TMP an attempt to revise Star Trek back to 'The Cage' style?

[MakeshiftPython]

Whatever the case, I’m glad what TMP aimed for didn’t persist. Where that style of sci-fi felt genuinely grand in movies like 2001, it felt dull and lifeless in TMP. The only moment that clicks is in the sick bay room with the trinity. That’s when it feels like Star Trek. Whereas when Decker and Ilia are talking in the corridor it’s attempt at earnestness feels less romantic and more closer to what was parodied in AIRPLANE. You might as well subplant the Goldsmith romance theme with Bernstein’s and CGI Leslie Nielsen in the background.

 

[Lestatdelc]

I think that TMP "suffered" for the same reasons why Paramount shifted it from a television series sequel/continuation to a major motion picture. That being... Star Wars.

Paramount—and pretty much most of the planet at the time—were drooling at the idea of having a "real budget" film version filled with iconic and beloved characters. Fans wanted it for obvious reasons, Paramount wanted it because of what they saw happen to 20th Century Fox's balance sheets. So the expectation was Star Wars level action and adventure, using Star Trek's characters (and ship) as the vehicle.

I think expectations were set too high, and slightly off target because Star Trek was never Star Wars. and never really will be, nor should be, despite J.J's best efforts.

I think Blade Runner had the same sort of problem as TMP. People thought, holy shit, Han Solo/Indiana Jones in a sci-fi film by the guy who just scared the shit out of us with a stunningly good little flick called Alien.

Hell they had ERTL die cast "police spinner" car toys on the shelves of Toys R' Us in 1982:

And Blade Runner is a masterwork, but is most assuredly not Han Solo or Indiana Jones in Space. I think the bulk of the "issues" people had were issues of expectations and perceptions thereof, which have become cemented into the consciousness of the cinema and Trek fandom.

And with that—I will circle back to the topic of the thread—TMP is, IMNSHO, the best of the film series when it comes to nailing what Star Trek's first pilot was (and why Paramount didn't go with it as a series as is in "The Cage"). It was not campy, it was earnest and with a substantive concept and plot, and production wise (each for their respect times) top-flight.

 

[MakeshiftPython]

I feel the BLADE RUNNER analogy would be applicable if TMP ended up being as well regarded years after its release. It’s biggest fans however are only a subset of the Trek fanbase. The only Trek film that’s close to being as highly regarded as BLADE RUNNER is the one that came out on the same month as that film’s release: TWOK.

 

[Lestatdelc]

TMP ended up being as well regarded years after its release

Its regard has grown in recent years, and continues to do so. Particular compared to the J.J.-verse attempt at "Trek" which is the Star Wars-ifcation of Trek many originally thought TMP was going to be in December of 1978, and they are not really Trek in my eyes (and I am not alone in saying that).

The human adventure, and the re-apprasial of TMP, continues.

 

[Lance]

The Motion Picture is, in my not so humble opinion, the best of the film series when it comes to nailing what Star Trek's first pilot was (and why Paramount didn't go with it as a series as is in "The Cage"). It was not campy, it was earnest and with a substantive concept and plot, and production wise (each for their respect times) top-flight.

This. This is so very much the thoughts that were going through my head when I started this thread, but which I didn't verbalize as eloquently as you just did.

The line Roddenberry espoused for why the suits didn't go for "The Cage" was that they thought it too ponderous, cerebral and tonally not what Roddenberry had promised them. They seen the potential in the *idea* and the production enough to order a second pilot that would hopefully be closer to the series they thought they were going to get, and "Where No Man..." is certainly that, but my feeling is that somewhere deep down on some level Gene may have been hoping to make both Phase II and the motion picture the 'cerebral' Star Trek he originally envisioned with "The Cage", to bring that ponderous tone back to it. I also feel he finally got his opportunity to do that in 1987 with The Next Generation, which is where my comparison to that series was coming from. I see a very clear through line from "The Cage" through TMP and onto TNG, where the actual TOS and the second through sixth movies are something of a detour from that tone.

 

[MakeshiftPython]

Its regard has grown in recent years, and continues to do so. Particular compared to the J.J.-verse attempt at "Trek" which is the Star Wars-ifcation of Trek many originally thought TMP was going to be in December of 1978, and they are not really Trek in my eyes (and I am not alone in saying that).

The human adventure, and the re-apprasial of TMP, continues.

