What's great about the movie is the various incarnations of it are all very good in their presentation. When ABC showed it on TV and added some footage (including things I swear are not on the VHS Extended Edition that came out not long after), as well as the Director's Cut with updated effects and some editing for pacing, they are all great to watch! Overall, I find myself going back to that original cut, because that was what you saw when it came out. I think that's on one of the DVD issues I have of the movie (maybe in that white box set with the lenticular pic of Enterprise on the front?)
What's great about the movie is the various incarnations of it are all very good in their presentation. Kirk hovering below the sound stage rafters notwithstanding... http://movies.trekcore.com/gallery/displayimage.php?album=270&pid=29513#top_display_media
What's funny is, even when Paramount released the Extended Edition on video, they didn't even crop it then! You can clearly see it's a set with the rafters being seen very clearly!
For years I didn't even realize that I was seeing the rafters of the set! Whenever I saw that scene I just thought that part of the ship was just missing some hull plates because it launched too early. I think I was too busy noticing that Kirk never actually pushes in the button on the top of his spacesuit's joystick (not sure what else to call it). Not sure why that bugged me so much but I always wondered what the button was supposed to do. Looking back, the button on the prop might have just been something glued onto the end of the joystick and it was supposed to look like Kirk pushes it to release those little jets to maneuver.
STAR TREK: The Motion Picture is still the most unique film in the entire franchise, being a work of art, as much as a product of commercialism. I love the costumes, the sets, the models, the cinematography ... the soundtrack! Eyecandy/Earcandy ... just every kind of candy there is, this movie has it. Hell ... even the Klingon photon torpedoes are pretty! An absolutely gorgeous entry in the STAR TREK franchise and so much of that is attributable to Gene Roddenberry having had a hand in it. In his own way, the Man was an Artist and that shows, in this feature. I continue to be extremely fond of it, despite the taint of Stephen Collins featuring so heavily. The character of Decker had a very unusual and unique destiny in motion pictures, however. It makes one wonder what that would be like, to spontaneously evolve, in the blink of an eye, into a merged creature whose knowledge spanned the known Universe. And the effect of it, how it was demonstrated, on film ... wow ... you know, I've never seen anything quite like that, in any other movie. Except for the initial plunge into V'GER, with everybody mugging for the camera and just eating the clock that way for, maybe, 15 minutes ... this film went down some interesting roads.
Absolutely love TMP. It still gives me chills whenever I watch it and consider the astounding leap from TOS to the first film. Everything that came after owes its existence to all the blood, sweat, and tears that went into that movie. I only wish the Director's Edition would get a much-deserved HD rebuild.
I love it too but I prefer the earlier part of the movie where there is more crew interaction. I would have loved for each of the crew to be given a little moment to shine, to show of their personality quirks. We get one line from Uhura and a few little comic moments from Chekov plus some decent Spock/Kirk/McCoy interplay but I would have loved more! Maybe it would have detracted from the scope of the movie but I would have loved it if a larger landing party had got to explore more of V'Ger on foot. Give me some scenes like the opening scenes in Alien where the supporting crew got to explore and show their smarts and I really would have been in love.
No, and I think that screenshot was from the deleted scenes that were incorporated into the extended edition but not in the original theatrical cut either. Kor
Kor- As a big Klingon fan...how did you react to the re-design / re-imagine of the Klingons that happened in TMP?
Well, I wasn't born yet, so to me there have always been two types of Klingons. When I was a kid I just accepted the Ford/FASA hybrid explanation. Kor
I always thought that was the reasonable answer as well. There were Human/Klingon fusions and Romulan/Klingon fusions if I remember correctly. Each genetically engineered for the purpose of more effectively dealing with their primary enemies.
I always thought the change to wrist communicators in TMP was cool, even though I missed the flip-phones. I'd love to find a good prop or re-creation sometime. I've seen the playmates toys versions...but they are about 4x the size of the actual prop.
Can we all agree that the warp drive effect in TMP was unmatched, even to this day? The streaking lights and kaleidoscope effect followed by the warp bubble "snap" was just awesome. I really was disappointed with the watered-down streak effect that came after (and seemed to get progressively worse each film). It made going to warp speed an "event," which I thought was really interesting.
I watched it original run - in a small single screen theater and loved it from the start to the finish... In retrospect, it does have issues but, at the time - it was one of the most perfect films I had watched.
You'll get little argument from me. Love it, though I prefer the first warp effect in TWOK, which is basically a refinement of the TMP effect but just has that little extra 'oomph' for me. Everything that followed just got progressively worse, like they couldn't be bothered.
I liked the TWOK effect in that first warp jump, but if you compare shots, it's basically just the reused TMP effect minus the extra colors and warp bubble snap.