GINO’s SCI FI CORNER

Okay, I think the best sci-fi film ever made was Blade Runner, but as this blog is on its maiden voyage, it’s only fitting that I christen it with an exhaustive treatise on the Star Trek Films.

Star Trek is my favorite movie series of all time even though each movie on its own is pretty average and in most cases below par. Yes, even the all-hallowed Star Trek II is cinematically so-so (for reasons I’ll get into later) And in my opinon, the only reason why Star Trek II stands out is because, by comparison, Paramount and its filmmakers haven’t been able to make a film to top it. In 1982, it got better than average reviews and made 78 million dollars. No huge smash, by any stretch of the imagination even when you adjust for inflation. It’s just that the previous film and subsequent entries into the series were more flawed and not as good.

But if you take key sequences, elements, moods and/or ideas from all the Star Trek movies and put them together minus anything in Insurrection and Nemesis, you have a bunch of parts that add up to a satisfying, time-tested film series.

STAR TREK: THE MOTION PICTURE (1979)

Sadly, I’ve never seen this movie in the theaters, even though at Christmas-time of 1979 I was anxious to see it. I had been, like most 70’s kids, a fairly interested fan of the show and I had the Mego dolls of Kirk, Spock, and McCoy, but then Star Wars took over and I basically changed majors for awhile. So for two years, I didn’t think about anything related to Gene Roddenberry’s groovy, wishful- thinking vision of the future. Then in the spring of ‘79 I had a Hulk comic with the Star Trek Teaser poster on the back cover depicting the cast under the Phase II Enterprise , which is still one of my favorite posters, (and the first to clue me into the very notion of a teaser poster) So their marketing worked I was primed to see a glitzy new Trek film with cool effects.

December came. But at that point in my family’s history, we had moved from SF to Oregon and movie theaters in Eastern Oregon played movies for a week. And even though I didn’t pay attention to reviews at age 10, there was a certain blah-ness about the movie. Kids who had seen the film didn’t seem to say much about it. I never even saw a trailer or a commercial. Though there was a Happy Meal ad with a Klingon that ran incessantly. Ultimately when the weekend came for my family to see the film, it wasn’t playing anymore. (We went to see Electric Horseman instead, which really made me wish we’d seen Star Trek.)

But I did buy the Marvel Comics adaptation with some Christmas money and from what I saw on the page, it seemed to have a pretty good story . Each time I read the comic, I was looking forward to seeing how it played out onscreen.

I sort of found out on a fuzzy black and white TV screen in 1983. (After Star Trek II caused me to become an obsessive fan.) And like nearly everyone else, my first reaction was, “Hurry it UP!” The film’s pacing was excruciating and, as a know-it-all thirteen-year-old, I wondered how I would have ever sat through it at the immature age of ten. All the scenes that seemed to play out fairly well in a comic book were badly acted and endlessly long–especially Kirk’s return to the Enterprise. (And in the extended TV version there’s a particularly wooden scene that has George Takei and co. displaying how long it had been between gigs, as an alien ensign vacantly asks, “What about Captain Decker? He’s been with the ship every day of its refitting.” and the cast stops, like animatronic animals, and all amateurishly turn as if they were expecting the question. Coupled with DeForest Kelly’s first scene with a hokey beard– pointing his finger like George McFly, hammering out his lines, “This was YOUR idea! Wasn’t IT?!” As much as I respect Robert Wise, I think he’d been a little rusty himself.  I read once that many of the bit parts were filled with fans, and that comes as no surprise as every Joe-Schmoe Crewman and Sally Crew Girl reads his or her lines like the cue cards are in front of them. “SIR! IT’S! ON! A! DIRECT! HEADING! FOR! EARTH!” Though Stephen Collins deserves praise for being a pretty decent, know-it-all Captain Decker. )

Although I had been paying attention to film music since 1976 with Rocky, I wasn’t crazy about the score at first. I liked the opening Klingon battle music, but I thought Jerry Goldsmith’s score was too loud and corny compared to the seafaring touch that James Horner brought to the Trek II score. The sole action scene in the film of the ship going into the wormhole, an exciting throwaway in the comic, was a tedious ten minute psychadelic trip with no tension whatsoever, not even a musical cue to speed things up. Then the Enterprise went into V’ger and I completely lost interest. I turned it off and went to eat dinner, thinking, “I can’t believe I’m turning off Star Trek”, eating chicken and mashed potatoes, then returning to the TV sometime later and the crew of the Enterprise was still on the bridge staring at V’ger on a viewscreen. I remember my mother started laughing.

So that was my first impression of “The Motion Picture” and that impression has stayed with me to this day, (obviously as I nerdily recount seeing Klingon Happy Meal commericals) But by the mid 90’s, I bought the widescreen videocassette and at that stage, I was well-versed in the problems with the film and the budget overruns, filming with an unfinished script, clashing egos, the rush to get it done before the effects were completed, etc, etc. Seeing it widescreen, almost as good as seeing it in the theater, I started to appreciate just how how BIG the film really was. A major disservice was done to that film when it was originally transferred to vhs. A muddy print and bad choice of pan and scans made it look like a much drearier film than it really was. Compared to the other entries in the series, it really did have a big-budget epic feel to it. (albeit, a dated, disco-y big budget, epic feel) And even though it’s a ponderous bloated misfire at best, it’s still a genuine science fiction film with an interesting, provocative theme at its core– that of man and machine molding to becoming a new form of life, (and an often-repeated idea, if one considers The Borg, The Terminator, Ghost In The Shell, Matrix, A.I, and nearly every science fiction film since then)

The Enterprise model shots and effects are still the most impressive and inspiring of the series and you almost get the feeling that the ship was real and out there in deep space. (Unlike in nearly all the other films where one is clearly looking at a plastic or cgi model )

And of course, my appreciation for what Jerry Goldsmith’s score contributed to the film, and to Star Trek in general, rose tenfold over time– when I became an avid collector of film music and realized Goldsmith purposely wrote a big splashy epic score–complete with an overture–for his big splashy show-offy sci-fi movie.

