How much did the writer's strike affect Star Trek '09?

[JonnyQuest037]

From Memory Alpha:

The first three months of shooting on Star Trek took place during the 2007 writers' strike. None of the filmmakers could make any changes to the film's script during the strike period, meaning the common practice of revising the script during production was not possible. Although Abrams complained about not being able to add new dialogue, the strike for the most part did not affect the film's production. Since it was one of the studio's "high priority" films, Paramount strove to help it despite the writing stoppage. Writers Kurtzman and Orci were able to stay on set without strikebreaking as they were also executive producers on the film. While they could not change any lines themselves, they could "make funny eyes and faces at the actors whenever they had a problem with the line and sort of nod when they had something better."

Three months is a pretty substantial amount of time to be shooting a movie without any rewrites. Do you think this worked to benefit or the detriment of the film? Would some of the plot holes people have complained about been plugged if the writer's strike had not been going on?

I know that J.J. Abrams once commented that he was very frustrated when he thought of a great line of dialogue on set but he legally could not suggest it to the actor. Has Abrams ever revealed what that piece of dialogue was?

 

[F. King Daniel]

I don't think JJ ever said so, but I could be wrong. I do know that Spock Prime's lines in the Delta Vega ice cave were re-written and re-recorded after filming, and his mouth was CG'd to fit the new ones by Digital Domain.

 

[Sector 7]

Without the writers' strike, all movies could have been better, including Star Trek. Every director makes changes during filming, some large and some small. I, personally, believe some of the movie's rough edges could have been smoothed over without the strike.

 

[JonnyQuest037]

I don't think JJ ever said so, but I could be wrong. I do know that Spock Prime's lines in the Delta Vega ice cave were re-written and re-recorded after filming, and his mouth was CG'd to fit the new ones by Digital Domain.

That's interesting. I've never heard that. Do you recall what the original dialogue was?

 

[FarStrider]

Without the writers' strike, all movies could have been better, including Star Trek. Every director makes changes during filming, some large and some small. I, personally, believe some of the movie's rough edges could have been smoothed over without the strike.

I agree. . . most of the things that people complain about in this movie probably would have been smoothed out if the writers' strike hadn't happened. . . but Star Trek was luckier than most, since its script was mostly complete. . .everyone is jumping on Orci and Kurtzman for Transformers 2. . . but that script was a 20 page outline when the strike began. . . then Bay added what he wanted to it, and when the strike was over, O&K and another writer had to write around what Bay wanted in a very short time in order to make the film's shooting schedule. . . it's amazing that the films of 2009 weren't worse. . .


~FS

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

No, other than the anecdote about Abrams commiserating on the picket line by saying that he'd come up with a line he couldn't use there's not been any indication that the writer's strike affected the film in any way.

 

[Devon]

From Memory Alpha:

The first three months of shooting on Star Trek took place during the 2007 writers' strike. None of the filmmakers could make any changes to the film's script during the strike period, meaning the common practice of revising the script during production was not possible. Although Abrams complained about not being able to add new dialogue, the strike for the most part did not affect the film's production. Since it was one of the studio's "high priority" films, Paramount strove to help it despite the writing stoppage. Writers Kurtzman and Orci were able to stay on set without strikebreaking as they were also executive producers on the film. While they could not change any lines themselves, they could "make funny eyes and faces at the actors whenever they had a problem with the line and sort of nod when they had something better."

Three months is a pretty substantial amount of time to be shooting a movie without any rewrites. Do you think this worked to benefit or the detriment of the film? Would some of the plot holes people have complained about been plugged if the writer's strike had not been going on?

I know that J.J. Abrams once commented that he was very frustrated when he thought of a great line of dialogue on set but he legally could not suggest it to the actor. Has Abrams ever revealed what that piece of dialogue was?

I'm sure if it was desperately needed then some reshoots could have been done, but as it stands, there didn't seem to be any substantial reshoots needed, especially as late in to the strike that the film suddenly had a bigger window of time after the release date was moved (which some speculated was due to the writers strike, but shooting ended in it's normal time frame, give or take a week or so.)

 

[Destructor]

as it stands, there didn't seem to be any substantial reshoots needed.

I dunno, I think they must have shot with some kind of extra-shiny lens because there was all this lens-flare constantly messing up the shot, they should have reshot those takes but probably didn't have time or something.

 

[F. King Daniel]

I don't think JJ ever said so, but I could be wrong. I do know that Spock Prime's lines in the Delta Vega ice cave were re-written and re-recorded after filming, and his mouth was CG'd to fit the new ones by Digital Domain.

That's interesting. I've never heard that. Do you recall what the original dialogue was?

I don't know since I haven't seen the shooting script. There's an early one at IMSDB.com, where things are quite different and Spock created the black hole went back in time on purpose to try and save Romulus again. In that version and the STXI novelization Spock Prime's suprised that the whole crew's united on the Enterprise despite the alterations in the timeline, and speculates that the timeline may be attempting to repair itself. In the novel Spock also mentions that it was a galactic crisis that united the crew in his timeline as well, but I don't know if Alan Dean Foster added that himself.

 

[JonnyQuest037]

as it stands, there didn't seem to be any substantial reshoots needed.

I dunno, I think they must have shot with some kind of extra-shiny lens because there was all this lens-flare constantly messing up the shot, they should have reshot those takes but probably didn't have time or something.

 

[JarodRussell]

I don't buy that no one could add new dialog just because of the writers strike. It's not like ad libbing needs a friggin' writer.

I don't think JJ ever said so, but I could be wrong. I do know that Spock Prime's lines in the Delta Vega ice cave were re-written and re-recorded after filming, and his mouth was CG'd to fit the new ones by Digital Domain.

Source or it didn't happen!

 

[F. King Daniel]

It's mentioned on the wikipedia page. I read an article about it somewhere ages ago, probably linked to from somewhere like trekmovie.com.

 

[Admiral_Young]

This is something that I have wondered myself...it can't have been affected shooting or the script to that extreme. I have a copy of the shooting draft, or at least as close to the shooting draft as you can get if anyone wants it feel free to PM me. I think there have been a couple of threads on the script and most likely if you do a google search you should be able to find it.