Star Trek

(THIS IS A REQUESTED REVIEW)

Space, the final frontier … well it used to be anyways. Lately it seems as if we’ve seen it all – from spaceships, to aliens, to intergalactic galaxies … we’ve seen it all. How is a new sci-fi film going to entice us to pay our hard earned cash for it if we’ve seen it all? Well maybe by throwing in a great cast, a decent story and some awesome special effects followed by a fan base of what we like to refer to as “Trekkies” and I think you’ve got a solid hit. Star Trek was a great re-vamp of an old franchise that I myself never took part of. If you haven’t seen it yet, then you are missing out on one of this year’s best films thus far. (Taken has been the best … so far)

SYNOPSIS:
A movie like Star Trek was going to rank in the money but it had to deliver more in today’s society if it was going to do well with the critics – and it did. This Star Trek doesn’t stray away too far from it’s original content – or so I think. Being as I’m not a man that’s seen an entire episode of Star Trek nor have I seen a complete film of Star Trek, I’m not familiar with many things about it. Though from what I’ve gathered from my friends and online critics, this film seems to stay true to the heart of it all. Wow, I’ve totally not even told you about the plot – ok so anyways …

Star Trek focuses on it’s main 2 characters, James Kirk, and Spock. Kirk is the remnants of his once courageous father and has chose to not follow in his footsteps, till he is told that he’s basically an idiot. He joins up with the rest of the “cadets” and enlists in the training that will solidify his future. Spock, well he’s an alien that looks almost human. He comes from a race that is far more advanced than us measly humans. Though there is a twist with Spock, he isn’t completely alien, he’s also half human. (oh yeah big plot turner there – not) Anyways, so these guys don’t see eye to eye and are sent out on a rescue mission that turns into a big ordeal and the story goes from there. Honestly I’d rather not go into too much here because I’ve got more important things to write about.

PROS of the FILM:
ACTION, ACTION, ACTION. If it’s one thing that J.J. Abrams did right with this movie was setting us all up for a roller coaster ride of action and never lettings us get out of our seats. If anyone got up during this movie to get a refill I would be surprised, and if they did then they are a moron and should be mushroom stamped. The movie was pretty intense scene to scene and didn’t really let go of us the whole entire way. Sometimes this doesn’t seem to work for some films because when they throw in that odd slow scene into the mix, it stands out and somewhat takes you out of the experience. While those slow scenes are in Star Trek, they never once slowed down the pace enough for me to even look at my watch or look around at the rest of the audience. Which to me is pretty awesome and let’s be honest, that’s the only opinion that counts on this site anyways.

Casting was a big plus for this movie. As I’ve always said with other films it seems like the main actors can really make or break a film, let alone a franchise. Case in point – STAR WARS. Did anyone else think that Hayden Fuckerstian was a good pick for Anakin? NO! Was Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto perfect for the two leads in this movie? YES! Even after the first trailer aired, I was somewhat skeptical with the pick for James Kirk. He looked almost too “fratboy-ish” to pull of a serious enough Kirk when the time would arise. Glad I was wrong there. (yes, I will admit when I’m wrong) As far as Zachary Quinto (aka: Sylar from a little show called Heroes) was probably the only person that could’ve pulled off the estranged alien half-breed Spock. He seemed to have a great way of showing emotion only through his eyes and flaring nostrils. Yet as much as you might want to not like him, you end up liking him and rooting for him anyways. Which for an actor to make you like and hate him all at the same time – that says a lot. The rest of the cast seemed to be pretty solid to me yet this is where I falter. I, like I’ve said before, am not a Star Trek person. I couldn’t tell you who each character was in the original films, nor could I tell you what they did on board the Enterprise. (fyi Enterprise is the name of the spaceship) It seems to me that by the reaction I received on my left while watching the movie – this is a reference to my good friend BK – that he seemed to think every character was fit brilliantly. Which is awesome because as long as those who know the history of Star Trek approve – then by god so do I.