(Some other day, I’ll carry on about the music of the films, one of the main reasons why I feel the series is so good.)

The highly-touted DVD Director’s cut released in 2001 hasn’t changed my opinon of Star Trek The Motion Picture much. It’s still a bore with great effects and a great musical score, but like Jeffery Katzenberg says in one of the DVD featurettes, without that film, you wouldn’t have the sequels.

STAR TREK II: THE WRATH OF KHAN (1982)

Flashback to May of 1982 and Scholastic Scope, a nation-wide school newspaper, that I happened upon in my 7th grade Social Studies class, had a black-and-white one page photo write-up on the next Star Trek film. The quality of the pics were so bad and grainy that I thought I was looking at an old issue from the 60’s. But then I noticed it was of the new movie Enterprise shooting phasers at another ship and even more intriguing, in another still, Kirk, Spock and McCoy were wearing dark military uniforms, not the ugly unisex Motion Picture booted pajamas.

At that time, I was a bespectacled 7th grade geek who got punched in the arm alot, BUT my glasses broke that spring and my parents hadn’t replaced them and I was good at baseball so kids started thinking I was cooler. One of the more popular kids actually asked me to stop hanging around nerds and to start hanging around with him and his set. Girls started smiling at me. So as I look back, that was a pivotal moment in time: I could’ve just put down the Scholastic Scope and become president of the country, but, nope, ever a nerd at heart, I said to myself, “Gino,” I says, “I have to see that second Star Trek movie!” Then after school let out for summer break, I was watching David Letterman and saw an action packed spot for Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan! Phaser battles in space! A racing surface of the moon shot! Ricardo Montalbahn! Paul Winfield screaming ! Kirk shooting his phaser and wearing a cool new jacket, yelling ‘Khaaaaan!’ After the commercial, I set phasers to kill.

I begged my parents to take me and they obliged, (kicking off one of the best movie-going summers in history) But the truth is, I was bored and confused for the first hour of the film. It was one of the first films I saw where at one point I said to myself, “This is boring,” something I’d never done at that stage in my life–at age 12 I loved all movies– but this had a pace I wasn’t used to, the acting seemed quiet and stilted. I laughed at the scene in Kirk’s apartment where DeForest Kelly starts off an awkard scene with a hokey reading of “Dammit Jim, what the hell’s the matter with you?!”(I was also confused because I still had the ST:TMP comic in my mind where McCoy was scolding Kirk for wanting to be Captain of the Enterprise, but now he was telling Kirk to get a command back.) I figure now that the scene works badly because it’s been ADR’d and/or mixed badly as the voices seem too loud for the expressions on the actors’ faces. (Plus, as one finds out by watching the Director’s cut, there were a couple of important lines cut out that make sense of Kirk’s granny glasses birthday present.)

Meanwhile none of the characters ever referenced anything from the first film, Spock was Captain, which was unsettling, and worse yet, he kept closing his eyes with grief and saying things like “Sauce For The Goose ” or “Be Careful.” Khan didn’t make much sense to me, since I hadn’t seen Space Seed, any time there was a reference to him as intelligent or whatnot, I didn’t get it, he seemed kinda mean and savage and come on, he fell for the old “we’ll use their prefix code on their computer to take down their shields gag”. I know, not fair, who knew about passwords in 1982? And then there was that curly haired spaz who turns out to be Kirk’s son. For the first hour or so, I just didn’t know what the heck was going on, this wasn’t the movie the trailer had promised or the Star Trek I was familiar with.

But then the pace picked up, Kirk bites the apple and says, “I don’t like to lose.” and to the rhythm of James Horner’s pulsating strings, they pulled themselves out of the rut, went into Mutara Nebula, really had a phaser/torpedo fight, Khan set off the Genesis device, director Nicholas Meyer maximized the tension with slow zooms and sweaty palms (”Time! “Distance From Reliant!”– great stuff!), Spock died and Shatner made me tear up with his ‘the most… HUMAN!” eulogy. I could kiss the popular kids goodbye.

From then on, I became a full time dork and went back and saw all the episodes on TV and read the movie novelization by Vonda McIntyre, as well as The Making of Star Trek by Stephen Whitfield, The Making of Star Trek II by Allan Asherman, the The World of Star Trek by David Gerrold– which was a very good read– and The Making of Star Trek: The Motion Picture by Susan Sackett, (without having seen the first film.) For Christmas of 82/83 I got the James Horner LP album for Star Trek II, The Star Trek: (no II on the title) The Wrath of Khan 1983 calender, (which was really a rush job with pretty bad stills from the film.) and a couple of books that I later gave away because they were so odd and uncanonical, but are now probably worth a fortune: Star Trek II Biographies and the Star Trek II Plot Your Own Adventure book.