Has it? I see it more championed among Trek fandom, but rarely or never do I see it embraced outside that group even among film aficionados. Even with Robert Wise’s attachment, you’d think that would have many give it another look and it would see a resurgence like BLADE RUNNER and THE THING, but that’s never happened. Paramount can’t even be damned to give the Director’s Edition an HD restoration.

 

[Armus]

^The Director's Edition has its own editing flaws and it messed with the original sound mix for no good reason. My favorite version is the long TV version which was the only available version on VHS. It would be nice if all three versions could be restored in HD.

 

[2takesfrakes]

A reason TMP stands apart from the other STAR TREK films is that its' a rarity in being an actual Science Fiction film. Once Khan exacted his revenge, he not only changed the trajectory of the character's lives, he changed the trajectory of the franchise. Everybody's out for revenge, or a personal score to settle ever afterward ...

Kruge is obsessed with something, Sybok is obsessed with something, Chang is fearful and angst-driven, Soran is obsessed with something, Picard is revenge-driven, the Son'a are out for revenge, Shinzon is angst-driven and obsessed, Nero wants revenge, Khan's back again, Krall is another one obsessed maniac ... when the BALLS is this franchise going to loose this infatuation with playing the same goddamn tune over and over again?

TMP was really the only science fiction movie in the lot. TVH, as I would consider it to be, was more fantasy-driven, what with its Time Travel and whale superiority and all that. It's just so good to have a movie in the franchise that dared to be different and it did make money. It could've been more entertaining, it should've done more business, but it wasn't a flop. It would shock the living shite out of me if STAR TREK 4 wasn't about somebody's deep-seated, personal demons. For real, take a page out of TMP's book.

 

[JonnyQuest037]

That doesn't track with how any of the other Trek shows assigned creator credits, or how most shows do it in general. Heck, these days, even shows directly adapted from comic books or novels usually give the creator credit to the TV writers who adapt them rather than the original authors/artists. Most commonly, the creator credits and the writing credits for the pilot episode are one and the same. So Fontana not getting co-creator credit for TNG was an exception to the general rule.

The television series Homicide: Life on the Street carries the credit "Created by Paul Attanasio," despite being heavily based on the nonfiction book Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets by journalist David Simon, because Attanasio wrote the pilot episode, "Gone for Goode." Series producers Barry Levinson and Tom Fontana do not sound happy about this in the commentary track for the pilot when Attanasio's credit comes up on screen.

Whereas when Decker and Ilia are talking in the corridor it’s attempt at earnestness feels less romantic and more closer to what was parodied in AIRPLANE. You might as well subplant the Goldsmith romance theme with Bernstein’s and CGI Leslie Nielsen in the background.

This is a brilliant idea and now I desperately want to see someone do this and put it up on YouTube, along with Kirk's Enterprise flyover dubbed over with porn music.

 

[Lance]

A reason TMP stands apart from the other STAR TREK films is that its' a rarity in being an actual Science Fiction film. Once Khan exacted his revenge, he not only changed the trajectory of the character's lives, he changed the trajectory of the franchise. Everybody's out for revenge, or a personal score to settle ever afterward ...

Kruge is obsessed with something, Sybok is obsessed with something, Chang is fearful and angst-driven, Soran is obsessed with something, Picard is revenge-driven, the Son'a are out for revenge, Shinzon is angst-driven and obsessed, Nero wants revenge, Khan's back again, Krall is another one obsessed maniac ... when the BALLS is this franchise going to loose this infatuation with playing the same goddamn tune over and over again?

TMP was really the only science fiction movie in the lot. TVH, as I would consider it to be, was more fantasy-driven, what with its Time Travel and whale superiority and all that. It's just so good to have a movie in the franchise that dared to be different and it did make money. It could've been more entertaining, it should've done more business, but it wasn't a flop. It would shock the living shite out of me if STAR TREK 4 wasn't about somebody's deep-seated, personal demons. For real, take a page out of TMP's book.

Interestingly, the threat in both TMP and TVH is similar... a non-human antagonist, an abstract threat rather than one driven by emotion (as you say, VENGEANCE).

 

[TrickyDickie]

This is Richard Schickel's review of TMP from the December 17, 1979 issue of Time magazine. He seems quite bummed-out that he didn't get another Star Wars-type movie. The part about "weirdos" is downright hilarious.

