TGT, why do you hate the TMP Director's cut?

[USS Mariner]

The God Thing, The God Thing, THE GOD THING!!!

 

[Gepard]

THE WOME...okay, I won't do it.

 

[trevanian]

if i'm not mistaken, itunes is a fairly recent development, POST de.

Yes. Weren't we talking about current audiences and their opinions on TMP?

No, talking about audiences who saw the DE since it came out and were impressed with it, but who probably hadn't seen the theatrical in any decent form (that being either projected or on widescreen laserdisc) and therefore had precious little upon which to base their earlier negative opinion.

NOW, if they run this theatrical you say is available (ws?) alongside the DE, perhaps we'll see some re-re-rethinks. Certainly I hope everybody rethinks their misplaced love for 2006's CASINO ROYALE once they take another look and realize turning Bond into a sociopathic adolescent in a middleaged body was NOT a good thing ... rethinks are often in order.

 

[GodThingFormerly]

Could one of the mods please kill this thread? I have infinitely more fascinating and worthwhile projects to complete - such as, say, cleaning out my garage - than indulging the whims of this pathetic excuse for an OP.

TGT

 

[Data Holmes]

Could one of the mods please kill this thread? I have infinitely more fascinating and worthwhile projects to complete - such as, say, cleaning out my garage - than indulging the whims of this pathetic excuse for an OP.

TGT

Booooo.

*Throws popcorn at monitor*

I was looking forward to you indulging his whims.

 

[GalaxyX]

Could one of the mods please kill this thread? I have infinitely more fascinating and worthwhile projects to complete - such as, say, cleaning out my garage - than indulging the whims of this pathetic excuse for an OP.

If you have any parts for a Ford 5.0L Engine Block, let me know lol. But seriously, I know you love TMP, I don't understand why you hated a version that IMHO fixes a ton of the original TMP's shortcomings.

Oh well.....

 

[GalaxyX]

I think the VFX on the DE are an improvement by and large. But, the relative merits of those effects aside, it's the editing that makes the DE a superior film.

I'm not nearly enough of a TMP historian to list all the changes and what specifically I liked and disliked. But, having seen the theatrical cut a week ago for the first time in like six years, I couldn't believe it's the same film I've been watching on DVD since 2001.

I never used to like TMP and now I know why. Lethargic would be a gross understatement of the film's pace. Some folks claim that TMP is the most true to TOS of the first six movies but the theatrical cut puts the lie to that claim. Sure, thematically it resembles TOS (it's basically "The Changeling" after all) but the vast majority of TOS "popped." A TOS episode clips along at a pretty good pace. Never feels like 50 minutes of TV when you're watching it. A viewing of the theatrical cut of TMP is lucky if it feels like less than four hours.

The DE, by comparison, is a marked improvement. While it's not cut at what I would call a breakneck pace by any stretch, it definitely moves in a way the theatrical cut doesn't. Rarely in the DE do you find yourself wondering what's coming up next instead of getting on with it already.

The DE's improvements were certainly greater in some areas than others, but the point is I think that even the things that were less successful were still better than what premiered in '79. Which, in the interest of full disclosure was five years before I was born. So, I wouldn't say I have any emotional attachment to that cut like some might.

That's pretty much how I feel too. Others are welcome to say why they did or did not like the DE version, but I was particularly interested in TGT's opinion because he holds the movie in far more higher regards that most of us could I think.

 

[Psion]

Funny, everytime I go to post a topic, someone else beats me to it.

Yes, I rewatched ST:TMP Theatrical Cut a few times lately, not having seen it for years.

Verdict? The DE has a few nice additions... but I simply do not understand the majority of the changes. A list, in no particular order:

1) The computer voice. For the most part, it was fine. The only bit that bothered me, was that fucking temperature read-out when Ilia-probe arrived. Not only was it pointless, serving to tell us what we already heard seconds before ("It's white hot"), but it actually talks over the top of the Ilia-probe, rendering her inaudible, so it can tell us that she's 37.5 degrees or some such. Fine, aside from that.

2) The long effects. Bollocks. There is one instance of an overlong effects shot, which I'm pretty sure everyone who saw the film was scarred by, resulting in them saying all of the shots were too long. The scene in question is at roughly 1h05m, and has some of the best music in the film. Too bad the scene was just slightly too long at 2 minutes or so, and too slow moving.

3) Pointless changes. Adding the TOS shuttle to Starfleet Command? Why? Removing Kirk's ohmigod? Removing the EVA voice during Spock's flight? Removing Kirk's second "viewer off"? Removing his grabbing of Spock after his mind meld? So many completely random changes that made no positive impact. The computer voice, aside from the afore mentioned Ilia-probe scene, was fine as well. Why did they redo V'Ger launching the green energy at Earth? The original was fine.

4) The wing walk. With today's technology, that pathetic stuttery-ass dull grey light-blob mess was all they could manage? They weren't smoothly moving or anything, it looked fucking awful. The saucer? Grey. Everything in the scene that wasn't black? Grey. For a film that had such a vibrant blue tint throughout, to suddenly be faced with grey with such poorly rendered light blobs twitching along is pathetic.

