Star Trek 6, The Dinner Scene....

[A beaker full of death]

guardian said:
Why not come out and make clear what you are saying?

Which I believe is--- the cast was so old and their acting so weak they couldn't even get through the scene without flubbing their lines, so no full scene exists.

Is that right??

I'm not saying anything; I'm reciting facts that have been reported elsewhere. Don't put words in my mouth.

guardian said:
I've never read what he's implying, but I'm sure he'd fight to his last breath that it's true.

I'm not implying anything. I'm repeating what I read in interviews at the time. I don't remember with whom (I think Nichols and Shatner, but I'm not sure). And yes, it's true (why would one lie about having read something?) The fact that you haven't read it is dispositive of... nothing.

In any event, even if the scene were broken into many cuts because of 'bad' acting, they could have put together a more complete version.
The acting in what is in the movie is not bad.

I don't recall anyone saying anything about bad acting.

The film had far worse problems: minor ones like not knowing starboard from port, and major ones like making Spock a rapist.

 

[A beaker full of death]

Plum said:
^^^
Yea I'm not sure what you know Beaker. Take after take is how it's done, after all.

Yeah, but aside from the poor continuity (arms in midair, glasses half full, etc.), lines were cut in midstream (that "to be or not to be" clearly was spoken immediately after the Klingon version, but a few lines were stuck in the middle) and the flow was just disjointed and choppy. Sorry, it was just poorly edited. And as I mentioned, it was widely reported that they had a lot of trouble getting that scene in the can.

 

[Maurice]

In the Trek Anniversary special aired near the time TUC was released, more of the dinner scene was shown. I have it on an old VHS tape somewhere...

 

[Timo]

As far as I'm concerned, awkward editing is smack on for a scene intended to portray awkwardness... And I like the final version's flow of things better than the above scripted one.

Just out of curiosity, where do they get port and starboard mixed?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[A beaker full of death]

Timo said:

Just out of curiosity, where do they get port and starboard mixed?

The shock wave. They say the wave is to port, and Sulu orders starboard thrusters to turn the ship into the wave. Only the wave is shown to the right (starboard) of the ship, and they turn the ship right (using the port thruster).

 

[Timo]

Right, thanks!

Although the Trek practice (reflecting today's practice) would have the thruster designations correct in that instance. "Starboard thrusters" means "use thrusters to go starboard" in the TOS movie and TNG/DS9/VOY context, just like "aft thrusters" means "use thrusters to move aft".

The old Royal Navy had the opposite practice: if they wanted to turn right, they specified how the hardware should be used. They commanded "over to port" because you needed to move the lever of the rudder to port to make the ship turn starboard - even after wheels rather than simple levers had been adopted for moving the rudder. That's micromanaging; modern navies take the macromanaging view where one specifies where the ship should be going, not where a particular lever should be pulled or a switch flipped.

A starship doesn't really have "starboard thrusters" - it has thrusters distributed all across the hull, and if these are used in the right combination (no doubt automatically managed by the computer), they move the ship port, starboard, forward, aft, up or down as commanded. Similarly, the ship doesn't actually have a rudder, but the command "right standard rudder" is still relevant and concise (not to mention the way the modern USN uses the terminology).

Timo Saloniemi

 

[A beaker full of death]

Timo said:
Right, thanks!

Although the Trek practice (reflecting today's practice) would have the thruster designations correct in that instance. "Starboard thrusters" means "use thrusters to go starboard" in the TOS movie and TNG/DS9/VOY context, just like "aft thrusters" means "use thrusters to move aft".

This is news to me, and bloody silly, not to mention creates a significant risk of confusion. "Aft thrusters" should (and as far as I knew always did) refer to the thrusters positioned at the aft, intended to move the ship forwards. This is what happens when people with no experience run a franchise.

In any event, given Nichols's love of all things nautical, and the identification of the wave as being to port, I think the command "Starboard thrusters - turn her into the wave" was indeed intended to have the starboard thrusters fired, turning the ship to port.

The old Royal Navy had the opposite practice: if they wanted to turn right, they specified how the hardware should be used. They commanded "over to port" because you needed to move the lever of the rudder to port to make the ship turn starboard - even after wheels rather than simple levers had been adopted for moving the rudder.

Interesting. Makes sense. Naval men tend to revere tradition.

 

[guardian]

So your original post implied nothing and you just wanted to convey that you read that they couldn't get through the whole scene in a single take and that accounts for why it was cut down---the fact that they couldn't get through the whole scene withouts many takes.

