Does What it Says on the Tin
Directed by JJ Abrams; starring Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Leonard Nimoy, Eric Bana, Bruce Greenwood, Karl Urban, Zoe Saldana, Simon Pegg…
JJ Abrams’ reboot of the Star Trek franchise begins with a brilliant idea. It travels all the way back to the original series for a new adventure with Kirk, Spock, Bones, and the rest — still the best (and best loved) crew of any Trek franchise. Yet, by focusing on their previously unseen early lives and first voyage it is able to tell its own, original story (and find a way to finally retire the old stagers for a hot new cast).
The film opens with a prequel sequence in which a Federation starship encounters a vast, mysterious, and hostile alien craft. Battle ensues and the good guys are promptly blown to bits (cue massive hull ruptures and bodies blown picturesquely into space). The Captain decides the only option left is to ram the enemy with his crippled ship. Of course the autopilot is out of action, so he has to sacrifice himself to steer the collision course. Jaw heroically clenched, he gives the order to abandon ship.
Cut to the medical shuttle, where his pregnant wife is being evacuated. Despite the massive destruction she’s been carrying on a running conversation with our hero on the magic radio all Star Trek characters carry in one of their ears. Realizing he is staying behind, she is able — in the half-minute remaining — to give birth, tell him the child is a boy, and fight about its name. The successful christening of the tyke cues the collision of the two warships. More huge explosions follow, covering the escape of the crew in their shuttles.
After this giant hairball of gobstopping sentimentality and huge improbability you have no excuse for not knowing what you’re in for; the rest of the movie, as the British say, “does what it says on the tin.” In fact, the remaining ninety or so minutes — filled as they are with melodramatic confrontations, unlikely coincidences, and the convenient development of “impossible” technologies seconds before they’re needed — seem almost plausible in comparison.
But, if thisStar Trek is pure hokum, at least it’s well-done hokum. The new crew, who looked like a casting call for Star Trek 90210 in the early publicity, are superbly cast. At times they seem to be channelling the spirits of the original crew (Chris Pine, as the young Kirk, has Shatner’s swagger down pat) and the writers give all of them at least one good character moment to get the fans chortling.
The new visual aesthetic is also a real treat. Past Treks tended to look as though Apple computer had taken over the universe; everything was clean and bare and made of shiny white plastic. But this film is built from gritty metallic textures; spaces are cluttered and real looking.
If the last decades’ spate of comic-book movies have shown us anything, it is that origin stories are the best (I know I’m in the minority on that one). And this is a good origin story, with plenty of action but also moments of genuine emotion as our crew define themselves. These are fun characters and, as in the best episodes from the series, there is a terrific \ story here. We see the origins of Kirk and Spock’s friendship and learn why Kirk cannot accept that there is such a thing as a no-win situation.
And yet, and yet, it bothers me that this new Trek is so melodramatic, so over the top — so stupid. I’ve never thought the original series was as cerebral as the fan boys claim, but it wasn’t a brain-dead action franchise; it focussed on human stories and dabbled, at least with ideas. What we have here is pure space opera, where black holes are tossed about like hand grenades and blowing up your ejected nuclear engine is the space equivalent of a turbo boost. Of course, the preceding trailers for the new Transformers and GI Joe films looked even more infantile.
Really, do Summer movies have to be this dumb?
WOBBLY THUMB
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