As I analyze my obsession for Star Trek, it really stems from Douglas Trumball’s effects work from the first film. I didn’t know it at the time, but the best shots in The Wrath of Khan were stock shots from The Motion Picture. And that’s what I wanted more of; I really liked the shots of the new Enterprise, all lit up, in the dark of space. But in trying to gather those shots of the Enterprise, to soak in that expertly designed and photographed symbol of adventure and the unknown, I learned all I could about the subject, like V’ger learning all that it could about the universe before returning home.

So after becoming intimate with the story and all the components, I saw Star Trek II twice more in the theaters and it all clicked. (But what about that? When one understands all the story elements and behind the scenes struggles, does that make the story better? I still don’t have an answer because in theory movies shouldn’t need research to become better or more clear.) Even though I probably would’ve told you The Empire Strikes Back was my favorite film at that time, as I look back, it was probably The Wrath of Khan. As much as I knew about the making of Star Wars, I never studied it so intensely. This was during the dawn of the VCR age when Star Trek II hit videocassette, I rented a VCR and the film on several occasions and watched it repeatedly. I bought my parents a VCR in 1987 (very late, I know) but made sure to pick up a copy of Star Trek II, for myself, along with it.

Now, knowing that film as well as I do, and I think I have every frame of it burned in my memory, my assessment is this: Star Trek II The Wrath of Khan clearly has the best plot and the most cohesive look, the best production design, the costumes were defintely the least cheesy of the series (–not by much, but still, the maroon tunics looked fairly big screen.) certainly the best space battle and the most satisfying climax and denouement of all the Trek features– Director Nicholas Meyer did have a clear vision of what he wanted to see on screen. However, in my humble opinion, since Nicholas Meyer wasn’t as familiar with the characters and the actors, it resulted in a rocky, uncertain feeling from the cast. They weren’t as comfortable as they’d be in subsequent movies. Plus there are continuity errors galore. Everyone always points out Chekov being recognized by Khan, but one that still has me puzzled is when Kirk tells his son David that he’s never faced death before. Which begs the questions, “Huh? What about your brother and his wife on the planet with the spine-eating enchiladas? And most importantly, what about poor Joan Collins, whom you had to let die so the universe could continue. I thought you spent your whole career, facing death ADMIRAL KIRK! Suddenly, cold, cold, emotionless Spock dies and you’re crying and spluttering and saying things that are just patently untrue?!”

So while I respect the fact that Nicholas Meyer gave Star Trek back it’s action-adventure paramilitary teeth and for discovering James Horner, who’s never really been able to write more original scores than Star Treks II and III, he loses points with me for tailoring the Trek Universe too much to his specifications. But that’s really a small gripe, he did resuscitate the series after TMP.

Anyway, while Wrath of Khan is great Star Trek, it’s not great cinema. The fact is, Star Trek II was made on the cheap. The film takes place on maybe four sets and has a smallish, TV show quality about it, especially when Chekov and Terrell are on the Ceti Alpha planet or when Kirk, McCoy, and Saavik are exploring the Regula Space Station. And ILM’s effects haven’t aged well , the ones that weren’t stock shots from the first movie. Probably because they didn’t have the time or the budget, effects supervisor Ken Ralston didn’t bother creating impressive shots of the Enterprise or Reliant. I think a signature of all of ILM’s Star Trek output is that the fx shots are competent and fluid but not awe-inspiring. (except for the Spacedock shots in III, I’ll get to that in a bit)

Finally, themes of sacrifice, death, acceptance and rebirth, always winners of course, but are not exactly hot off the presses, mind-bending science fiction. Though they were onto something with the whole idea of terraforming.

Which leads me to….

STAR TREK III: THE SEARCH FOR SPOCK (1984)

The Search For Spock came out when I was a full-fledged 14-year old Trekkie, and this time I was ready, I’d seen all the trailers, read all the Starlog articles and knew what to expect– knew that the Enterprise would explode, that David would get killed, that Spock would come back right off as a child and live–expectations were high and I still loved the hell out of it. It was the kind of movie-going experience that felt like it lasted three minutes, when it was over, I could’ve watched ten more hours of it.

I would see the film in the theaters three more times in the summer of ‘84, (another spectacular summer for films) and each time, I thrilled to the better pacing, the sense of camaraderie, the natural, confident interplay between the actors, the sacrifice for Spock, the Stealing the Enterprise sequence, the terrific James Horner score. It just felt so much more like Star Trek than ‘The Motion Picture’ or ‘The Wrath of Khan.’ I thought it was everything I wanted to see in the movie and the most like a familiar Star Trek episode. Still, even as I left the theater in a grinning Star Trek daze, subconciously there was something nagging me, a voice or an impression that kept telling me that the film wasn’t as good as I was saying it was

Then, a couple years later, I rented the three available Star Trek movies on VHS and watched them back to back to back. That night, I realized The Wrath of Khan was legitimately the best one and actually, the Search For Spock had the weakest script. And while it had the best TV show ambience of the three features to date, it also looked most like a low-budget television episode. A key reason for this is the fact that Paramount wouldn’t let the cast and crew leave the lot. Now, even if you’re a studio executive who has to insist on keeping costs down by having the Genesis planet be filmed on a set, why not let the art department go outside and drop some dirt on a parking lot and plant some trees? Nothing looks phonier in ANY film– whether it’s Star Wars or Indiana Jones or Legend– than jungles or forests built on a soundstage. The epilogue of Star Trek II was filmed in Golden Gate Park in San Francisco, I always wondered why, for continuity’s sake, that the company couldn’t move up there for a week, at least to film the initial landing on Genesis. Hell, the Genesis Planet could’ve been filmed at the some suit’s Malibu backyard/ swimming pool and would’ve looked more convincing.