Okay, sorry I misunderstood.

 

[A beaker full of death]

guardian said:
So your original post implied nothing and you just wanted to convey that you read that they couldn't get through the whole scene in a single take and that accounts for why it was cut down---the fact that they couldn't get through the whole scene withouts many takes.

Right - and to add my impression that it looks cobbled together.

Okay, sorry I misunderstood.

No sweat.

I went back through my library from way back when, and found the source:

 

[Plum]

A beaker full of death said:

Plum said:
^^^
Yea I'm not sure what you know Beaker. Take after take is how it's done, after all.

Yeah, but aside from the poor continuity (arms in midair, glasses half full, etc.), lines were cut in midstream (that "to be or not to be" clearly was spoken immediately after the Klingon version, but a few lines were stuck in the middle) and the flow was just disjointed and choppy. Sorry, it was just poorly edited. And as I mentioned, it was widely reported that they had a lot of trouble getting that scene in the can.

Oh I see what you mean. Yea, dinner scenes are murder on continuity. And I will concede a filmic eye would definately pick out the editing dexterity. You've a more observant eye than most!

A beaker full of death said:

Timo said:

Just out of curiosity, where do they get port and starboard mixed?

The shock wave. They say the wave is to port, and Sulu orders starboard thrusters to turn the ship into the wave. Only the wave is shown to the right (starboard) of the ship, and they turn the ship right (using the port thruster).

That ALWAYS drove me nuts. They coulda just looped that line!

 

[Timo]

...Or flipped the visuals.

Or perhaps "moving from right to left" is mandatory for any scene that wants to convey that the subject is "returning" from somewhere? (No, seriously!)

Anyway, Trek is remarkably consistent about using "starboard thrusters" for "turning the ship starboard on thrusters" - the one piece of technobabble they haven't managed to get wrong, despite the obvious risks.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[A beaker full of death]

Timo said:
Or perhaps "moving from right to left" is mandatory for any scene that wants to convey that the subject is "returning" from somewhere? (No, seriously!)

I've often wondered if Israelis would find the opposite true.

 

[guardian]

So a 5 page scene, with 10 speaking actor parts and all the coverage involved that took 35 or 40 takes seemed like a lot to Koenig???

Wow, that really shows how little work in major set-piece scenes he did in his later career.

If he thought that was an 'inordinate' amount of takes I really question his judgement.

Maybe he was just way more used to sitting at nav and having the lines spoken to the viewscreen.

I still think the scene was cut because they wanted to shorten the lead-up to the 'action' parts of the movie, not any technical reasons.

Thanks for posting that article!!

 

[Therin of Andor]

guardian said:
If he thought that was an 'inordinate' amount of takes I really question his judgement.

You're talking about "shots". He's talking about "takes". In that, so many actors kept fluffing their lines, or missing action cues, or continuity was wrong, in this lengthy, complicated scene, that a great many takes of each shot were needed.

 

[Nebusj]

guardian said:
So a 5 page scene, with 10 speaking actor parts and all the coverage involved that took 35 or 40 takes seemed like a lot to Koenig???

Wow, that really shows how little work in major set-piece scenes he did in his later career.

Yeah, 'cause forty times through the same five pages is a quick breezy little thing, especially when the actors start getting punch-drunk three weeks into the shooting day and screwing up lines.

 

[guardian]

^^Was that an attempt at sarcasm? Can't tell.

At any rate, I know a 5 page scene of that type is hard. It was probably the whole day's shooting. 10 actors speaking lines, multiple camera angles, many takes, coverage, reaction shots etc.

His comment made it seem HE thought it was particlarly hard is what caught my eye--or he just exaggerated to tell a better story.

In any event of the 41 lines (by my script count) that were cut, Kirk, Chang, Gorkon lost none and Spock & McCoy lost a combined 7. So the 34 other cut lines were divided between Scott, Uhura, Chekov, Kerla & Azetbur---Wow a big surprise there.

Did all the re-takes and line flubs affect only the stuff spoken by the minor characters or is this just another case of speeding up the pace of the movie by getting rid bits of stuff done by the supporting cast?

I think the latter, but everyone's entitled to their opinion.

It is a fact, that the dinner was the major scene for the supporting actors besiders the usual stuff at their regular posts. It must have looked meatier than usual when they read the script and said, "finally I get to say something beisides exposition and tech dialouge."

Hopefully, the HD DVD release will give us lots more deleted scenes than the previous release to boost sales and we'll all get to decide for ourselves.