Warp Speed to Nowhere

"It used to be that special effects were created to serve a movie's story, to permit the camera to capture that which could not be found—or recorded on film—in the natural world. But now, in the post-Star Wars era, stories are created merely to provide a feeble excuse for the effects. Star Trek consists almost entirely of this kind of material: shot after shot of vehicles sailing through the firmament to the tune of music intended to awe. But the spaceships take an unconscionable amount of time to get anywhere, and nothing of dramatic or human interest happens along the way. Once the ships reach their destination, they do not encounter the kind of boldly characterized antagonists that made Star Wars such fun. In fact, they do not meet any human or humanoid antagonists at all. There isn't even a battle scene at the climax.

Instead there is a lot of talk. Much of it in impenetrable spaceflight jargon. Scanners, deflectors, warp speed, linguacode—words like that are always being barked into the intercom. But it is never to the point: it is hard to decipher where the starship Enterprise stands vis-a-vis the mysterious intruder from outer space. When the crew are not jabbering in technocratese, they are into metaphysics, one of the characteristics of the old Star Trek television show and a major reason for its cult vogue among the half-educated.

It turns out that the villainous UFO is not manned. This is very peculiar, since in the film's opening sequence it is full of weirdos. By the time the Enterprise closes in on it, the creatures have all disappeared, victims not of the story line but of what appears to be a shortage of either money or time. In a very fast shuffle, the film suddenly announces that the villain is not merely a Death Star, but "a great, living machine." When Ilia, the Enterprise's navigator, is captured by the enemy and literally rewired to be its servant, she explains that the machine is seeking its creator and is terribly cross. The bad temper results from the fact that though the great machine thinks like a whiz, it has no human emotions. And so the picture ends not with a bang but, as it were, a bang. One of the space cadets, who has had his eye on the original Ilia all along, agrees to mate with the improved model and produce a hybrid race of brainy but emotionally turned-on creatures. Just imagine how the effects guys get the colored lights whirling in order to preserve the G rating when that happens.

Some of the metaphorical questions that used to get raised by the Enterprise's intergalactic encounters on the old TV show were at least a little more interesting than this stale intelligence-vs.-emotion debate. One suspects a sellout to the Me Generation's self-absorbed search for feelings. It's a wonder they didn't invite the great machine to join them for an Esalen weekend.

There is little point in discussing the performances. William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy and the rest of the old crowd are back on the bridge. They remember their moves from the old days, though Shatner's promotion to admiral has rendered him more than usually cranky. There is a certain tackiness to the Enterprise, which has been redesigned to fill a large screen. Even some of the costumes are ill-fitting, and the special effects do not reflect the current state of the art. Star Trek had a long, troubled production history. Called to the rescue, John Dykstra and Douglas Trumbull have been able to contribute only quite simple versions of the shots they did respectively, and more spectacularly, in Star Wars and Close Encounters. But, completed in haste, Star Trek is, finally, nothing but a long day's journey into ennui.—R.S."

 

[Lance]

^ Things like that I find fascinating reading in hindsight: the contemporary viewpoint from the day. There are times when I feel like umpteen viewings and a solidified view of what 'the consensus' on the movies is (eg. The Final Frontier is crap, The Wrath of Khan is the best, etc) blinds modern eyes to being able to reflect on the pros and cons in any objective sense. Reading a contemporary account can be refreshing, as it was genuinely written without outside influence of decades of opinions and counter-arguments clouding things up.

 

[TrickyDickie]

I am having a lot of fun digging into these reviews of the time. Here is Vincent Canby's, from The New York Times on December 8, 1979. Interesting that he mentions Lazarus (I somehow doubt that he is thinking of 'The Alternative Factor', though, considering his opinion that the film has ties to Christianity.) Also interesting is his association of Bones with HMS Bounty:

The Screen: ‘Star Trek,’ Based on TV

“ 'Star Trek,' the popular television series that died 10 years ago but would not be forgotten, has, like Lazarus, come back to haunt the skeptical and reassure all those who have kept the faith. It's called “Star Trek — the Motion Picture,” rather superfluously, I think because I doubt anyone who sees It could possibly confuse this film with those shards of an earlier, simpler, cheaper television era.