Let’s get on with the special effects shall we? They were amazing. Honestly there wasn’t a time where I reflected upon the movie and said, “damn, that CG looks horrible…” which I can almost do in every other film that I watch now-a-days. (please reference the review on Wolverine if you don’t believe me) But yes, the computer animation and effects were astounding. I can’t wait for the Blu-Ray to come out so I can watch how they did all the special effects and brought them in so nicely without making it look like everything was shot on a green screen – which I’m pretty sure a lot of it was. Yes, it could’ve been a blue screen don’t fret I’m not racist. I’ve heard from a couple critics that the sun glares and over exposure in some shots was a little too much to take, but I apparently never saw these said spots or glares. Maybe the early release was touched a few times before the final release on this past Friday? Sure there were some times where a creature would look not so real, but that’s only due to our lack of imagination. I don’t blame that on the effects teams.

Story. Yes we’ve got to mention that the story, while it was more or less the introductory story to a much bigger plot – that it was simple enough for anyone to grasp a hold of, yet not too mundane that it didn’t make the film unwatchable. Which is exactly what it needed to be. Yes it might’ve thrown a lot of characters and names our way, but at least we were able to hold on to the ride and know what our destination was without getting off at rest stops every five minutes to ask a friend what the hell is going on.

CONS of the FILM:
Not too many here but I do have some.

Who was the makeup artist on Zachary Quinto – aka: Spock? Who I ask you, who!?!?! That person needs to be fired and someone should post a website of this person making sure that they don’t get work anymore. Honestly, if we’re going to have close ups of this “alien” and when I say “alien” I mean, the human with pointy ears and oddly shaped eyebrows – that when we have these close ups, you need to make sure of one thing. COVER UP THAT DAMN STUBBLE! Honestly did anyone else see the 5′oclock shadows under Spock’s eyebrows where they obviously shaved away his real ones?!?!?!? How was this missed? Did they have too much lighting on set that the light was bouncing off his huge brow and into the directors eyes so that nobody saw this? Seriously I’m not even kidding – it was there enough that it bothered me to the point that I had to bring it up as the first CON – and that my friend is not a good thing.

Next, so it’s an origin story right? Are we all “Trekkies”? NO! Do we all understand what kind of aliens there are, who some of the characters are etc.? NO! Do you think you should try and give us a little explanation to some of that? Maybe …?? Also – where was the explanation of the Federation? How was it formed? Did anyone else know that the Spock people and the Humans have been co-existing under the Federation? Hey you – yes you reading this blog – do you even know what the Federation is? Well, I don’t really know, and I felt that I was owed some type of explanation for these things. On top of all the other weirdo races of aliens we were thrown along the way – what were they? Where did they come from? Were they all part of the federation or were some of them pets of humans?

Speaking of aliens – aside from the 2 big ugly beast aliens that were on the snow planet, why were all of the aliens a lot like humans? We had some big eyed bimbo nurse lady, some short green midget alien, a green skinned red haired alien girl that to me was probably played by some sweedish chick. I mean come on? Is this a Trek thing that was lost on me – or are all the aliens out there descendants of humans? If you are going to do aliens in a sci-fi movie – then let’s make them have feet for hands, or 8 different appendages or something, I’m sure the writers and designers could’ve been creative on all that stuff a little more than they were.

And my last CON is the fact that they had Winona Ryder in this movie. She sucks! Why would you throw her into this film? You honestly mean to tell me that you couldn’t find a classy old lady to play Spock’s mother? Oh, that’s another thing – she didn’t even look that old! (oh and yes, she can’t act damn it – this was just a bad choice!) Ok, so this is my call to the director – next time you need a casting decision I really think you need to have a conference call with me so that I can talk you out of stupid decisions like that. Good, glad we had that talk.

SUMMARY:
Good movie, see it. If you haven’t seen it then you better have a good excuse for not seeing it. I am actually going to end up seeing this movie probably more than once in the theatre. I honestly don’t know the last time I saw a movie twice in theatres. So if that isn’t a good enough excuse to go see it then maybe you should read my review again and maybe it will start to sink in. Seriously, good action, good cast, decent story and great special effects = great time at the movies and well worth your hard earned cash!

FINAL MOVIE RATING: 8.5/10

~ by phoenixwave on May 10, 2009.