Of the 11 Trek films made,what are your 2 or 3 favorite ones and why?

[Cingular]

Of the 11 Star Trek cinema films made so far, what 2 or 3 films,
are your current favorite ones and please separately say why,
for each fave Trek cinema film named (as in for the film's better
script, the acting, direction, FX, or a combo of all of these or
any other factors).

 

[Ward Fowler]

Re: Of the 11 Trek films made,what are your 2 or 3 favorite ones and w

Well, let me give the most popular answer of all time.

Star Trek: The Motion Picture: It may not have been exciting but it was smart for general audience Sci-Fi. It was also ambitous and had a bit of heart.

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan - For the first time it dealt with the characters as real human beings. It showed that our heroes weren't infallible, made many mistakes, and were merely mortal.

Star Trek V: The Final Frontier - Like TMP it was ambitious. It had the best character moments of any of the TOS movies, and it attempted to be thoughtful in a way that few mainstream movies do. Sure, the comedy was awful and ultimately it was anti-climactic, but you got the best insight into Kirk, Spock, and McCoy that you are ever going to get.

 

[trevanian]

Re: Of the 11 Trek films made,what are your 2 or 3 favorite ones and w

Well, let me give the most popular answer of all time.

Star Trek: The Motion Picture: It may not have been exciting but it was smart for general audience Sci-Fi. It was also ambitous and had a bit of heart.

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan - For the first time it dealt with the characters as real human beings. It showed that our heroes weren't infallible, made many mistakes, and were merely mortal.

Star Trek V: The Final Frontier - Like TMP it was ambitious. It had the best character moments of any of the TOS movies, and it attempted to be thoughtful in a way that few mainstream movies do. Sure, the comedy was awful and ultimately it was anti-climactic, but you got the best insight into Kirk, Spock, and McCoy that you are ever going to get.

Agreed, agreed, and agreed. How many times are you gonna get two in a row saying TMP, TWOK and TFF on this board?

 

[Ward Fowler]

Re: Of the 11 Trek films made,what are your 2 or 3 favorite ones and w

Well, let me give the most popular answer of all time.

Star Trek: The Motion Picture: It may not have been exciting but it was smart for general audience Sci-Fi. It was also ambitous and had a bit of heart.

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan - For the first time it dealt with the characters as real human beings. It showed that our heroes weren't infallible, made many mistakes, and were merely mortal.

Star Trek V: The Final Frontier - Like TMP it was ambitious. It had the best character moments of any of the TOS movies, and it attempted to be thoughtful in a way that few mainstream movies do. Sure, the comedy was awful and ultimately it was anti-climactic, but you got the best insight into Kirk, Spock, and McCoy that you are ever going to get.

Agreed, agreed, and agreed. How many times are you gonna get two in a row saying TMP, TWOK and TFF on this board?

Never. But that's all right. We don't need the rest

 

[RyuRoots]

Re: Of the 11 Trek films made,what are your 2 or 3 favorite ones and w

First Contact, despite the queen, is my favorite ST movie hands-down. It has the introduction of my favorite ship (the Enterprise-E), my favorite ST uniforms, and Picard's inability to cope with a perceived loss to the Borg and desire for revenge at any cost and realizing just how far he's going to satisfy that is up there with Kirk getting over his racism and hatred in TUC. The movie still looks great, has my favorite ST movie score, and was the one Picard/Data movie to really hit it out of the park. I think the Borg queen is an idiotic idea and an even more idiotic character, but she's used as well as is possible. If nothing else, it creates a fun moment in Data's "Resistence is futile!" at the end. Even though it's definitely a Picard/Data movie, everyone is given something to do/say, even if it's a bit part, which I liked. The TNG regulars were all up to their usual high standard, and Cromwell was great as Cochrane.

Star Trek XI very closely following FC. It was a compelling trial-by-fire story, and it re-introduced us to TOS and did away with the static one-dimensional archetypes that were TOS' biggest problem. All the actors did a simply phenominal job as the TOS characters, with special mention in particular to Karl Urban. And I enjoyed some of the new takes, like Chekov being a wunderkind and Scotty being a little more comedic. I didn't care much fore the score in a vacuum, but it works brilliantly in the movie itself. And yes, I wasn't a huge fan of the lensflare shots, but it could've been worse. It has your usual Star Trek logic flaws, but it's a fun ride that did exactly what it set out to do and did it extremely well.

The Undiscovered Country following those two by a slightly bigger, but still pretty small margin. This film is by far the best at presenting Kirk and Spock (or Prime!Kirk and Prime!Spock if the distinction is necessary) as real people. I think that's a thing that the TOS movies tried to do in general, but it came out the best here, especially for these two, I think. It was also a great lead-in to the peace between the Federation and Klingons in TNG, and it has my favorite Kirk scenes easily. Pretty good music, and an entertaining conspiracy plot.

 

[ialfan]

Re: Of the 11 Trek films made,what are your 2 or 3 favorite ones and w

First Contact

The Search for Spock

The Undiscovered Country

 

[Aike]

Re: Of the 11 Trek films made,what are your 2 or 3 favorite ones and w

Star Trek
Finally, a real action-adventure TOS-movie.

First Contact
By far the best TNG-movie.

I mainly like these two movies because the storytelling is a mix of myth and sci-fi.

 

[SRFX]

Re: Of the 11 Trek films made,what are your 2 or 3 favorite ones and w

1. The Motion Picture - It has my favourite story, the best special effects, best soundtrack and ends with the biggest climax - both visually, aurally and philosophically of any Star Trek movie. It's perfect and I will never like another ST movie better.