Watching “Star Trek — the Motion Picture,” which opens today at Loews Orpheum and other theaters, is like attending your high‐school class's 10th reunion at Caesar's Palace. Most of the faces are familiar, but the décor has little relationship to anything you've ever seen before. Among the friends are good old Captain Kirk (William Shatner), commanding officer of the Starship Enterprise; pointy‐eared Mr. Spock (Leonard Nimoy), whose humanity disqualifies him from attaining “kolinahr,” the state of grace on his native planet Vulcan; Dr. McCoy (DeForest Kelley), the spaceship's general practitioner, nicknamed “Bones,” just as he might have been on H.M.S. Bounty, and such other reliables as Scotty (James Doohan), the engineering officer, and Sulu (George Takei), the ship's helmsman.

The newcomers are Stephen Collins, who plays Commander Decker, the Enterprise's stalwart. young executive officer, and Persist Khambatta, an actress from India who plays Ilia, a shockingly beautiful young woman whose head has been shaved as clean as a whistle in the fashion of her homeplanet, Delta Four.

This time out the mission of the Enterprise is to intercept a mysterious cloud, which is apparently light years In diameter and is heading toward earth for reasons that not even Mr. Spock can divine. It's not revealing a secret to tell you that the cloud contains what is usually referred to under such circumstances as “a superior intelligence,” though just what that intelligence is must remain one of the film's few witty surprises.

I suspect that wit is not what “Star Trek” fans are looking for. Instead they want to see favorite characters who are as ageless and multidimensional as characters in a comic strip, and not at all ashamed of those origins. The dialogue — at least what dialogue one can hear over Jerry Goldsmith's music and the sounds of rockets being fired — is of a banality that soothes the weary mind, like Magic Fingers that work on a tired brain. Unlike “Star Wars,” which was full of conscious associations to other literature, “Star Trek” refers only to itself, with the possible exception of the climactic sequence that borrows freely from Christian myth.

The film's vision of the future, which is a bit tacky at the beginning, becomes increasingly hypnotic as the movie goes on, or maybe it just seems that way as one falls under the spell of so many abstract patterns of light and color, designed to simulate the experiences of the members of the Enterprise crew as they pass through various dimensions of time and space.

“Star Trek” is yet another film that owes more to Douglas Trumbull and John Dykstra, who did the special photographic effects, and to Harold Michelson, the production designer, than it does to the director, the writers or even the producer, Gene Roddenberry, who also created and produced the television series.

The formidable Robert Wise, who once directed a good, pacifist sci‐fi film, “The Day the Earth Stood Still” (1951), a film with very few special effects, directed “Star Trek,” but I can't imagine what there was for him to do after telling the actors where to stand. Because most of the drama in such a movie is created in the laboratories, the actors are limited to the exchanging of meaningful glances or staring intently at television monitors, usually in disbelief."

 

[mb22]

I remember reading these reviews at the time. Notice that Canby's review was published on December 8, not 7. Paramount didn't have advance critic screenings for TMP, a sign of anticipation of poor reviews.

 

[TrickyDickie]

Here is Roger Ebert, for the Chicago Sun-Times, from December 7, 1979. (Interestingly, the folks maintaining his website today have a large image of the Phase II version of the Enterprise, complete with blue bussards, displayed at the head of this review.) :

Star Trek: The Motion Picture

"Epic science-fiction stories, with their cosmic themes and fast truths about the nature of mankind, somehow work best when the actors are unknown to us. The presence of the Star Trek characters and actors who have become so familiar to us on television tends in a strange way to undermine this movie. The audience walks in with a possessive, even patronizing attitude toward Kirk and Spock and Bones, and that interferes with the creation of the "sense of wonder" that science fiction is all about.

Let's begin with the toy for the eyes. The Star Trek movie is fairly predictable in its plot. We more or less expected that two of the frequent ingredients in the television episodes would be here, and they are: a confrontation between Starship Enterprise and some sort of alien entity, and a conclusion in which basic human values are affirmed in a hostile universe. In "Star Trek: The Motion Picture", the alien entity is an unimaginably vast alien spaceship from somewhere out at the edge of the galaxy. The movie opens as it's discovered racing directly toward Earth, and it seems to be hostile. Where has it come from, and what does it want?

The Starship Enterprise, elaborately rebuilt, is assigned to go out to intercept it, with Admiral Kirk, of course, in charge. And scenes dealing with the Enterprise and the other ship will make up most of the movie if the special effects aren't good, the movie's not going to work. But they are good, as, indeed, they should be: The first special-effects team on this movie was fired, and the film's release was delayed a year while these new effects were devised and photographed. (The effects get better, by the way, as the movie progresses. The alien ship looks great but the spaceports and futuristic cities near the film's beginning loom fairly phony.)

