December Bonus Review #3 Star Trek: The Motion Picture

The original Star Trek was a classic that helped define sci-fi television alongside the likes of Doctor Who and the original Star Wars trilogy. The original series ended in the late 60s and the first film came out around a decade later. Oddly enough, not many people talk about the first Star Trek film. The second film, Wrath of Khan, gets talked about a lot and so do Search For Spock, The Voyage Home, Final Frontier & Undiscovered Country. But this one seems largely forgotten. Let’s find out why.

Story:

We open with a group of Klingons, seen for the first time in their more iconic makeup, confronting what looks to be a cloud of energy and getting nowhere in the process. Star Fleet is made aware of a life form of great power headed for Earth. The Enterprise is sent and Captain James Tiberius Kirk is pulled off of desk duty to command her. He’s joined by Sulu, Chekov, Mr. Scott and Uhura. He also has Doctor Bones McCoy drafted into service. Meanwhile, Spock is on Vulcan when he hears an intelligence in space calling out to him and he catches a ride to the Enterprise to join them in confronting it. Thereby filling out our cast.

The fundamental flaw with this film is the pacing. They spend a long time showing off that they’ve gotten a substantial special effects budget for the first time in the history of the franchise. They drag things out with some scenes that don’t matter and when you get to the action, a lot of sequences are more than twice the length they actually need to be. Which makes it feel like they had a script for an episode they never used and just padded it to be more than twice as long as it was.

Buried beneath all the padding, there are some interesting ideas. The reveal about the entity is nicely done. The idea of the original Enterprise crew getting back together for a new mission is solid. It’s just difficult to get really immersed in it because it feels like all those good ideas are buried under a shit tonne of nothing.

Characters:

I’ll start by saying that I actually do like the original Star Trek and I appreciate the characters it has. So, there’s a certain amount of “oh, it’s great to see them again.” And, in general, the film does do a good job of recapturing what made the characters so memorable and the dynamics that worked so well in the series proper. I also do think the way Captain Decker and Ilia are handled is a bit compelling. It could be really good if they were more developed characters but they actually don’t get that much screen time before major things start happening that change things for them.

That being said, I have a couple major problems with the way the film handles them. First off, Kirk has McCoy drafted, knowing he doesn’t want anything more to do with Star Fleet. Which comes across as a complete dick move and not like something Kirk would actually do to his friend. And the film never really addresses this violation of boundaries besides having a brief conversation betwixt them where Kirk says he needed Bones and the good Doctor just lets it go. It also bothers me that Kirk basically uses the situation to force his way back into command of the Enterprise.

There’s also a bit of awkward dialogue. The Deltan navigator comes aboard and the first thing she mentions is her vow of chastity. Just, out of nowhere. Did she hear that Kirk had a slight problem keeping it in his trousers around attractive alien women and just thought she’d get it out the way?

Cinematography, Visual Effects:

For the late 70s, these are some impressive special effects. And I’m not saying that because it looks far better than the original series. That’s a given when you have a decade of special effects advancements and a proper budget. It legitimately does look really good for the time. The biggest issue with the film in the effects department is actually the wardrobe. This film is a bizarre outlier in that the characters wear uniforms unlike any they’d worn before or after. My guess is that audiences didn’t like the change and that’s why the later original series films all feature those iconic red uniforms.

Acting and Music:

The acting is pretty solid. Nimoy, Shatner, Kelley, Doohan, Nichols, Takei, and Koenig all know their characters really well and have playing them down. Khambatta does a really good job in her role as well and Collins is solid. The biggest issue is that some of the dialogue is a bit wooden. Which is also an issue with the original series, to be fair. And there aren’t that many scenes with wooden acting but there are enough to make it noticeable. Jerry Goldsmith’s music is fantastic.

Areas of Improvement:

1. Instead of having a bunch of slow sequences that don’t really do anything, use the extra time to better develop your characters, their relationships and the situation. Make the scenes feel like they merit a film instead of just being there for padding.
2. Instead of having Doctor McCoy get drafted at Kirk’s behest, have Kirk meet with him and convince him to come back to duty. It would give you the whole element of the Doctor coming out of retirement without putting it at the expense of Kirk’s characterisation. And it would be a better use of screen time than long, dragged out special effects shots.
3. Give Decker and Ilia more character development. When you have two characters who have a hinted at pre-existing relationship and then things start spiraling for them, a big part of what makes it work is how well they’re developed at that point. And when things start going awry for these two, it doesn’t have the impact it should because they’ve had maybe five minutes of screen time together at that point.

Final Thoughts:

So, the reason this film doesn’t get talked about that much seems obvious to me. It’s slow to the point of being boring. Is it the worst film in the franchise? No, Abrams took the franchise to levels of rubbish it had never gone before. Even if you just look at the original six films, this isn’t the worst. But the film that is is bad in a way that’s really memorable whereas this one isn’t bad it’s just forgettable. So, I’m giving it a 5/10. If you’re someone who’s getting into the franchise and you want to watch the films, you can honestly skip this one completely and not miss out on anything of value. It’s light on plot and character and heavy on showing off the special effects. Which aren’t nearly as impressive by today’s standards as they were back then.