REAL DISCLAIMER:
This review is a work of speculative fiction inspired by the Rotten Tomatoes thread. It's speculative in the sense that it's a prediction for how I may review the film in May of next year. It's not speculative in the sense that it's a story about spaceships and time-travel and aliens. Well...it is but only because it's a review of Star Trek. Like the film itself it is written for a mainstream moviegoing audience as well as Star Trek fans. It is for entertainment purposes only and does not contain any spoilers that have not already been reported through other news media.
FAKE DISCLAIMER:
Just over seven months from now I saw the new Star Trek film. It was the only time I had seen it, as it has not yet been released on DVD. So, given that my now hazy first viewing was in the future, much like Star Trek, my review may be based more on the themes it brings up—the big picture aspects of the movie as a whole.
Before this is a Star Trek movie it is a JJ Abrams movie written by Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman. The significance of this statement cannot be underrated for it permeates every aspect of this film. All three have records of writing mainstream character-based pop science-fiction for the popcorn crowd with some kind of original twist. If we analyze it through that prism we may gain a better understanding of this film.
One of the themes that all three have tackled over the years has been gender politics. How does one tackle gender politics in a movie based on a television show with an admittedly dated view of the role of gender in the world of the military, and the greater sphere of society as a whole.
I'll tell you, I loved the original Star Trek series. I started watching Star Trek: The Next Generation when I was about 10 years old. This was when my local affiliate aired the show at six o'clock on Saturday nights. Right before that show were reruns of the original series (or TOS in Trekkie parlance). TOS was a grand and swashbuckling adventure show where TNG was more of an intellectual exercise (though both shows clearly had heavy doses of my proclaimed hallmark of the other show). To that end, TOS entered my mind as a right-brain exercise where TNG was more a study left-brain analysis. Kirk was a romantic hero, Picard was a superlative and compassionate negotiator.
And the backgrounds of the creative forces of this movie are worth looking at in the context of gender politics. Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman started out as writers for Xena: The Warrior Princess and JJ Abrams created Felicity, Alias, and Fringe, all shows with strong women as central characters. But at least in the premises of Felicity and Fringe, the motivation of the women is in service of a man they love. In Felicity, Keri Russell changes her college plans to follow the boy she loves; and in the series premiere of Fringe, the character of Olivia only realizes her full potential when the life of her boyfriend turned traitor hangs in the balance. It's an interesting juxtaposition that poses some interesting questions about character motivation in relation to the themes in these shows.
Which brings us to this film Star Trek. About a month ago, roughly nine months before I got to see the film, Kevin Smith specifically praised Zoe Saldana's performance as Uhura. This made me more curious about the film than some of other aspects such as how closely the Enterprise on the silver screen matched the one on the small screen. I was struck by exactly this performance. It was perhaps one of the biggest clues that this was a movie made in the twenty-first century. She was a strong character that was very independent and had a love of life and adventure filtered through a cool intelligence. This was clearly evident in Nichelle Nichols performance, but here the character skews a little closer to Jadzia Dax, a character from another Trek show: Deep Space Nine.
But what of the other hallmarks of TOS? Do they permeate this show as they did the show that started it all? James T. Kirk was known the galaxy over for his brash cockiness, his bravado in command, and his pervasive charm. Here, in Chris Pine, we get someone who does satisfy those traits throughout. In episodic television even a character like Kirk would only get one lady-of-the-week. Since the format of this film spans several decades in his life, in order to establish his character as someone who was liberal with his affections, he had to break a few more hearts. Does that make him a sexist pig, or someone who's emotionally stunted, someone who arms himself with defense mechanisms? Here for the first time, we get a glimpse of his childhood on film. For some viewers it just may answer some of those questions. I won't spoil it too much; suffice it to say Kirk's wasn't a happy childhood.
Much has been made of the fact that this is a film that brings together the crew as we knew them on the show. That is certainly true, for the catalyst of the film is an older Spock who is runs into a version of himself around the time of the original show, played here by Zachary Quinto (Heroes, 24). And as much time as I spent on Uhura and Kirk, this is above all a Spock story. This is not surprising. When the show premiered in the sixties, Spock was the breakout character. When then Trek novice Nicholas Meyer directed Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan he decided that his first shot should be of the thing most recognizable to him as Star Trek: Spock's ear.