Because really, those sets look CHEAP!! And Leonard Nimoy seemed forced to film everything in close up. That doesn’t excuse why he filmed most of the action on the Klingon Bird of Prey in close ups, and nearly everything on Earth and Vulcan as well, but I’m assuming it was because he was a first time director, working with a producer best known for doing television. As a fourteen-year old, I noticed there were no shots of Kruge from the Enterprise Bridge viewscreen, so one never gets the sense that Kirk and Kruge are actually looking at each other. In fact, as I learned more about cinematography and editing, it became clear that Star Trek III has far too many close ups and medium shots to make an interesting looking film. Either to hide the budget limitations or because Leonard Nimoy was too green, the film doesn’t leave much of a cinematographic impression. And that’s what was nagging me.

But while the budget limitations can be forgiven, much of the script can’t be. Harve Bennett really should’ve hired a screenwriter for this one. We have an unmotivated, gullible set of villains. Christopher Lloyd just seems like a moron; without anyone’s orders he jets off to Federation space to do what? Land on a planet and take soil samples? He has a crew of 12 bumblers! What are they going to do? Make their own Genesis torpedo out of bamboo? Seems a more plausible idea would’ve been to have Klingon spies capture David Marcus and Saavik, or better yet, kill off Carol Marcus so then we’d know what happened to her. I’ve never understood why the character of Carol Marcus dropped off the face of the universe so inexplicably– Harve Bennett replaced loveable Kirstie Alley, for crying out loud, surely if he had problems with Bibi Besch no one would’ve cared if he recast her. I mean, what happened to the character? Genesis was her baby. Not even one reference like, “Boy, too bad my mother died of a stroke before she could see this completely schlocky snow covered cactus that doesn’t make any sense.”

Which, even by hokey Star Trek standards, the scientific inconsistencies are pretty glaring, all coming from former Quiz Kid Harve Bennett. Heck, I’m no scientist and picking out Star Trek III’s scientific puzzlers are like shooting fish in a barrell.
And here’s another gripe, directed at Star Trek in general. How come their sensors are only as good as what the writer dictates for any given scene? What can sensors sense? What are their limits? Because Spock pinpoints the Genesis Wave going off in Part II and they’re always pinpointing exactly who’s got a phaser in some toilet somewhere, So you’re telling me, HARVE, Mr. Quiz Kid, that between Starfleet and the Klingon Empire no one’s sensors can detect that the Genesis Planet has problems with its core and is a day away from going supernova?

And If Spock’s molecules were regenerated by the unstable protomatter-fuelled Genesis wave, how does taking him off the planet make it all better? Why doesn’t Spock just grow old and die when the planet goes bonkers and breaks apart? (And I love Robin Curtis’ THANKS FOR TELLING US dialogue about the b.s. plot device of Protomatter. “Protomatter? An unstable substance that every ethical scientist in the galaxy has delared as dangerously unstable?” In my script, David would have replied, “Uh, no, that’s not Protomatter at all. You don’t know anything!” I LOVE to rip on Thanks for Telling Us Dialogue. I just got a major blast of it in the completely overrated The Departed. But I’ll save that rant for another day. The Departed, talk about Science Fiction. Ha!! )

Okay, I don’t watch Star Trek for its iron-clad science but even as a story of friendship and sacrifice, there are way too many lazy spots in Harve Bennett’s script to make it great, starting with the katra and bringing Spock back in the first place. But you know, I guess he sort of had to bring Spock back, so he can’t be blamed for just closing his eyes and going for it. But close his eyes he did.
Again, HARVE! How come there weren’t any Reliant crew members onboard the Enterprise in the beginning since Kirk said they were on their way to pick up survivors at the end of Khan? “Most of our trainee crew have been reassigned?” Huh? It took two years to come home? No, HARVE! It took two years to make the movie, it should have only taken a couple of days for the Enterprise to come home, based on the time frame of Khan. Another line of contention, “In your absence, Genesis has become a galactic controversy.” “Oh, right,” Kirk should have said, “I missed all that in the two years I was away, FIGHTING KHAN, the center of this controversy that I haven’t heard of. Yeah, that big controversial weapon that we’ll never discuss again in the film series because it’s too big of a subject. Then Admiral Morrow tells Kirk, “Jim, the Enterprise is twenty years old, her day is over.” Okay, first dummie, you’re the producer/writer of STAR TREK, you know? The show with a million nerds checking your facts? Your math sucks, Mr. Quiz Kid. It had been fifteen years since Kirk saw Khan. And in the episode ‘The Menagerie’, Spock says that Captain Pike and Spock served together thirteen years earlier. Let’s see, fifteen plus thirteen, why that makes twenty-eight, AT LEAST. The admiral doesn’t know how old the ship is that he’s just signed papers to mothball? Come on! But let’s not forget this, maybe five years ago, the Enterprise was refitted so it would be the best, baddest ship in the fleet. Had it been twenty years since Star Trek The Motion Picture? What did he mean by that? No matter how you slice it, it’s a dumb, nonsensical line.

Though despite it all, I still contend that Search For Spock is the 2nd best Star Trek movie, and don’t subscribe at all to the odd/even theory. Sure, the film has major weaknesses, but Nimoy did get the best out of his main cast. DeForest Kelly’s performance was honest and funny and wasn’t stilted like his previous two outings. Shatner’s reaction to David’s death is rather touching, proving that he was better than the T.J. Hooker episodes of the day. The rest of the cast do fine in their cutesy scenes, The Search For Spock being the first film to start showcasing the other cast members.