5) The pre-wingwalk chamber. Why? Because some assholes couldn't deal with the fact that Spock's little journey didn't add up to the Enterprise finding V'Ger on the other side of the V'Ger orifice? How the hell does adding another chamber that Spock didn't see resolve that? Pointless.

6) The nacelle. For some reason, I remembered the Theatrical Cut as having a solid panel instead of a moving starfield. Until now, I thought the moving starfield was a good improvement added by SharpLine. Now, though, I see that the only thing they added was that fucking stupid looking nacelle. The concept art that they lifted that from had a totally different set, one that actually allowed having a wide impressive view of the nacelles, instead of a pathetic tiny window with one cock-eyed nacelle on it. Worthless.

7) Things they didn't do. Wow. Where to begin? With all the pointless shit they added, redoing things that were fine... why leave the matte lines around the Klingon ships? Why not straighten some of the more dubious effects shots? Why not give us that huge image of V'Ger towering over Earth and casting a shadow across the entire planet?

8) Credits. Why fuck with those at all? Why add that cheap blur effect?

To their credit, they pulled off a few decent shots of the Enterprise with the white energy balls approaching, that really did fit in.

Overall, considering the tools they have at their disposal... a fucking poor effort.

Don't forget how the size of V'Ger's cloud went from 200 AUs to only 2.

I like the DE, but largely prefer the original. I don't think the perfect Director's cut has been made yet. And given Robert Wise is dead, I really doubt we'll ever see a perfect version. It's also my understanding that an entirely new suite of sound effects had been composed in 1979 for the movie that weren't quite ready for the film when it came out. These sounds must have been subsequently lost. It'd be interesting to hear what had been made.

 

[GodThingFormerly]

Don't forget how the size of V'Ger's cloud went from 200 AUs to only 2.

82 AU, actually, so the energy cloud could be depicted engulfing the entire Solar System as V'ger approaches Earth.

TGT

 

[Therin of Andor]

NOW, if they run this theatrical you say is available (ws?) alongside the DE, perhaps we'll see some re-re-rethinks.

TMP, the theatrical version, has been available for download through iTunes for about a year. And the next boxed set of TOS DVD movies coming out will have the theatrical, not the DE, version. New bonus features include a reunion of fan extras from the rec deck scene.

 

[GalaxyX]

82 AU, actually, so the energy cloud could be depicted engulfing the entire Solar System as V'ger approaches Earth.

TGT

So you hate the DE because they changed the incredibly ludicrous number of 82AU to a more reasonable 2AU??

 

[dillon3001]

I think the best thing about the DE is the overworked shots of Vulcan.

100% agree with you on that one. I think the only thing I didn't like was the uniforms and the wrist communicators. Really not something that would stop me from enjoying a movie however. TMP remains one of my all time favorite Trek movies. I loved how they showed V'Ger near the end of the directors cut. I grew up on Trek movies as a kid and I always wondered what V'Ger looked like, so that was awesome from that aspect of it.

 

[dillon3001]

Don't forget how the size of V'Ger's cloud went from 200 AUs to only 2.

82 AU, actually, so the energy cloud could be depicted engulfing the entire Solar System as V'ger approaches Earth.

TGT

I guarantee that most people dont know what an AU is, it was probably just thrown in there like that to make it sound more "sciency"

mmmm......sciency....

 

[GalaxyX]

^^^ But it makes sense to nerds like us lol.

82AU is insanely huge. Bafflingly huge, we can't even wrap our heads around that. I mean, it's 82 times the size of a Dyson Sphere's circumference!!

V'ger itself was pretty big, but it not big enough to create an energy field 82AU across in diameter, that was just sillyness. Even 2AU is ridiculous, but at least not on the same magnitude.

 

[The Laughing Vulcan]

82AU is insanely huge. Bafflingly huge, we can't even wrap our heads around that. I mean, it's 82 times the size of a Dyson Sphere's circumference!!

Diameter. You want circumference you'll have to multiply by pi, Mr Nerd...

V'ger itself was pretty big, but it not big enough to create an energy field 82AU across in diameter, that was just sillyness. Even 2AU is ridiculous, but at least not on the same magnitude.

What's ridiculous got to do with anything. 2 AU or 82 AU it matters not. Cosmologically speaking it's insignificant. If the sun's heliopause can reach out past the edge of the solar system, then why can't a technologically superior object have a similar effect. Besides, V'Ger was Clarke's Law incarnate, a technology significantly advanced to be indistinguishable from magic. The principles it opearted on, its energy source and how it applied it could only be speculated about by the Enterprise crew, certainly not replicated. It was about as ridiculous as deity speaking through a burning piece of vegetation. From the insignificant viewpoint of a carbon based units, its abilities may have seemed ridiculous, but I'm sure V'ger found them perfectly explicable.

2AU, 82 AU, it makes no difference. What's ridiculous is thinking that it does.

 

[Nardpuncher]

Hey...I watched Star Trek: The Motion Picture on ABC back in 1989 and it was funny! You could see some of the set behind Captain Kirk when he left the Enterprise in his spacesuit! What a blooper!

 

[cardinal biggles]

Since the thread was directed to TGT, and he's indicated he's not interested in participating...