(Copy of post I made to my personal Facebook page and various groups there.) I finished reading Joe Fordham's Star Trek: First Contact: The Making of the Classic Film (2022) a few days ago. A very entertaining behind the scenes look at what is (I think) pretty much universally regarded as the best of the four Star Trek films based on the "Star Trek: The Next Generation" tv series cast. (Although, I have to say that referring to it as "the classic film" doesn’t feel quite right to me because, even though this book was intended to be released in 2021 in time for First Contact's twenty-fifty anniversary, it still doesn't seem that First Contact (1996) is quite old enough yet to be called a "classic film". Then, again, it could just be that it makes *me* feel very OLD to see it put that way.)
The book is divided into chapters based on the development and major elements of the movie: the development of the script, the design of the new Enterprise-E, the casting of the major new characters, designing the Montana of 2061 locations as well as redesigning the Borg for the big screen, etc. Much of the information will already be familiar to the diehard Star Trek fans who read lots of behind the scenes Star Trek books, magazines, websites, etc., but there are still many interesting quotes from the actors, writers, producers, and director Jonathan Frakes to make it still worth while reading for them, and the book is written in such as way as not to overwhelm the casual Star Trek fan.
My one slight complaint is that while there are loads of pictures in this book from the film and also of behind the scenes development art--indeed, there are pictures on pretty much every page--a lot of the pictures from the actual film (and even some of the promotional stills) have a blurry look to them, as if taken from film screenshots or stills that have been enlarged. The reaction is often one of, "that's a great picture, I just wish it was in better focus". And since the pictures often dominate each two page spread, it can overtime detract a bit from what one is reading.
Still, even with that small complaint, I really enjoyed the book and highly recommend it for fans of the Star Trek movies, "Next Generation", and Star Trek: First Contact in particular. I gave it four out of five stars on GoodReads. (Copy read was checked out from the Tampa/Hillsborough County Public Library which added it to their collection upon my request.)
—David Young