While James Horner’s score now seemed like that of a confident Trek veteran, expertly reshaping his previous cues with bolder more organic statements of Alexander Courage’s fanfare. His music for Star Trek III score is my favorite of the series. ( I especially like approaching Spacedock cue and the Destruction of Genesis music, a cue that isn’t on the soundtrack album) The showstopping ‘Stealing The Enterprise’ cue still stands out as my favorite moment of cinematic Star Trek music, perfectly enhancing the breezy semi-comic action. In fact, that sequence is probably the most enjoyable plot device in all of the ten films. I still enjoy the idea of Kirk and co. sticking it to Starfleet and taking their ship.

It was the last time , I feel, the visual effects in a Star Trek movie would be awe-inspiring, notably the shot of the Enterprise approaching Spacedock (though where was Spacedock in the previous films? ) and the shot of the janitor watching the Enterprise back out of its berth. And the pace was better. No need to relearn the Star Trek Universe, there was continuity from the last film (despite all the beefs about continuity) we knew what the characters had been up to and where they were headed. (Duh! “Life from lifelessness!” The plot is such a no-brainer, I’m surprised they didn’t just stick around the Genesis Planet and see if baby Spock would show up.)

But still, there was a payoff and we were treated to a nice reunion at the end on Vulcan, with Horner bringing in the theme from the TV show (not the fanfare, but the bongo-beat, woman’s voice theme, but this time it was performed with synthesizers and horns. Awesome! A shame Horner didn’t do IV) at a point in history that declared STAR TREK WAS BACK! Not only was it good drama, it was damn good Star Trek. And the Adventure Continues…Excelsior!!

STAR TREK IV: THE VOYAGE HOME (1986)

Star Trek IV was a big hit in 1986, grossed 105 milliond dollars, caused Star Trek to make cover of Newsweek, and was so popular that Paramount decided to go ahead with a new series. But at the time, I didn’t like it and, for quite awhile after that, preferred Shatner’s disatrous Final Frontier over this one.

I was a senior in high school when it came out and at that point, I had contact lenses and and was going to high school dances and trying to be cool. Meaning, I had to downplay my obsession with the subject. So when I saw it, it was with friends under the ‘Hey, let’s do something dorky and go see a Star Trek movie,’ guise. But deep down, of course, I had been counting the days; the idea seemed terrific, TIME TRAVEL! Back to The Future had ruled 1985 and brought the 50’s into vogue, not to mention science fiction films. Surely Star Trek, the Time Travel Champ with the episode The City On The Edge of Forever, would show them all how it’s done and vindicate nerds like me.

Again, I knew all about the film. Like a stack of pornos, I had a Starlog magazines salted under my bed, hidden from the outside world. I knew every publicity department-generated article like the back of my hand. I knew they were going for comedy; I knew Nicholas Meyer had been brought in to co-write the screenplay; Nimoy was directing again, ‘with training wheels off’, this is a Leonard Nimoy film,’ he kept saying over and over and over. I was confident that under his steadier hand, the film was going to be the best yet.

The advance buzz was palpable. Siskel and Ebert raved on their show, and when I saw a clip of Shatner talking to what’s-her-face, Catherine Hicks, at the pizza place, saying “I’m from Iowa, I only work in outer space” it felt big time, like Superman the Movie, or some other prestige picture. Everyone seemed to love the film. Big box office! Glowing reviews! Star Trek was HOT!!!

Expectations couldn’t be higher. Then I saw it and like a music snob who feels his favorite group has gotten too commercial once the band goes platinum, I came out feeling strange, almost above it all. Even though my friends, who did not want to see it, were laughing about it and saying, “That was good!” “I was thinking, “Really? I thought it was terrible…” Though I didn’t voice that opinion otherwise I wouldn’t be able to see it multiple times in the theaters. “It was okay,”…, I said.

But I came out that first time feeling like I’d seen a flaccid, unfunny movie of the week that wasn’t STAR TREK AT ALL. It was an old lady comedy about whales. And even though it looked good, with competent big-screen cinematography, it was disjointed, lazy– lazier than ever, and it had a TERRIBLE music score.

I had been nervous when I found out that James Horner wasn’t composing the soundtrack, but I never expected an opening title track to a Star Trek movie to have Christmas bells and schmalzty trumpets with no tangible theme. “WHAT THE HELL IS THIS?!”was my reaction. Leonard Rosenman’s music destroyed an otherwise polished opening credit sequence. (A bit of behind-the-scenes trivia for any film music buffs who don’t know this or care, the original script specifically mentioned that the opening title sequence would start to the tune of Alexander Courage’s original TV show theme and then the music would grow slower and more menacing as the Prope appeared in deep space. Apparently Leonard Rosenman did write that music but Leonard Nimoy didn’t like it and preferred the music Rosenman wrote for the end titles– the dopey Christmas bells theme.) The film started off on the wrong foot.

The feeling grew as the opening minutes mounted up. We go to Vulcan and the crew are in the same outfits they were in two years ago. (three months in the movie’s calender.) They’re preparing to leave for Earth in a couple of days and they’re wearing the same clothes? So, what? There are no stores on chilly, emotionally barren Vulcan? “Oh, Vulcan is too logical of a place for clothing stores. We all make our clothes out of whatever terry cloth and styrofoam phallic shapes that are lying around– which explains our Vulcan repair crew extra and their stupid hats…” Really, never give actors, not even extras, bad hats, that’s a rule. I found it funny that Walter Koenig’s Chekov had a ridiculous outfit with a large collar in III, so he got to change clothes simply for aesthetic reasons.

