Monday, May 11, 2009

Star Trek movie review

Yes, I was going to go eventually, but my son Daniel deserves the credit for pestering me to go this weekend to an IMAX showing of Star Trek. It was an 11 PM show, so it was almost the full geek experience possible.

I agree with a lot of other people, this is definitely worth your popcorn money, and IMAX is the way to go.

Likes-
  • mix of old and new
  • plenty of homage to TOS (the original series, for the non-Trekker), to the level of some audio cues
  • humor
  • Zoe Saldana's way retro outfit
  • Zoe in general
  • Zoe in specific
  • Zoe Zoe in a bar
  • Zoe Zoe in a car
  • Zoe and Green Eggs and Ham (or whatever that girl's name was)

Dislikes

  • way too much lens flare
  • naval tactics of the WWI era
  • Romulan mining vessels that look like goose roadkill
  • destroy two planets (Vulcan and Romulus) and stick us in an alternate universe
  • Scotty's mascot - should get an award for Establishing Annoying Alien Sidekick Persona In the Fewest Scenes
  • all the Star Wars homage, i.e. Ice Planet, there's always a bigger fish, Kirk as Han Solo punching bag, planet destroying ship, older Spock as Obi Wan

I don't think the big open sets made sense as the machinery spaces of the Enterprise. No one would build a military spaceship that way.

By far, the best line in the film is "Your father was captain of a starship for twelve minutes, and saved 800 lives."

I like the set up of the Kirk/Spock/Uhura triangle. As a reboot, I would have been happier if the creative team had just established that much in this film. The film crowds in all of the basic characters, and is a bit too hyperactive in doing so. In comparison, the Bond reboot is two films old and we still haven't met Moneypenny and Q.

Bottom line: Go!

1 comment:

Rich Hughes said...

Plus Starfleet looks like Beverly Hills 90210.