Star Trek - my critical thoughts
The love of my childhood, I grew up on the original series and none other was as good - carboard sets and all. So, I was both dreading and looking forward to the new Star Trek re-boot. And, in that vein, I was both happy with and deeply dissapointed by it.
I've seen a lot of commentary on it and the uncritical love ... well, I understand it even if I don't share it.
One of the things that's struck me about all the positive responses has been that they contain no substance. It's true that intial squeals of joy seldom do but I doubt that any more thoughtful reactions will happen and that's because ...
... there was almost nothing of substance in the movie.
There were a great many explosions; the movie had the feel of a porn movie to me - where a strict formula has to be followed and everythign else is sacrificed to the great alter of bigger and bigger CGI speical effects.
Two examples: what story function did the ice planet animals serve? And, why did the Enterprise fire on Nero's dying ship at the end?
Their only function was to provide more opportunities for sub-sonics and special effects and the second was a huge violation of the Star Trek morality on top of it.
What was the plot of the movie?
Nero's entire motivation, the entire plot of the movie was described by original!Spock in the five minute scene in the ice cave. For a two-plus hour movie, that's not much story.
The strongest section, the most moving for me, were the few moments of 'prequel' where Nero first shows up and kills Kirk's father. Most of the rest of the movie was eye candy of one sort or another.
There was very pretty eye candy. In fact, the eye candy was so pretty that vids and fiction is already showing up on the 'net. I have hopes that fans - in fine fanish tradition - will be able to provide the depth and significance the movie did not.
I loved the minor characters best: Cho, Urban (especially him), the kid who played Checkov (and I loved the mish-mash of accents, it gave me ideas), and Simon Pegg brought a welcome bit of warmth and earthiness to a fairly chill and stiff movie.
I have to say that, despite clearly described efforts by Abrams and Nichols and co, I found the female roles relentlessly stereotypical and regressive. Kirk's mom was there to be maternal and never seen again. The sole function of Spock's mom was to provide Spock with adequate man!pain for the fight scene between him and Kirk (as if the death of his whole planet wouldn't be sufficient) and Uhura was a sex object pretty much from start to finish - first as the stereotypical girl to fight over (and incapable of stopping the brawl herself), to the emotional outlet for her man, with Spock. With a brief visit to T&A land while all marketing gurus drool at the teenage voyeuristic fantasies (as they must imagine them) satisfied by the scene in her room. Uhura had only one plot critical element to provide and it was done verbally, in one short scene, where her role is to verify Kirk's claim of ambush. Unlike the rest of the characters she has no action role (all other characters did), nor did she press any plot point of her own.
The movie suffered, as well, the usual problems of this era. It was rather chill, no one really liked each other, gestures of affection were strictly cross-gender and we see no real sign that Kirk and Spock ever achieve more than a tolerance for each other.
It also had the added (non) bonus of blue-collar vs. office drones and the implication from original!Spock that Nero was mentally ill.
So, I'm bewildered by the uncritical love for the movie but I still have hopes for future movies in the line - hopefully better writers and less pressure to be a 'summer blockbuster'. The rigid limitations of the blockbuster genre I think really hampered this from being a better film; one with content.
As an aside; I and my partner's best idea for who would do best for Star Trek? Joss Whedon. Setting aside the general fail that is Dollhouse, Joss (who also did Firefly, which I think was his best work) is very skilled at both the details of worldbuilding and developing shows with a true ensemble cast (meaning, all characters are individuals, have story arcs of their own, and none are neglected in favor of the beefcake/cheesecake).
I've seen a lot of commentary on it and the uncritical love ... well, I understand it even if I don't share it.
One of the things that's struck me about all the positive responses has been that they contain no substance. It's true that intial squeals of joy seldom do but I doubt that any more thoughtful reactions will happen and that's because ...
... there was almost nothing of substance in the movie.
There were a great many explosions; the movie had the feel of a porn movie to me - where a strict formula has to be followed and everythign else is sacrificed to the great alter of bigger and bigger CGI speical effects.
Two examples: what story function did the ice planet animals serve? And, why did the Enterprise fire on Nero's dying ship at the end?
Their only function was to provide more opportunities for sub-sonics and special effects and the second was a huge violation of the Star Trek morality on top of it.
What was the plot of the movie?
Nero's entire motivation, the entire plot of the movie was described by original!Spock in the five minute scene in the ice cave. For a two-plus hour movie, that's not much story.
The strongest section, the most moving for me, were the few moments of 'prequel' where Nero first shows up and kills Kirk's father. Most of the rest of the movie was eye candy of one sort or another.
There was very pretty eye candy. In fact, the eye candy was so pretty that vids and fiction is already showing up on the 'net. I have hopes that fans - in fine fanish tradition - will be able to provide the depth and significance the movie did not.
I loved the minor characters best: Cho, Urban (especially him), the kid who played Checkov (and I loved the mish-mash of accents, it gave me ideas), and Simon Pegg brought a welcome bit of warmth and earthiness to a fairly chill and stiff movie.
I have to say that, despite clearly described efforts by Abrams and Nichols and co, I found the female roles relentlessly stereotypical and regressive. Kirk's mom was there to be maternal and never seen again. The sole function of Spock's mom was to provide Spock with adequate man!pain for the fight scene between him and Kirk (as if the death of his whole planet wouldn't be sufficient) and Uhura was a sex object pretty much from start to finish - first as the stereotypical girl to fight over (and incapable of stopping the brawl herself), to the emotional outlet for her man, with Spock. With a brief visit to T&A land while all marketing gurus drool at the teenage voyeuristic fantasies (as they must imagine them) satisfied by the scene in her room. Uhura had only one plot critical element to provide and it was done verbally, in one short scene, where her role is to verify Kirk's claim of ambush. Unlike the rest of the characters she has no action role (all other characters did), nor did she press any plot point of her own.
The movie suffered, as well, the usual problems of this era. It was rather chill, no one really liked each other, gestures of affection were strictly cross-gender and we see no real sign that Kirk and Spock ever achieve more than a tolerance for each other.
It also had the added (non) bonus of blue-collar vs. office drones and the implication from original!Spock that Nero was mentally ill.
So, I'm bewildered by the uncritical love for the movie but I still have hopes for future movies in the line - hopefully better writers and less pressure to be a 'summer blockbuster'. The rigid limitations of the blockbuster genre I think really hampered this from being a better film; one with content.
As an aside; I and my partner's best idea for who would do best for Star Trek? Joss Whedon. Setting aside the general fail that is Dollhouse, Joss (who also did Firefly, which I think was his best work) is very skilled at both the details of worldbuilding and developing shows with a true ensemble cast (meaning, all characters are individuals, have story arcs of their own, and none are neglected in favor of the beefcake/cheesecake).