Anyway, before you think I’m some preening costumer, (I’m an all around filmmaker, dammit! A direcTOR!!) Kirk says to poor, poor, scuttled away Lt. Saavik, “This is goodbye.”To which Robin Curtis hammers out the lines, “I. Haven’t. Told. You. About. Your. Son. He. Died. Bravely. He. Saved. Spock. I. Thought. You. Should. Know.”

“Um. Yeah…. you said that already in the last film, only better.” How about a conversation between two people who have spent three months together? Or better yet, how about Saavik’s NOT ON VULCAN, but rather serving as a 1st Officer on the Starship Saratoga or the like since she’s not at all guilty of Stealing the Enterprise? For those who don’t know, in the script she stayed behind on Vulcan because she was pregnant with Spock’s baby, but Nimoy cut that out because he was uncomfortable with it. So I say, “Mr. Nimoy, if a plot point embarrassed you, then you should have it written differently. We of the members of the United Trek Federation of Dorks kind of pay attention to what happend before and don’t like being needlessly confused.”

Just as we paid attention to the fact that the bridge of the Klingon Bird of Prey is completely different in this film than in the last. I can respect wanting to make a set look better and more cinematic. The Star Trek III Klingon Bridge was underwhelming, but at least keep the round sliding doors for continuity.

Meanwhile, I know it seems like I’m picking on poor departed DeForest Kelley, but the fact is, I have nothing but respect for the man and his Dr. McCoy character. He was great on the show and an integral part of the series and why it worked. However, his movie performances were all over the map. Embarassingly wooden and stilted in the first one, off the mark in The Wrath of Khan, but still some good one-liners, very good and reliably funny in III, then suddenly in The Voyage Home he acts like an aging queen every time he’s around Spock. At one point he actually purses his lips and kinda winks at him! “Nobody’s perfect, ” he says. Huh? What’s that supposed to mean? Was that a reference to Some Like It Hot?

Okay, so then the Probe attacks earth and I’m still bugged about the TV-movie of the week style music, then I can’t help but notice that this plot is basically reheated leftovers from The Motion Picture. A probe that we know nothing about is going to destroy the planet Earth. ZZzzzzz… I guess Kirk and crew are the only ship in the quadrant….Zzzzzz. Both time somone says a line about not being able to answer the probe if you don’t understand the question. Zzzzzz….It’s too bad were so warlike and always jumping to warlike conclusions….Zzzzz….(conveniently forgetting how many ships are being destroyed around the galaxy.) And really, a sound wave does all that?

Then it’s addled, befuddled reborn SPOCK?!! who figures out that the alien probe is talking to whales? Huh?!!! That’s funny, if anyone should have a big breakthrough about extinct ocean life I would think it would be James T. Kirk since he’s, you know, from that very planet and supposed to be a seafaring Captain type, always quoting shanty songs and poetry about ‘tallships and stars to steer by’ and ‘the sea’s hottest blood’. You think maybe when he was a kid dreaming about exploring the final frontier he knew something about whales in the 21st Century? Nope. It’s Spock who knows all about extinct marine life on Earth. And he knows what they sound like right off the bat???!! He just hears the probe’s call, mixed at breakneck pace by Uhura to sound exactly like the call of Whale song and he has a theory. I guess Spock knows EVERYTHING (Okay, I’m being a grump. We are watching a movie after all. But it is funny how both Nimoy and Shatner alternately stroked their own egos through their characters in their directorial efforts, proving that neither really understood their characters as well as they understood how to make themselves look like the hero.)

Then they hatch out the the time travel scheme from Tomorrow is Yesterday, which was nice, (I liked when Harve Bennett would do his homework and reference the show’s paradigms, like the destruction of the Enterprise in III which was just like how Kirk tried to do it in Let That Be Your Last Battlefield) but I could’ve done without McCoy’s ‘Thanks for Telling Us’ recap of exactly how they would do it.

But when they travel in time, HOLY SMOKES! Who dreamed up that bizarre sequence? A burning clay man?!!! Cat tails??!! Me, I would’ve simply made a collage of images from the episodes and movies and called it good.

After that point, I was knocked clean out of the movie. I had hoped that life on present day Earth would get me back in. I’d seen the “Double Dumb Ass on You!” clip and was waiting for non-stop hilarity once the crew interracted with the 20th century. But it never really happened. “NUCLEAR WESSELS!” Ha! Ha! Ha! Let me guess, they’re improvving? I LOVE IT!! (Clap, clap clap!) Actors are always patting themselves on the back for improvising a scene. Well guess what? IT ALWAYS SHOWS!! Uhura says, “It’s in Alameda, but where is Alameda?” Well, you know, you’re from the future and you have this ship that can darn near detect anything. How about going back to your ship and FINDING OUT rather than bugging people on the street who might think you’re from the future, you out of character hams?!!! And let’s all clap like old biddies when Spock does physical harm to that irritating PUNKER and his loud music!! I thought the point of all this was to not draw attention to yourselves so you know, you don’t alter history.