The Enterprise, perhaps deliberately, looks a lot like other spaceships we've seen in "2001: A Space Odyssey," "Silent Running," "Star Wars," and "Alien." Kubrick's space odyssey set a visual style for the genre that still seems to be serviceable. But the look of the other spaceship in "Star Trek" is more awesome and original. It seems to reach indefinitely in all directions, the Enterprise is a mere speck inside of it, and the contents of the alien vessel include images of the stars and planets it has passed en route, as well as enormous rooms or spaces that seem to be states of a computer-mind. This is terrific stuff.

But now we get to the human level (or the half-human level, in the case of Mr. Spock). The characters in this movie are part of our cultural folklore; the Star Trek television episodes have been rerun time and time again. Trekkies may be unhappy with me for saying this, but there are ways in which our familiarity with the series works against the effectiveness of this movie. On the one hand we have incomprehensible alien forces and a plot that reaches out to the edge of the galaxy.

On the other hand, confronting these vast forces, we have television pop heroes. It's great to enjoy the in-jokes involving the relationships of the Enterprise crew members and it's great that Trekkies can pick up references meant for them, but the extreme familiarity of the Star Trek characters somehow tends to break the illusion in the big scenes involving the alien ship.

Such reservations aside, "Star Trek: The Motion Picture" is probably about as good as we could have expected. It lacks the dazzling brilliance and originality of 2001 (which was an extraordinary one-of-a-kind film). But on its own terms it's a very well-made piece of work, with an interesting premise. The alien spaceship turns out to come from a mechanical or computer civilization, one produced by artificial intelligence and yet poignantly "human" in the sense that it has come all this way to seek out the secrets of its own origins, as we might.

There is, I suspect, a sense in which you can be too sophisticated for your own good when you see a movie like this. Some of the early reviews seemed pretty blase, as if the critics didn't allow themselves to relish the film before racing out to pigeonhole it. My inclination, as I slid down in my seat and the stereo sound surrounded me, was to relax and let the movie give me a good time. I did and it did."

 

[Tallguy]

I remember reading these reviews at the time. Notice that Canby's review was published on December 8, not 7. Paramount didn't have advance critic screenings for TMP, a sign of anticipation of poor reviews.

Also a sign of "the movie isn't done yet". They could have had the next Casablanca and they couldn't have screened it.

 

[J.T.B.]

It turns out that the villainous UFO is not manned. This is very peculiar, since in the film's opening sequence it is full of weirdos. By the time the Enterprise closes in on it, the creatures have all disappeared, victims not of the story line but of what appears to be a shortage of either money or time.

That's funny, apparently he didn't know what was going on and missed the Klingons being zapped.

I remember reading these reviews at the time. Notice that Canby's review was published on December 8, not 7. Paramount didn't have advance critic screenings for TMP, a sign of anticipation of poor reviews.

I think it's pretty well established that the prints were barely ready in time for actual release-date distribution, anything earlier was out of the question. They were still working on it.

 

[TrickyDickie]

Charles Champlin, for the L.A. Times, December 9, 1979. "Spockalypse Now". :

Go for a ride on the starship Enterprise in 'Star Trek: The Motion Picture"

" 'Star Trek: The Motion Picture' is not so much a film as a phenomenon: a space family reunion, fan club meeting and Thanksgiving Day parade under the same spacious roof.

If ever a film was willed into being by the people who wanted to see it, this is it. The Trekkies were in line before dawn, some of them, for the Friday citywide openings. At the Chinese the doors opened an hour before showtime and the seats and the popcorn lines were full within moments.

It's the only non-trade screening I can remember when the producer's name — Gene Roddenberry — drew a rousing ovation during the opening credits. Ray Stark, eat your heart out.

The audiences, this early at least, are part of the film. The Trekkies sounded pleased to the point of delirium with what they saw. They cheered the first glimpse of each of the eight familiar faces (with lesser cheers, out of courtesy , for the two new faces).

Leonard Nimoy as Mr. Spock has been given an entrance unequaled for showmanship since Carol Channing sashayed down those stairs in "Hello, Dolly!" and it drew a great roar. The pleasure of a comedy is the contagion of the laughter and, Trekkie or not, the pleasure of "Star Trek: The Motion Picture" is the contagion of delight of old friends reunited, which is to say, of William Shatner as Capt. Kirk, Nimoy, DeForest Kelley as Dr. "Bones" McCoy, James Doohan as Scotty, et al, once again in the presence of their admirers.