And what an arc the character of Spock has gone through over the course of the past forty-two years of storytelling. Fans already know that his childhood was filled with angst-filled conflict with his father, and other Vulcan children. It was an angst that brought him to Starfleet, and to who would become his best friend, James T. Kirk. Through this bond, and his later efforts in the shows we've seen, to reconcile his two halves, he eventually followed in his father's footsteps as an ambassador, someone whose post-Starfleet career grew out of his experiences bringing peoples together from the Federation and the Klingons to the Vulcans and Romulans. And it is here where we start the film.
At this point jumping through time is a pedestrian affair for even the most novice of movie patron, but as with most stories told by this trio, the conventional plot elements serve as a context for fun set pieces and dynamic character interaction. And yes Virginia, the sets look just fine. The film spans the twenty-third and twenty-fourth centuries and they reflect previous depictions of both but with the veneer of polish that only four decades of improved filmmaking can provide. JJ Abrams used several real locations to double for futuristic planetside and shipboard locales, and in so doing he chose places that reflected the design aesthetic of Matt Jeffries. CalState Northridge's mid-twentieth century library and a similarly mid-twentieth century city building in Long Beach both serve as examples to this. The exterior ship designs themselves also reflect the shape and scale of the original ships. But here they also demonstrate scale in the same grand sense that the first Star Trek film did.
It's a daunting task to pace a film that spans so much story time, especially when such a story involves time-travel and is told out of chronological order. To that end the editors have succeeded for the most part. Unlike the last Trek film Paramount was a little more generous with its running time. Star Trek: Nemesis had several scenes that fans argue would have added to the character development of the film but were cut for pacing reasons. In its place was an action sequence that had little to do with the rest of the film that felt like a placeholder for something that would. Here, for better or worse, we have a Star Trek film pushed to just beyond two hours, as is the trend with some of the major genre tent pole pictures of this decade. Thought it skates on the edge of being overlong, it's a minor point to suggest that there could have been some pieces of action or a one-liner here or there that could have been cut for pacing because overall the film does work as a brisk piece of pop entertainment.
It's its own interpretation of the same fictional events and characters as TOS. A lesson for viewers of this film, especially longtime fans of the franchise, is to take this a piece on its own. If TOS was the musical 1776, then this film is the HBO miniseries John Adams. Another analogy can be the Get Smart film from this summer. For thoughts on that film click here.
This review is a work of speculative fiction inspired by the Rotten Tomatoes thread. It's speculative in the sense that it's a prediction for how I may review the film in May of next year. It's not speculative in the sense that it's a story about spaceships and time-travel and aliens. Well...it is but only because it's a review of Star Trek. Like the film itself it is written for a mainstream moviegoing audience as well as Star Trek fans. It is for entertainment purposes only and does not contain any spoilers that have not already been reported through other news media.
FAKE DISCLAIMER:
Just over seven months from now I saw the new Star Trek film. It was the only time I had seen it, as it has not yet been released on DVD. So, given that my now hazy first viewing was in the future, much like Star Trek, my review may be based more on the themes it brings up—the big picture aspects of the movie as a whole.
Before this is a Star Trek movie it is a JJ Abrams movie written by Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman. The significance of this statement cannot be underrated for it permeates every aspect of this film. All three have records of writing mainstream character-based pop science-fiction for the popcorn crowd with some kind of original twist. If we analyze it through that prism we may gain a better understanding of this film.
One of the themes that all three have tackled over the years has been gender politics. How does one tackle gender politics in a movie based on a television show with an admittedly dated view of the role of gender in the world of the military, and the greater sphere of society as a whole.
I'll tell you, I loved the original Star Trek series. I started watching Star Trek: The Next Generation when I was about 10 years old. This was when my local affiliate aired the show at six o'clock on Saturday nights. Right before that show were reruns of the original series (or TOS in Trekkie parlance). TOS was a grand and swashbuckling adventure show where TNG was more of an intellectual exercise (though both shows clearly had heavy doses of my proclaimed hallmark of the other show). To that end, TOS entered my mind as a right-brain exercise where TNG was more a study left-brain analysis. Kirk was a romantic hero, Picard was a superlative and compassionate negotiator.
And the backgrounds of the creative forces of this movie are worth looking at in the context of gender politics. Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman started out as writers for Xena: The Warrior Princess and JJ Abrams created Felicity, Alias, and Fringe, all shows with strong women as central characters. But at least in the premises of Felicity and Fringe, the motivation of the women is in service of a man they love. In Felicity, Keri Russell changes her college plans to follow the boy she loves; and in the series premiere of Fringe, the character of Olivia only realizes her full potential when the life of her boyfriend turned traitor hangs in the balance. It's an interesting juxtaposition that poses some interesting questions about character motivation in relation to the themes in these shows.
