My "Just Saw Insurrection For the First Time" Review.

[BillJ]

sonak wrote:

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yeah, I'm with you on the dud premise. Really, I don't see a way that he could have made it work if this basic premise was the one he was determined to work around. I've written on previous threads on this movie that there was just no way for it to work. They should have told him to scrap the original idea and start over.

They couldn't. They already had a release date when they brought Piller aboard to write it.

[sonak]

BillJ wrote:

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They couldn't. They already had a release date when they brought Piller aboard to write it.

he had a deadline yeah, but that doesn't mean he had to stick to the premise he had. Didn't Nick Meyer write a rough draft for TWOK in a short time?

Still, the "heart of darkness" story would have been better than what we got but that's not saying much.

[BillJ]

sonak wrote:

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he had a deadline yeah, but that doesn't mean he had to stick to the premise he had. Didn't Nick Meyer write a rough draft for TWOK in a short time?

Still, the "heart of darkness" story would have been better than what we got but that's not saying much.

Meyer wrote one of the drafts in a short time but I'm pretty sure he wasn't starting from scratch when he wrote it.

In order for Piller to start over he would have had to go back through the process of mollifying both Stewart and Spiner. When they had a release date before they had any idea of what the film was even going to be about, they were doomed to make a bad movie. In my opinion.

[sonak]

BillJ wrote:

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Meyer wrote one of the drafts in a short time but I'm pretty sure he wasn't starting from scratch when he wrote it.

In order for Piller to start over he would have had to go back through the process of mollifying both Stewart and Spiner. When they had a release date before they had any idea of what the film was even going to be about, they were doomed to make a bad movie. In my opinion.

oh I didn't realize that they had to worry about script approval from Stewart or Spiner. Whose dumb idea was that? Were they really not going to get those two onboard without pre-approval rights from them? I wonder if Stewart later regretted interfering in the process.

[Flake]

Its clear they just wanted to have lots of fun out of the 'spacesuits' and on location.

There is a scene in there where Picard has to run away quickly because of the drones and he is laughing/smiling

[Australis]

Script approval. John Hurt once said something like: "I don't want the writers coming on the set and act. That's my job. I don't tell them how to write, that's their job, and I should respect them enough to let them do it." Stewart and Spiner, while they have a lot invested in their characters... they sure aren't writers. To be fair, some of Stewart's notes were solid, but as we're saying, the idea was not all it could have been.

[lurok]

sonak wrote:

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oh I didn't realize that they had to worry about script approval from Stewart or Spiner. Whose dumb idea was that?

I think they should have called it Star Trek: Tantrum, or Fit of Pique. Didn't feel like much insurrection going on.

[Dream]

Flake wrote:

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Its clear they just wanted to have lots of fun out of the 'spacesuits' and on location.

That was a huge mistake trying to go lighter.

People were expecting another movie similar to FC.

They should have done what TOS films did which was lead from Khan to Kruge to the Whale Probe. There should have been some kind of bigger picture since they were doing films.

[Dale Sams]

Australis wrote:

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Script approval. John Hurt once said something like: "I don't want the writers coming on the set and act. That's my job. I don't tell them how to write, that's their job, and I should respect them enough to let them do it." Stewart and Spiner, while they have a lot invested in their characters... they sure aren't writers. To be fair, some of Stewart's notes were solid, but as we're saying, the idea was not all it could have been.

Yeah, but poor Piller. He handcuffs himself by *trying* to keep to Roddenberry's vision of no intercrew strife, and Stewart tells him he should forget everything Picard et al have done in the past cause we want to move forward.

I guess it's a damn good thing that Frakes doesn't seem to care that his character is ridiculously underdeveloped compared to Data and Picard...While I was reading Piller's book, it occureded to me that the logical thing would be to make Riker as Kurtz. and then it struck how dumb that would feel and how little emotional resonance it would have because....we don't really care about the frigging second in command.

Hell...THOMAS Riker is more interesting.

[Dale Sams]

By the way...is there any source material on the making of Nemesis as comprehensive as what I've learned in this thread?

Edit: And having now seen Nemesis and Insurrection in their entirity, I'd say Insurrection was worse than reviews, and Nemesis was better. Nemesis wasn't *bad* so much as just....pointless, kinda hollow.

[sonak]

Dale Sams wrote:

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Yeah, but poor Piller. He handcuffs himself by *trying* to keep to Roddenberry's vision of no intercrew strife, and Stewart tells him he should forget everything Picard et al have done in the past cause we want to move forward.

I guess it's a damn good thing that Frakes doesn't seem to care that his character is ridiculously underdeveloped compared to Data and Picard...While I was reading Piller's book, it occureded to me that the logical thing would be to make Riker as Kurtz. and then it struck how dumb that would feel and how little emotional resonance it would have because....we don't really care about the frigging second in command.

Hell...THOMAS Riker is more interesting.

internet reviewer SFdebris, in his review of INS said that it would have been a bold idea to divide the crew in this movie over whether or not to help the Baku. It would have made the movie much better and given the "dilemma" the true two-sided feel that a dilemma is supposed to have, rather than the comic book "white hats" thing Picard and company had here.

It would never have happened of course, because it would have been much too "non-TNG."

[Kevin W.]

BBC America (I think) is broadcasting Insurrection and Nemesis next week. It'll be the first time I see Nemesis and the first time in a long time that I see Insurrection all the way through. I'm looking forward to reevaluating Insurrection nowadays, and Nemesis is the one Trek film I've never seen.

[Lance]

sonak wrote:

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oh I didn't realize that they had to worry about script approval from Stewart or Spiner. Whose dumb idea was that?

The thing which surprised me the most when I read "Fade In" was how... seemingly egotistical Stewart came across. Almost as if the success of First Contact had gone straight to his head. At least Brent Spiner's script notes were (I thought) all well thought-out and helped to progress the story. But the best that Stewart seemed to be able to come up with was "I don't want Romulans in it - oh, and by the way, we shouldn't bother with 'the family' so much either, let's make this movie more about Picard and Data". Yeah, that's exactly what the script needed, Patrick.

[DonIago]

Maybe it was typically dry British humor?

[Kevin W.]

Well, I watched Insurrection. It turns out it was on Syfy, not BBCA.

There were bits cut for time, as expected. For some reason, the part where you actually see the Son'a crew get transported from their ship to the holoship wasn't show, among other parts. Considering it's important to the ending, I don't know why it was cut.

Honestly, it's not a good film. It's just middle of the road. It's not The Final Frontier bad, but it's not The Wrath of Khan great.