Considered on its own, as a film without antecedents (which is, of course, all but impossible), "Star Trek: The Motion Picture" is slightly another matter.

It is hugely scaled (the title "Spockalypse Now popped into my dazed mind).

The new starship Enterprise is reported in the production notes to be 947 feet by 417 feet, with a crew of 431 and a speed 218 times as fast as light. No EPA estimates are given.

The special effects created by Douglas Trumbull and John Dykstra are as spectacular as one would expect them to be. One sequence especially, in which (as nearly as I could figure out) the Enterprise careens into a time warp with one of its spark plugs misfiring and threatens to vibrate to pieces, is a wonderful mic of faces gone rubbery and blurry as through a wet windshield and voices gone low and hollow as on a failing tape recorder.

Individual bodies chug-chug in space, small space ships nurse up to mother and a sense of size is so convincingly established that the real Golden Gate Bridge, briefly seen, look like a miniature.

But, despite the crackling electricity (the effects are very lightning-oriented), the visuals more often than not are majestically, terminally slow, better at conveying size than speed. There are a couple of dazzling burps, when the ship blasts through the time warp (a postgraduate sound barrier), but most of the time the approaches, dockings and flybys are so leisurely there is some danger to the pilot will doze off at the stick.

There is virtually none of the slam-bang action and excitement of "Star Wars." The script by Harold Livingston from a story by Alan Dean Foster attempts a parable in which Deep Space and Future Time offer more promise than peril and in which misunderstanding rather than villainy is the problem. In this, "Star Trek" is closer to "Space Odyssey" and "Close Encounters," though without Kubrick's special mix of high energy and mysticism or Spielberg's lively confrontation of Earth and Other.

The plot is that a mysterious cloud of unthinkable size and destructive energy is zipping toward Earth and only you, starship Enterprise, may be able to stop it.

(What it proves to be will not be explained here, even if I could, but there is one faint echo of "Zardoz.")

Shatner as Kirk comes out of retirement for the fateful mission, dislodging as commander young Stephen Collins, who has overseen the new Enterprise. The rivalry is not really developed.

Persis Khambatta, she of the shaved head, plays an old flame from Collins' tour of duty on Planet Delta and looks every inch an Egyptian princess. She and Collins, both attractive players, carry the film's parable , looking to some higher evolution in which mates may make circuits and alloys instead of babies but still live happily ever after.

For the rest of it — to the satisfaction of the devotees — Spock is pretty much his old haughty emotionless and invaluable self, Kirk the heroic but human leader, the doctor the grousing and skeptical voice of Earth, Scott the lovable, dependable character.

The rest of the old gang, George Takei as Sulu, Majel Barrett as Dr. Chapel (elevated from Nurse), Walter Koenig as Chekov and Nichelle Nichols as Uhura, are on hand to wave from the back of the convertible, so to speak.

It is, beyond doubt, a phenomenon and an attractive one in that it reflects a kind of double idealism: good fictional people in quest of whatever may be best about tomorrow, with enthusiastic audiences, able to be optimistic about tomorrow if not today, going along for the ride.

But the hard fact is that a lot of "Star Trek" is sluggish going, and would seem slacker without Jerry Goldsmith's bold, resourceful and hard-working music, which does everything music can to create feelings of exuberance and alarm.

The director was the meticulous Robert Wise, and the polish of "Star Trek" cannot be faulted. But the troubles surrounding the film have been widely reported: early effects discarded, others abandoned for want of time before the inexorable premiere date. It may be that the stirring action the film seems to lack is on the drawing boards, not the cutting room floor.

Buf what you see is what you respond to, and what you see is a unique cultural phenomenon, and a film that for all its visual splendors falls well short of its aspirations. You don't have to be Trekkie to love it, but it would certainly help."

 

[TrickyDickie]

Judith Martin, for the Washington Post, December 14, 1979:

Just a Pretty 'Trek'

"No one doubted that a "Star Trek" movie could count on a large audience of "Trekkies" who watched the television series and made a profitable cottage industry out of "technical manuals" of fictional spaceship plans, maps, uniform designs and other paraphernalia of a behind-the-scenes universe.

The question is whether it could also pick up the non-diehards who flocked to "2001," "Star Wars" and "Alien."

Probably not, for reasons that are not entirely its fault.