Then for the sake of some cheap laughs, if anyone bothered laughing– I know I didn’t– McCoy and Scotty sell away the future for some plastic, Ha! Ha! Ha! But hey, wait, this gang of thieves stole 2 starships and then nuclear power from the nuclear powered aircraft carrier, so why not save a scene and just beam the plexiglass aboard the Bird of Prey, since clearly they have no problem with stealing or using their transporter. And for a ship that’s low on power, what’s with flagrant, wasteful use of the transporter beam especially since your average passerby, or a certain whiny Ocean biologist, would see it? Why destroy the future in the bargain? LAZY!!! LAZY!! LAZY!!! Now, I understand that the film was supposed to be a lark, and I know I sound very grumpy over everyone having a good time. But if one looks at the time travel episodes of the show or say, Back to The Future, the very seriousness in which they treat altering the future makes the plot more interesting and, when those comic moments arise, very funny. (”Who’s president in 1985?” Whatta gag!) You don’t have to be so lazy to get a laugh. Smart humor works too.

Lazier still, when they return to earth of the future, all the problems are solved, replete with no one batting an eyelash over letting Gillian stay to ruin history and a crew that stole a jillion dollar starship and destroyed it is rewarded with a new Enterprise.   Again, I know I’m a grump and you have to end your movie somehow, but as tying loose ends go, I thought it they were too loose and implausible.

But worse than the lazy writing within the context of the Star Trek universe, at one point I’m sitting there watching a scene with Catherine Hicks and some guy named Bob, who’s got a bigger part than, say, Sulu, and he’s saying, “Don’t tell me fish stories, kiddo!” And I’m just sitting there, cringing at the complete lack of that Star Trek feeling.

I went to see it two more times in the theater, telling myself, “Expectations were too high, take the movie for what it is, a comedy meant to appeal to non-fans.” But each time, the film got progressively worse where the music and continuity errors irritated me even more– especially that amateurish whaling vessel sequence. No one thought to put something over the actors playing Swedish Whalers so it looks like there’s a ship hovering above them.? Or what about Catherine Hicks flailing her way through a mime routine in the park? She walked into a metal landing strut. Wouldn’t she get a big gash on her head instead of bouncing back as if she walked into an invisible beach ball?

At any rate, for awhile I really hated Star Trek IV, but once I bought the special edition DVD, (after buying two different vhs versions) I realized I’d always been too hard on it. It’s fine. The music still sticks out like a bad Vulcan hat, and if I was billionare Bill Gates, I’d pay James Horner to see what he’d do with the film, you know, just for kicks, but beyond that, it’s the kind of film that’s okay for nostalgia’s sake.

And there are some things to enjoy about it: Shatner’s comic performance for one. He’s loose, in command, and brimming with charm and charisma. (except when he says, “As we say in your century, I don’t even have your phone number. Ha! Ha! Ha!” –there he seems back on a TJ Hooker episode or The Love Boat. Or when Catherin Hicks first beams aboard the Klingon ship, he acts like an old pervert, holding her and pawing her and seeming like he’s in a single’s bar, but still around his crew and everyone else, he’s tops!) The interplay between him and Leonard Nimoy is what stands out in the film. “Do you like Italian?” “No, yes, no. ” Not exactly original, but Shatner and Leonard Nimoy pull it off like old pros. Plus, the for the first time in a Star Trek feature, the rest of the cast felt like an integral part of the team. I wasn’t overjoyed with some of their gags, but I did appreciate that the lesser crew members seeming as if they actually had a purpose on the ship and in the film. And as I said, The Voyage Home had decent cinematography. Even back in ‘86, I kept going back to see it in the theaters because it looked like a big-budget movie, confident of its stature.

That would only happen one more time in a Star Trek film. Now you want to talk about a crappy looking movie…?

STAR TREK V: THE FINAL FRONTIER (1989)

Okay, since I’ve ranted and raved about the good Star Trek films, I suppose on this one, I should type in all caps let William Shatner have it. But that’s really like complaining about how Liberace was a gaudy, outrageous showboat. Of course Shatner was going to turn in a cheesefest. Ever seen the guy on an awards show during that time? (This was before Ben Folds made him self-aware and hip in the 90’s.) All through the 70’s and 80’s, he was a boozy, sequin-clad, cravat-wearing, terror! (And that’s why we all look up to him.)

The simple truth, in my humble opinion, is the suits at Paramount, gloating and lazy over their Voyage Home plunder, greenlit a ridiculous idea. If you’re a Trek fan or even just a fan of the filmmaking process, read William Shatner’s Star Trek Movie Memories. It’s really a fascinating look at the politics and tactics that go on in Hollywood and in life in general. Now, while Mr. Shatner still doesn’t believe he made a bad film, which is, of course, pathetic –but still vintage Shatner–he does give a lot of good explanations as to why it’s so crappy. But one thing Shatner never saw, even though Harve Bennett told him as much in an interview, was that it was a fruitless search, to search for God on film.

Okay, so Bill Shatner had a vision and he’s not exactly the brightest bulb, but all those money people at Paramount couldn’t see that it was a dumb idea? I always shake my head in disbelief at the prospect of the writer(s) turning in this godawful, STUPID script and a studio head stamped it ‘Approved!.’