2. First Contact - I love the FC storyline and the Borg action/drama tension doesn't hurt it either. Picard is excellent throughout the movie ("I WILL MAKE THEM PAY FOR WHAT THEY'VE DONE") and Riker/Geordi are great playing off the entertaining Cochrane. The first contact scene between the Vulcans and Cochrane is so good it gave me goosebumps the first time I saw it. Just perfect. Jerry Goldsmith's best theme as well.

3. The Undiscovered Country - It's just great. Everything about this movie is slick and polished and everything works so well. There is not a single wasted scene or boring conversation. The drama is well portrayed, big things are at stake and most importantly - it's ABOUT something. Never have the TOS characters felt more real than in this film. This crew couldn't have had a better send off.

 

[Cryogenic]

Re: Of the 11 Trek films made,what are your 2 or 3 favorite ones and w

Can I vote for "Star Trek: The Motion Picture" three times?

Aside from high excellence of craft, it's also as all great works of cinema should be: a lucid dream; exorbitant yet simple; mysterious yet rational; grand yet intimate. To (para)quote Adorno, it's not only an allegory, but the eucatastrophic fulfillment of allegory. I'm really fond of TMP's onion-like layering, from its ecclesiastical exploration of the monad, to its high-minded gesamtkunstwerk-esque structure. Suffice it to say, it's rare among films, and unique among "Star Trek" movies.

 

[Bones2]

Re: Of the 11 Trek films made,what are your 2 or 3 favorite ones and w

It's difficult for me to pick 2 or 3, because TWOK, TFF, TUC, GEN, and FC are all fairly close. Different days, it could be any combination of those.

 

[Shazam!]

Re: Of the 11 Trek films made,what are your 2 or 3 favorite ones and w

Star Trek XI very closely following FC. It was a compelling trial-by-fire story, and it re-introduced us to TOS and did away with the static one-dimensional archetypes

When?

 

[Shazam!]

Re: Of the 11 Trek films made,what are your 2 or 3 favorite ones and w

It's difficult for me to pick 2 or 3, because TWOK, TFF, TUC, GEN, and FC are all fairly close. Different days, it could be any combination of those.

I have that same combination problem for TMP, TWOK, TFF, TUC and FC.

TWOK is pretty much the only constant as I love the cat & mouse aspect of the conflict, how the two protagonists never actually meet and because Kirstie Alley was hot as hell back in the day.

 

[Kegg]

Re: Of the 11 Trek films made,what are your 2 or 3 favorite ones and w

Can I vote for "Star Trek: The Motion Picture" three times?

Aside from high excellence of craft, it's also as all great works of cinema should be: a lucid dream; exorbitant yet simple; mysterious yet rational; grand yet intimate.

This sort of sums up why I love the movie better than I could, and the first term (lucid dream) can aptly be referred to my overriding obsession regarding cinema, an interest in dreamscapes and fantastical imagery, especially if the whole thing is a trifle operatic (and TMP is).

Anyway that, and... uh. I dunno, the Meyer duology. FC and the new Trek flick are also up there in that general area.

 

[AxelFoley]

Re: Of the 11 Trek films made,what are your 2 or 3 favorite ones and w

The Wrath of Khan: Great villain, great story & script, great character moments. It's just great all around. Has the most powerful scene in all of Star Trek.

The Voyage Home: Different, in a good way. I love the idea of the film and it ended up being a great move. A lot of humor that worked very well. It's the movie I watch the most, even though it's not my #1 favorite.

The Search For Spock: I love the directing by Nimoy in this. Having Spock in this, only in the last few minutes of the film didn't really bother me (and I LOVE Spock), that should be a testament of how great this movie is. Kruge was cool, as was the fight in the end with the classic last words Kirk gave him: "I... have HAD... enough of YOU!". The last scenes of the film really touches me as well "Jim... you're name, is Jim". Always gets me teary-eyed.

 

[backstept]

Re: Of the 11 Trek films made,what are your 2 or 3 favorite ones and w

2) The Wrath of Khan - the best of the original cast movies, excellent score and fantastic villain
4) The Voyage Home - it's just a fun movie
11) Star Trek - it's just a fun movie excellent score and fantastic cast

 

[Shazam!]

Re: Of the 11 Trek films made,what are your 2 or 3 favorite ones and w

Don't just list the films, guys. That's lame. The thread title dictates that you need to explain your choices.

 

[RyuRoots]

Re: Of the 11 Trek films made,what are your 2 or 3 favorite ones and w

Star Trek XI very closely following FC. It was a compelling trial-by-fire story, and it re-introduced us to TOS and did away with the static one-dimensional archetypes

When?

If you have to ask that, there's nothing I can say that will make you think so.

 

[Bones2]

Re: Of the 11 Trek films made,what are your 2 or 3 favorite ones and w

Incidentally, anyone who complains about Scotty being used for comic relief in TFF certainly shouldn't be a fan of XI to that end.

 

[Joel_Kirk]

Re: Of the 11 Trek films made,what are your 2 or 3 favorite ones and w

Star Trek
Finally, a real action-adventure TOS-movie.

First Contact
By far the best TNG-movie.

I mainly like these two movies because the storytelling is a mix of myth and sci-fi.

I have to agree with this poster....

 

[Myasishchev]

Re: Of the 11 Trek films made,what are your 2 or 3 favorite ones and w

The trilogy. 2-4.