If anything, this film's plot, although as thin as the others', is slightly cleverer and its characters are somewhat more appealing. Rather than being a dopey good-guys/bad-guys shoot-out, the Star Trek film shows a more open-minded view of the future, where most creaters seem to mean well and humanistic quirks are tolerated.

The characters, an assortment of races and nationalities representing a united universe of the 23rd century, are individualized. William Shatner, as the captain, is if anything, too vulnerable -- by repeatedly making and admitting mistakes, he makes a shaky leader. The appeal of Leonard Nimoy's much-admired role of Spock, the strange man from another planet, is based on his failure to live up to his cold ideals. The value of DeForest Kelley's Dr. McCoy is to remind us that technology can't be completely trusted.

There are funny little touches, such as an invented Germanic sort of language requiring subtitles on the film, and someone's darting through the space ship's automatically sliding inner doors just as they close.

The big touches -- the "special effects" of the space genre -- are attractive, if occasionally evocative of Oz, Luray Caverns or a Metro station. Lots of lacy lightning strokes light up the scenes, and a faster-than light speed is dramatized with blurred film.

This picture even has a teeny philosphy, something along the lines of Knowledge-Is-power-But-God-Is-Love.

But is this enough to make a general audience trek is the movie house?

The very clear-cutness of the war or monster space films endeared them to general audiences, brought up on standard westerns and horrors, because it acted as a setting for the visual hijinks. If there is time, in such a film, to think about lives of the characters, the film is dragging. An endless loving look at the renovated spaceship Enterprise by its once and present captain can be enjoyed only by those who enter into his feelings, which is to say those who knew his past history from television.

And then the photography is getting to be a bore. There are only so many ways to photograph black starry space and the under-bellies of spaceships, and the films that got there first used them all up.

As the Muppet film was entitled "The Muppet Movie" to assure the steady customers that they were getting their favorite product in a new form, this movie, called "Star Trek -- The Motion Picture," is for those who are already sold."

 

[TrickyDickie]

Kathleen Carroll, New York Daily News, December 8, 1979. She calls the studio model a "replica" of the Enterprise. :

Pretty dull trip, this 'Trek'

" 'Star Trek,' that futuristic TV series that captivated millions of earthlings in the '60's, has, thanks to popular demand, been converted into a monster of a movie. On second thought, this long-awaited science-fiction adventure saga is not so much a movie as it is a sort of giant display case, designed exclusively to show off the latest space gimmickry and photographic tricks invented by Hollywood's most creative special effects artists, Douglas Trumball and John Dykstra.

Under the listless direction of Robert Wise, "Star Trek" continuously grinds to a complete halt as the camera lovingly scans some expensive piece of equipment - like the massive-looking replica of the Starship U.S.S. Enterprise, and the sound level of composer Jimmy Goldsmith's ponderous music rises accordingly.

"Star Trek" fans (who are known as Trekkies although it is said that some prefer the more formal Trekkers) will be pleased to note the return of their favorite stars, all of whom look a little older, if not wiser.

William Shatner (who remains teary-eyed throughout the movie apparently to show that he is quite overcome by this reunion with his spacecraft), as Admiral James Kirk, has used his forceful personality to regain command of his old ship, the Enterprise. He is reluctantly joined by the ship's one-time resident physician and self-appointed psychiatrist, the gruff Dr. McCoy (De Forest Kelley, who looks much the worst for the wear and tear of the last ten years, but who also supplies some welcome humor.).

As the re-designed Enterprise heads out into space on the now standard mission of having to intercept a mysterious planetary intruder that is presently on a collision course with the planet, Earth, another familiar face materializes. With his slanted eyebrows and pointed ears, he could only be the all-knowing Vulcan, Mr. Spock, and he could only be played by the impeccably straight-faced Leonard Nimoy.

There are newcomers aboard the Enterprise, among them a bald-headed, but still striking-looking navigator (Persis Khambatta) who quickly reassures her fellow passengers that "my oath of celibacy is on record," and the newly replaced captain of the Enterprise (Stephen Collins) who exchanges meaningful looks with the Deltan navigator throughout the voyage.

Spock, after he first makes contact with the intruder (which is later discovered to be a "living machine" in search of its "Creator") reports that it is "cold" and it lacks "mystery." The same could be said for "Star Trek." It is a purely mechanical movie that is no more dazzling to the eye than a nighttime landing at Kennedy airport."