Here I am, Mr. Noodlehead Studio Chief and I’ve just been told Shatner wants to do a Star Trek film with this plot: a renegade Vulcan, Spock’s brother no less, with some sort of undefined mind control wants a starship to find God on a special planet. Hmmm…. yes, God, the physical being that religious zealots are all looking for on a real planet in this here third dimension. I hope he has a curly fake white beard! Yes, yes, fascinating idea. And really, if anyone’s up to the task of pulling the curtain on organized religion, it’s WILLIAM SHATNER!? And I’m sitting in my plush office, rattling the ice in my gin and tonic, hearing this idea, saying “Great! Great stuff! We’ll debunk this whole God thing. But just be sure there’s a lot of old-lady humor in it to really let ‘em have it! (”Next! Let’s greenlight a Batman pic with ice skating George Clooney and Uma Thurman dancing in a Gorilla Suit. “)

The screenplay credited to David Loughery—man this guy’s deep! Check out the metaphysical prose in Passenger 57 and Money Train– really calls religious nuts out on the carpet. In his book Shatner said that David Loughery was one of the funniest men he’d ever met. You gotta wonder at what tickles Shatner’s ribs when this is what they came up with together. MarshMELONS? Hoo! Hoo! Scotty hitting his head? Uhura dancing naked? Everyone always cites that scene as the worst in Star Trek history and while I agree that it was indeed unpleasant, I’m still more outraged at the other LAZIER aspects of the plot. Like, for one, “Gee, how come EVERYONE believes in God?” No one, not even super-smart, know-it-all Spock says, ” I don’t know, I was there in the afterlife, and I don’t remember Him.” Or conversely, how come Spock isn’t saying, “Yeah, let’s seek God on the planet because I was dead and before and didn’t believe in Him, but now I believe!” If anyone’s going to offer insight into whether or not they should even pay attention to Sybok (ack! hurts to to even type that ridiculous name) it’s Spock. But again, once you start delving into the logic of the screenplay, you’re unravelling a cableknit sweater that someone keeps knitting and knitting and knitting and knitting….

How does this Vulcan zealot control minds? How does he make visions appear for all to see? Dunno, doesn’t say. How the *@*! does he take over the ship with his team of about four dummies in rags? Why are they freaking out about the Great Barrier? THEY’VE BEEN THERE BEFORE! Or the edge of the galaxy or whatever. Wouldn’t Kirk say, “Hmmm…. I had this good friend named Gary Mitchell and when we hit the edge of the galaxy, he became an evil God-like super being. Say, EVIL GOD. ARE YOU GARY MITCHELL?!” That could’ve been the movie. Star Trek V: The Revenge of MITCHELL! Seems like anyone assigned a Star Trek movie, even its star, whom you’d think would remember major details just by virtue of being accosted by fans, should be contractually obliged to watch all the previous episodes before directing a feature.

Now obviously the argument could be made that the suits knew they had a turkey on their hands, so why spend more money on it, but if that’s the case why spend money at all? We Trekkies do tend to buy whatever crap you put out, so doesn’t it seem only polite and smart in the long run to make the best damn movie possible, even with said clunker of a story and filmmaker behind it?

And under Shatner’s direction, William Shatner delivered some of the worst acting of his career, –as bad if not worse than Big Bad Mamma, if that’s possible.

For the first hour of the movie, notably in the rock-climbing and campfire sequences where he’s clapping his hands and exploding with lines, ‘That’s great! I haven’t sung around a campfire since I was a boy in Iowa!” he’s shrill and out of control. (and not in the good way that we all expect, but in a decidely out of character, going crazy with all the details of production sort of way) DeForest Kelly, not the strongest actor to begin with, also fell prey to a distinct hamminess in a good many scenes. Then you have the other crew, Sulu, Uhura, Scotty, Chekov, all of them embarrassing and out of character. However, Leonard Nimoy, having directed three hit movies and one Diane Keaton dud, seems to have remembered film acting and gives an honest, reliable performance as Spock. And while he always gets lambasted, I thought poor Laurence Luckinbill as Sybok was pretty good, all things considered.

But my biggest beef with the film– and really this blame falls squarely on the studio is the film has primitive–I’m talking Godzilla movie primitive –visual effects, like so primitive they look worse than those on the 60’s TV show. Shatner knew it and asked for more money but the higher ups got pissy and made him release it as is. Was that a weird vendetta or what? I mean, come on! It’s Star Trek! The big billion dollar franchise of the last twenty-three years (at the time) and the studio wouldn’t cough up more money to make the effects look better? That’s not only mean, it’s nonsensical. Like sending, oh, say Eddie Murphy or Tom Cruise or one of those other Paramount tentpoles of the day, out to a premiere screening of Beverly Hills Cop or Top Gun in a beaten up old Chevy Citation. The only reason to see a Star Trek film in the theaters is to see the visual effects.

The fans usually regard this film as the worst in the series, but I don’t. Filmmaking-wise it’s plenty bad, technically the most shabby. But it does have Shatner’s stamp and energy behind it that makes it sort of fun to sit through. And to his credit, the moronic story has a big, almost epic quality to it. The crew is all over the galaxy and there’s Klingons and a ship take-over and Shatner squaring off with Sybok saying in his true Kirk voice, “I NEED my pain!” (remembering how to act at this point). And the scene where Kirk, Spock and McCoy all tell Sybok to take a hike that their friendship is stronger than his b.s., that’s nice And Shatner does get full credit for getting Jerry Goldsmith back as the composer. When I first saw the film, while stunned that it was so awful in many ways, I did walk out thinking it had more of the Star Trek ambience than The Voyage Home did. And that’s really because of Goldsmith’s big, awe-inspiring score. It’s too bad the film’s such a mess because it could’ve been the ultimate adventure that Shatner intended. He just shouldn’t have directed it, or had a hand in the story for that matter. But without Shatner the story wouldn’t have been so epic and far-reaching. Another one of those Sci-fi paradoxes to muse over…