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Title: Star Trek
Director: J. J. Abrams
Starring: Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Leonard Nimoy, Eric Bana, Karl Urban, Simon Pegg, John Cho
Release: 8 May 2009 [UK]

Rating:

Synopsis: The fate of the galaxy rests in the hands of bitter rivals. One, James Kirk (Pine), is a delinquent, thrill-seeking Iowa farm boy. The other, Spock (Quinto), was raised in a logic-based society that rejects all emotion. Chronicling Kirk’s rise from farm boy genius to starship captain, we see Kirk, Spock, Bones(Urban), Scotty (Pegg) et al thrust into bitter conflict with rampaging Romulan Nero (Bana).

Review: I’d just like to get one thing straight – I am not a “Trekkie”, and I never have been. The extent of my Star Trek knowledge comes from watching The Next Generation (aka TNG) with my father when there was literally nothing else to watch on TV. I was always more of a Star Wars kid myself… though as an adult I really couldn’t give a toss either way.

This being said, I loved Abrams’ Star Trek for a multitude of reasons – and should another series based on this movie, or more sequels emerge (I hope they will)… then you may be able to brand me as a new-gen Trekkie. However… new-found fanboy-ism aside, let me divulge a little more about my opinion on the movie.

Again, with all my movie reviews I am giving you a SPOILER WARNING right now just so I don’t ruin anything for readers that haven’t seen it yet.

The story follows both Kirk & Spock’s recruitment into Starfleet – with their “friendship” being one of the primary focusses of the movie. Kirk is targeted purely on the basis of his Father’s stellar achievement of saving 800 lives while he was the captain of the Starship Kelvin for 12 minutes – you get to see this right at the beginning of the movie, opening into a spectacular scene littered with carnage created by Nero decimating the starship in his search for Ambassador Spock (Nimoy).

Spock’s recruitment into Starfleet is his own doing, as an act of rebellion against his father, and the Vulcan committee who recruit for the Vulcan Science Academy – all because they described his mixed Vulcan/Human heritage as a “disadvantage”.

Plot-wise, I don’t have a single problem with the movie – I know a lot of Trekkies do, but as Nimoy himself has mentioned, you can accept all of the events in the film due to the altered realities caused by Nero & Spock’s time travelling antics.

Aesthetically-speaking, the movie is absolutely outstanding. The gritty feel of the movie doing it’s job in making everything seem more real works a treat – much like the highly successful Chris Nolan Batman reboots. And somehow this is even transcribed into the space battle scenes. The visceral destruction of starships & planets are gobsmacking – even when I first saw the trailer I think I may have even uttered the word “wow”. The cinematography is great too, with most camera angles providing beautiful shots.

However the aesthetics are where I have my one and only gripe about the movie – the overuse of the lens flare effect in almost every bridge scene. Just to set the tone – the bridge of the Starship Enterprise has had a little overhaul (see below)… there seems to be lots of glass everywhere. Now don’t get me wrong, this makes the bridge much more interesting and pleasing to the eye – however it means that for some damn reason in the background of almost every shot we have bright white lights reflecting off everything, often obscuring the view of the actors.

This is both annoying and very unnecessary. And from a design point of view – why would there be a lot of glass on the bridge anyway? Surely this is just another thing for crewmen to be thrown through/impaled on (I know this is the point, but you’d think the Federation’s design crew wouldn’t overlook safety as a primary factor would you?).

All the actors in the movie do very well in my opinion (my girlfriend didn’t feel the same way about Quinto as Spock – mainly as she felt he was prettymuch just reprising his Sylar role from Heroes). Pine is a great choice for Kirk – he has the charisma and on-screen presence to replace William Shatner (who I didn’t really enjoy as Kirk anyway in all honesty). Quinto is creepy in his likeness to Spock when made-up, almost rivalling Brandon Routh’s turn as Clark Kent/Superman in Singer’s Superman. I felt his protrayal as Spock was very good – he even gets Spock’s famous eyebrow raising down to a tee, but only does it once.

Karl Urban doesn’t disappoint as “Bones” McCoy being his usual outspoken self & John Cho is excellent as Sulu and has a great fight scene. Simon Pegg was an interesting choice for Scottie – he’s one of my favourite actors (ever since Spaced), but I wasn’t sure he was right for the role… Thankfully I was wrong. Pegg’s comedic input into the character is great – even when he used the nostalgic “I’m giving it all she’s got, Captain!” line.

These nods back to the original series and movies are only slight, which I’m thankful for. I did worry that the Abrams would rely too much on these little facets to please the fans, but the “new” direction the movie has gone in is great.

There were a few casting surprises I didn’t know about before I watched the movie – Winona Ryder as Spock’s mother being one of them. I’m not a big fan of her work, but she doesn’t do badly. Thankfully she’s not in the movie enough to cock anything up. Eric Bana was another I wasn’t aware of, and he is great as Nero – malevolent, vicious and self-righteous to the end.

The music in the movie is great too, with The Beastie Boys’ “Sabotage” used early on in a scene with Kirk stealing his stepfather’s antique car and driving it off a cliff. Most of the music is more atmospheric fare, and works very well to accentuate the tone of the movie in the right places.

Verdict: Like I said at the start of the review – I’m not a trekkie… but should the inevitable sequels continue in the same vein, then I can quickly see myself becoming one. The movie is one of the greatest sci-fi movies around, and definitely the best movie I’ve seen of the year so far… (I’m expecting a lot from Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, hence the inclusion of “so far”). Needless to say I will be buying this as soon as it hits DVD, and I would urge you all to do the same.

Rating:

Trailer:

Popularity: 12% [?]

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 13th, 2009 at 12:20 and is filed under Movies, Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.