I'm re-watching/re-evaluating "Star Trek: Nemesis"

I hit the pause button on the Blu-Ray. I'm an hour and nine minutes in. Shinzon wants to destroy Earth but Picard is counting on Shinzon wanting his DNA even more.

I have to say the fact that this will no longer be the last we'll see of the 24th Century takes the sting out of Nemesis. A lot.

Despite the super-dark lighting scheme, Jeffrey L. Kimball's cinematography shines through.

B-4 is still annoying. And a lot of times it feels like I'm watching Captain Stewart instead of Captain Picard. But Patrick Stewart in 24th Century drag isn't bad.

It's all I've got to say half-way through. This will never be my favorite Star Trek movie, but my opinion of it has gone up.

 

I recently watched it with the deleted scenes re-inserted where they were supposed to be and they definitely helped lift it a little. The film's problems are still all firmly in place, but some of the character moments really should have been left in the film.

 

Good that the Romulans, represented by Donatra and the Senator, only wanted Earth defeated not destroyed. The fact that Shinzon wanted to destroy Earth is what made them turn on him.

Shinzon wanting to destroy Earth puts him in the same category as Nero but worse. Nero at least saw his homeworld destroyed. Shinzon didn't.

The Enterprise smashing into the Scimitar is still awesome. I thought so at 23, I still think it at 40. What can I say?

Riker and the Viceroy are a different story. That fight was pointless and dragged on too long. Riker kicking the Viceroy and the Viceroy finally falling reminds me of Kirk and Kruge... but the Viceroy is no Kruge. Not to slight Ron Pearlman. I liked him in Alien Resurrection and he's a bad-ass in Sons of Anarchy.

EDIT: Picard beams over to the Scimitar. Then suddenly the transporter stops working? Just like that? Come on. They didn't even try with that one. Couldn't Geordi have said something like the damage was getting worse and worse and say he wasn't sure how much longer the transporters would be able to hold out?

The reaction to Data's death. In this forum before, I've said that it wasn't good to have Picard in a situation where he was crying early on Generations when he was being introduced to the film audience as the guy who was supposed to replace Kirk and Movie Land had barely spent any time with him yet. I don't even think we were half an hour into the film yet. But by the end of Nemesis, I think that's different. We've reached a point, four films in, where I think it's okay to let Picard tear up like Kirk did in TWOK and TSFS for Spock and David. The reaction to Data's death, while there, and still somber, was a little too muted. For everyone but Troi. The guard should've been down completely. It's like they were trying hard to find a middle ground between "too much" and "nothing at all". They should've just written what felt right. Some of it did though. A lot of it was very much like they were at a wake, or the get-together after the wake, not knowing what to say. And Riker tried to break the ice.

But that's not the note I want to end this post on. The Enterprise in dry dock at the end does a good job of tying right back to the first film, where we first see the original Enterprise in dry dock in TMP. Nice touch. It brings the Prime Timeline Films full circle. And then Picard talking with Data-infused B-4, I think, will probably lead straight into Star Trek: Picard.

Like they used to say, "And the Adventure Continues." Or as Star Trek: Picard says, "The End Is Only the Beginning."

 

I think Nemesis is a far more entertaining film than it gets credit for. It's problematic in several ways as a Star Trek film, but I've never found it to be vile or insulting like others have.

I do agree that the editing process trimmed parts of the movie that would have made it a much better film. There was a lot more character and thematic content there that could have easily substituted for some of the other content (honestly, some of the action) and made this a better film.

 

Lots of green in Nemesis (green logo/posters, green Scimitar lighting, green nebula).. the reason? probably The Matrix (sequel was due summer 03)

 

Could be. But green was also a big Romulan color.

I'll take it over what we have nowadays with everything being teal and orange. I'm hoping The Matrix 4 will be the beginning of a shift away from that.

 

I liked the green thing they had going on in Nemesis - at least it gave it a visual identity, unlike it's bland predecessor.

 

I don't mind the green, but the preponderance of X's are a bit on the nose. Tenth movie, X...okay, we get it guys.

 

What X's do you refer to?

 

They're all over the Scimitar. In computer interfaces, on the walls, even on the outer hull.

 

Ah yes, I'd never really noticed that and made the correlation before.

