audience’s intelligence. I’m definitely in the latter camp. 

When everything is weighed in the balance, and all excuses and apologies set aside, this movie is crap.

What’s more, though—and this is what sparked the self-examination—the last Trek movie (Nemesis) was also crap. And the movie before that (Insurrection) was crap. And the last TV series (Enterprise), and the series before that (Voyager)—all crap. Really, there hasn’t been any reliably decent Trek on screen in at least a dozen years.

So why do I still call myself a fan? How can I still harbor any affection or loyalty for this franchise?

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Short version of my previous post:  I really didn’t like the movie. To me, it not only doesn’t work as Star Trek, it just doesn’t work as a movie, period. It has Big Stupid Summer Action Blockbuster in its very cinematic DNA. 

Lots of fans seem to be embracing it, though. Ironically, I could do worse to underscore my points than merely to quote a few bits from this review, which strains far too hard to be positive by way of excusing its myriad flaws:

“It’s clear there was something about Shatner’s Kirk, the very human but sometimes high-flown soldier-philosopher, which the filmmakers either couldn’t relate to or felt no longer spoke to modern audiences.”

“McCoy is in there pitching throughout the movie, often seeming to reprise every trademark line the Doctor ever uttered in the series—but he doesn’t get the kind of intimate, key scene with Kirk where he can truly function as the film’s conscience.”

“The one unfortunate artifact from the success of 1982’s The Wrath of Khan is the need to have a madman out for vengeance in every other Star Trek movie.”

“Nitpickers will have a field day with some of the movie’s science, tech and logic issues…. [and] may also wince at the amount of coincidence that drives the plot.”

Really, after making all those apologetic exceptions, what’s left? I’m particularly amused by the dismissal of “nitpickers”—as if plausible science were too much to ask for in a science fiction film, or coherent plot logic in any kind of film at all.

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Meanwhile, while reflecting back on the movie and surfing the tide of opinions about it, yet another continuity snafu occurred to me:  has it struck anyone that Nero’s revenge plan actually guaranteed the destruction of Romulus in the new timeline just as in the old? It was the Vulcans who created the “red matter” that defused the supernova, but with Vulcan destroyed, there’s nobody left to do that. However, an altered timeline does nothing to change the internal processes of the star itself. It will presumably still explode on schedule, except this time with no way to stop it at all. 25 years cooling his heels, and yet it didn’t occur to Nero that he could save his race; instead, he doomed it.

And another, almost too obvious to mention (at least among Trekkers):  somehow Nero’s single initial time-change must have greatly increased the Federation’s contact with and knowledge of the Romulans. (In “Balance of Terror,” one of the best TOS episodes, Starfleet hadn’t encountered them in a century, had no idea what they looked like, and didn’t know they shared a heritage with Vulcans.)

And another, just a bit of sheer idiocy:  Spock’s claim that it’s “logical” for him to go aboard Nero’s ship because that “shared heritage” would help him decipher the Romulan computer systems. What, even though the cultures split two thousand years earlier? Really?

And another scientific whopper: the villain’s final defeat is achieved by opening yet another massive black hole, in Earth’s solar system. Possibly just a wee bit of danger in that?

There were so many of these little jarring moments in the film that it just wasn’t possible to keep them all at the top of my mind. But they keep bubbling to the surface again…

The new Chekov, Kirk, Scotty, McCoy, Sulu, and Uhura

Tonight was the opening of the new Star Trek movie. With IMAX tickets booked well in advance, my girlfriend and I and some friends went out for dinner and conversation, then joined an enthusiastic audience for the long-awaited and much-publicized film. It was a lovely spring evening, and overall we had a good time.

I just wish we’d seen a good movie.

I approached Star Trek (no number or subtitle) with cautious optimism. I’d had some cause for apprehension, as I’ve written about, based on the design aesthetic of the new Enterprise and the tone and style of the early trailers. A more recent TV spot tag-lined “Forget Everything You Know” wasn’t encouraging, either:  I’m a Trek fan from way back, and I’m showing up to see a new story set in the Kirk/Spock era because of everything I know, because of my affection for those characters and concepts, not despite it. 

But hey, most of those things could just be chalked up to marketing choices and visual sensibilities. They didn’t necessarily bode ill for the movie as a whole. Certainly the last few years of the Trek franchise under former producers Rick Berman and Brannon Braga had been fairly disappointing, on both the small and the large screen, so some new creative blood was called for. Screenwriters Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman were reportedly sincere Trek fans:  the L.A. Times went  so far as to ask them about their favorite prose Trek novels, and they actually named four—and good ones, at that. So even if director J.J. Abrams admitted to not being a Trek fan, professing more of a Star Wars sensibility instead (anathema!), perhaps the story itself was in good hands. Leonard Nimoy’s willingness to be involved, reprising his role as Spock for the first time in 18 years, also seemed promising. Yes, as details leaked out it became clear that the film would not be a prequel to the original television series (as I would have preferred, all else being equal) but a reboot instead… but even so, it could be good on its own terms. It just needed to be handled thoughtfully and respectfully, with an understanding of the concepts and themes that had made Trek a success all along, and in numerous interviews the filmmakers assured us they were doing exactly that. So I was hoping for a movie I could like, maybe even love.

But Abrams and company didn’t hit the mark. What they delivered wound up meeting almost all of my fears and almost none of my hopes.

This was a big, stupid summer blockbuster, in the worst sense. It was a bad movie, plain and simple. 

[Ample SPOILERS below the fold.]

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Leonard Nimoy as Future!Spock in Star Trek (2009)

There has been ongoing concern in fan circles over whether J.J. Abrams’ upcoming Star Trek film will be in keeping with the spirit of Trek as we’ve come to know it over 40+ years. I’ve written about it myself, but I’m far from the only one… and Abrams himself hasn’t exactly quelled such concerns with remarks like his recent statement to TV Guide that “it’s really made for future fans of ‘Star Trek,’ not existing ones.” Such statements may warm the hearts of executives at Paramount, but we existing fans want to like this movie too.

In an interview last week, screenwriter Bob Orci attempted to ease these concerns, emphasizing that he and co-writer Alex Kurtzman are dedicated Trek fans (unlike Abrams) and that they’ve made sure to tie this film into existing Trek continuity in a way that fans will appreciate. The way he describes this, however, has caused more consternation than it’s resolved.

Many of the concerns so far have been about the differences seen in the trailer—in the Enterprise, the bridge, and perhaps most significantly the backstory of Jim Kirk. The movie has looked suspiciously like a reboot, rather than a story within Trek’s familiar fictional reality.

Long story short? What’s the inside scoop? It’s like this:

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As noted earlier, I didn’t get to see the new Star Trek trailer on the big screen as anticipated last week… but as is the way of things these days, it was released online this week, for all the world to see. And comment upon. (And satirize. And annotate shot-by-shot. Yes, while I would never deny my own geek status, there are people in this world who score much higher on that meter than I do.)

My personal reaction? Mixed, I have to admit. Certainly not as jazzed as I was by the first “teaser” trailer last winter.

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On Tuesday EW.com released a preview picture of the U.S.S. Enterprise from director J.J. Abrams’ reboot of Star Trek. (More can reportedly be seen as of today in the new trailer appearing in front of A Quantum of Solace.)

Here it is:

And I have to say…

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