Which brings us to this film Star Trek. About a month ago, roughly nine months before I got to see the film, Kevin Smith specifically praised Zoe Saldana's performance as Uhura. This made me more curious about the film than some of other aspects such as how closely the Enterprise on the silver screen matched the one on the small screen. I was struck by exactly this performance. It was perhaps one of the biggest clues that this was a movie made in the twenty-first century. She was a strong character that was very independent and had a love of life and adventure filtered through a cool intelligence. This was clearly evident in Nichelle Nichols performance, but here the character skews a little closer to Jadzia Dax, a character from another Trek show: Deep Space Nine.
But what of the other hallmarks of TOS? Do they permeate this show as they did the show that started it all? James T. Kirk was known the galaxy over for his brash cockiness, his bravado in command, and his pervasive charm. Here, in Chris Pine, we get someone who does satisfy those traits throughout. In episodic television even a character like Kirk would only get one lady-of-the-week. Since the format of this film spans several decades in his life, in order to establish his character as someone who was liberal with his affections, he had to break a few more hearts. Does that make him a sexist pig, or someone who's emotionally stunted, someone who arms himself with defense mechanisms? Here for the first time, we get a glimpse of his childhood on film. For some viewers it just may answer some of those questions. I won't spoil it too much; suffice it to say Kirk's wasn't a happy childhood.
Much has been made of the fact that this is a film that brings together the crew as we knew them on the show. That is certainly true, for the catalyst of the film is an older Spock who is runs into a version of himself around the time of the original show, played here by Zachary Quinto (Heroes, 24). And as much time as I spent on Uhura and Kirk, this is above all a Spock story. This is not surprising. When the show premiered in the sixties, Spock was the breakout character. When then Trek novice Nicholas Meyer directed Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan he decided that his first shot should be of the thing most recognizable to him as Star Trek: Spock's ear.
And what an arc the character of Spock has gone through over the course of the past forty-two years of storytelling. Fans already know that his childhood was filled with angst-filled conflict with his father, and other Vulcan children. It was an angst that brought him to Starfleet, and to who would become his best friend, James T. Kirk. Through this bond, and his later efforts in the shows we've seen, to reconcile his two halves, he eventually followed in his father's footsteps as an ambassador, someone whose post-Starfleet career grew out of his experiences bringing peoples together from the Federation and the Klingons to the Vulcans and Romulans. And it is here where we start the film.
At this point jumping through time is a pedestrian affair for even the most novice of movie patron, but as with most stories told by this trio, the conventional plot elements serve as a context for fun set pieces and dynamic character interaction. And yes Virginia, the sets look just fine. The film spans the twenty-third and twenty-fourth centuries and they reflect previous depictions of both but with the veneer of polish that only four decades of improved filmmaking can provide. JJ Abrams used several real locations to double for futuristic planetside and shipboard locales, and in so doing he chose places that reflected the design aesthetic of Matt Jeffries. CalState Northridge's mid-twentieth century library and a similarly mid-twentieth century city building in Long Beach both serve as examples to this. The exterior ship designs themselves also reflect the shape and scale of the original ships. But here they also demonstrate scale in the same grand sense that the first Star Trek film did.
It's a daunting task to pace a film that spans so much story time, especially when such a story involves time-travel and is told out of chronological order. To that end the editors have succeeded for the most part. Unlike the last Trek film Paramount was a little more generous with its running time. Star Trek: Nemesis had several scenes that fans argue would have added to the character development of the film but were cut for pacing reasons. In its place was an action sequence that had little to do with the rest of the film that felt like a placeholder for something that would. Here, for better or worse, we have a Star Trek film pushed to just beyond two hours, as is the trend with some of the major genre tent pole pictures of this decade. Thought it skates on the edge of being overlong, it's a minor point to suggest that there could have been some pieces of action or a one-liner here or there that could have been cut for pacing because overall the film does work as a brisk piece of pop entertainment.
It's its own interpretation of the same fictional events and characters as TOS. A lesson for viewers of this film, especially longtime fans of the franchise, is to take this a piece on its own. If TOS was the musical 1776, then this film is the HBO miniseries John Adams. Another analogy can be the Get Smart film from this summer. For thoughts on that film click here.