 

I don't know...TMP had a theme of "6" with V'Ger's spindles and some hexagon shapes throughout.

I don't see a problem with the "X's" on the Scimitar.

 

The Matrix in 99 was such a huge influence on everything that came after in the early 00s most of all the bullet time (e.g. AvPs bullet time facehugger) leathers/shades (XMen) and maybe green stuff in other films of that era? and with the 'year of the matrix' just around the corner maybe Trek wanted some of that Matrix cool look? idk.

I do remember an interview with Rick Berman when he stated hed seen an early cut of the film and it looked more like a Ridley Scott or John Woo film than a regular Trek film - I presume he meant Scott due to some vague Alien imagery/look? (maybe he meant the green on the Alien poster and maybe the Derelict/darkness of the Schimtar?) or maybe the various Gladiator connections... and Woo the action stuff with Picard blasting everyone (didn't he have a phaser in each hand at one point?) he should've also added George Miller with the Mad Max Picard buggy chase lol

 

Given that we're talking about Rick, I can't tell if he meant that as a positive or a negative. If a negative, then the lack of experimentation is one of the issues that I've had with Rick Berman.

The passage of time helps too. Given that this was made in 2002 and eight years away from the end of TNG. It's the first TNG film that looks and feels like there's some distance from the series, like how -- from a production standpoint -- the TOS films felt like there was some distance from their series.

The dark deep purplish browns inside the Enterprise-E and the washed-out browns -- not to mention the blue Okudagrams -- make the ship feel kind of like the Discovery with its bronze interiors. I was mentally comparing the lighting of the Enterprise to the lighting of Discovery.

I wonder if the bronze in Discovery makes some people think of the Enterprise-E and if that's part of what makes them think, subliminally, "it should be post-Nemesis!" I can see that point of view that some people have, but -- at the same time -- it's not like bronze wasn't invented until the late-24th Century. Went off on a tangent there.

 

One of the things I really liked about the film (other than Jerry Goldsmith's powerhouse score) was the muscular sound design. The phaser fire was really strong, the collision scene was devastating and the Scimitar's final explosion was totally enveloping.

On the minus side: the stars made sounds as they whipped by the screen. Oy.

I loved this film when it was released. I still do.

 

This. A hundred times yes. Usually I can see how removing scenes makes a movie better, but in the caseof Nemesis there's a *lot* of gold in those deleted scenes. The post-wedding discussion between Picard and Data. Data trying to teach B-4 how to socialize. Beverly having those couple of heart-to-heart talks with the Captain. And the ending, which promises more adventures ahead with a new first officer and an elated Picard looking forward to a fresh start after being quite morose about losing Riker at the start of the movie. Bookends. Even Spot going away with Worf, a cute throwback to the TV show. There is a lot there which elevates the film. I've got some small hope that if the Picard show is successful, it'll prompt an extended cut (supervised by Frakes?), because damn, all of that character stuff should have stayed in.

 

I can kind of see why they did it though - they wanted an action blockbuster of sorts, but didn't have the megabucks to do it that was starting to get thrown about on these type of films, more 'character' scenes would have diluted the amount of action they did get on screen. I would like to see an extended cut of the movie though.

 

The picture is packed with action...in the second half. The first is primary chit chat, which is why the much-maligned desert planet chase sequence was so important. It was the act 1 action scene needed to break up the conversations.

 

Obviously the Picard show is going to be the ultimate canon-keeper on this, but my hope was always that Data's memories would live on in B-4 in the same way the Omicron Theta colonists memories existed within Data, but that what we saw in that final scene was B-4 starting to develop as an individual, something worthy of exploration, as he could ultimately evolve into someone as distinct from Data as Data was from Lore. I was always... uneasy... about how most of the post-Nemesis EU material simply assumed that Data 'overwrote' B-4, partly because I feel that's something unethical that Data wouldn't do, but also because when Data transfered the memory engrams, he had no foreshadowing of his own death (unlike Spock placing his katra in McCoy), therefore as far as he knew, he and B-4 were going to continue to co-exist. There's no way he ever intended to simply transfer into B-4's body and replace him, and that "solution" feels like a massive cop-out on Data's journey ending, to me. Far more interesting would be to see B-4's journey begin.