Well, last time we had a film that dealt with aging, death, and
no-win scenarios. This time we have a
film about friendship, loyalty, love, and resurrection, and is it as good as Wrath of Khan? No not really.
Before I rip into what I think is wrong with the film let me
talk about some of the good things here.
And the first thing I’d like to praise is the fact that there is
anything good here at all. The fact that
the creative team managed to make a full length film, that is engaging and
interesting all things considered, about bringing Spock back based on a mind
meld with one word and a shot of Spock’s tube on the Genesis planet speaks
volumes about the creative talent of the people working on this. Also we have good music that again plays with
the theme of the last film; which works because this film deals directly with
the events of the last film. The actors
are all working really well together and each gets at least one moment to shine. Two thumbs way up for Deforest Kelley for
managing the task of not only portraying the character of McCoy, but also McCoy
as possessed by Spock and doing a wonderful job. Nimoy also does well as a first time film
director. Shots are well staged, the
actions clear, and the pacing is good.
The first problem for this movie then is the writing and unfortunately
it starts right at the beginning of the film.
The whole opening previously on Star Trek recap does not need to be
there. Harve Bennett mentions himself in
the commentary that it was kind of useless because if you were going to see
the third movie of a franchise chances are good that you already saw the
others, but he couldn’t assume that. Now
on some level I agree with him, it’s good to provide some background for the
audience so they become invested in the story and understand what’s going on, even
if they are a newcomer, but I’ll still argue that the recap doesn’t need to be
there. Kirk opens with a personnel log where
he describes the events of the previous film and how he feels about them, you
don’t need anything else. Also I find
that opening on a little blue tinted square of footage from The Wrath of Khan that we slowly pull in
on really distracting and off-putting. I
always think, why do we have this random piece of the last film before the
credits? Is my copy of the movie broken? If they really thought they needed a recap I
think they just should have opened on Spock’s tube have Kirk’s eulogy as a
voice-over and then just do the credits and move forward. Speaking of the credits though I do like that
they omitted Leonard Nimoy’s name from where it would normally be. It provides intrigue as to whether or not
this search for Spock will result in the return of the Spock we know.
The next big issue is the plot, not that the plot is bad,
but that it has glaring errors in it. Harve
says that he wrote this film backwards starting with Spock being alive and
going from there and it shows. Everyone
seems to have knowledge of things they shouldn’t. The biggest and most glaring one for me is
that everyone knows where Spock’s body is so they can go be the rebel underdogs and save their friend.
Even Sarek asks Kirk why he left Spock on Genesis. The problem is that no one except the science team on Grissom knows that
Spock’s tube, and therefore his body, is on Genesis. David even says that the tube must have soft
landed. When the team went to study the
planet they weren’t expecting to find Spock’s body there. The shot of Spock’s tube being fired off from
the Enterprise in Wrath of Khan shows it seeming to go past the
planet. But now everyone just knows that
Spock’s body is there because if they don’t the story doesn’t work. It’s a ghastly plot hole that drives the
entire film.
Another problem that arises from this is the question, why can’t the science team just pick up Spock’s body? Kirk knows that Grissom is the ship that’s supposed to be studying Genesis. He tries to hail them when the Enterprise arrives at the planet. It should be nothing for Kirk to ask Starfleet to contact them and tell them to beam up the remains. This is a rather easy thing to fix too I think. In the scene where David and Savvik are beaming down to the planet just have the communications officer tell the captain that Starfleet has given some subspace blackout on them or something, and they are not to make further contact in case the transmissions get intercepted. So when we cut to the scene of Kirk talking to admiral what’s his name in the lounge we know why Kirk has to personally go to Genesis, because the ship there can’t be communicated with.
Speaking of communications, why the heck does Uhura just go
away after she helps the crew beam aboard the Enterprise? Especially since they needed all the help
they could get manning the Enterprise and because this whole story is supposed to
show how devoted Kirk and the crew are to Spock. Maybe Nicehelle Nichols had another project
going on at the same time, but it just seems weird to have one member of the
crew absent from this adventure, they even have Chekov using communications to
contact Grissom and monitor Starfleet channels so it’s not like she wouldn’t
have had anything to do on the ship. Instead
she goes to Vulcan with Sarek. This
brings up my final problem with the whole Spock’s body plot hole, why do they
even need the body? When Sarek first
visits Kirk he says that only Spock’s body was in death. That Spock trusted Kirk with his future, his
katra; implying that the katra is more important than the body. That also seems to play out in that McCoy has
all of Spock’s marbles as he says. Everything that Spock knew and was is in the katra.
So obviously getting the katra to Vulcan is vital, but why the body
too? Again looking at the story
backwards it’s necessary because without it you can’t do the re-fusion and bring
Spock back, but no one set out to do that initially they just wanted to fulfill Spock’s
final wishes according to Vulcan customs.
All right getting off the clunky plot a bit let’s look at
some more characters. Christopher Lloyd
does quite a nice job as the Klingon Kruge.
I’ve mostly seen Lloyd in comedic roles so getting to see him portray a
villain is really nice. Introducing the
whole idea of Klingon honour here also provides a nice contrast of the extreme
loyalty of the Enterprise crew. They
will do anything for Spock while Kruge is willing to kill his lover and his
crew if they learn something they shouldn’t know or do something they shouldn’t
do. The only complaint I have is that I
wish Kruge could have been a little more developed; to provide some kind of
history with Kirk. Sure Kruge kills
David and causes Kirk to destroy the Enterprise but Kirk doesn’t really get to
act like a wounded man outside of two scenes that follow those events. Although I do like the scene of Kirk falling
to the floor after David’s death, a wonderful image of a fallen hero; also
McCoy in the background shaded by smoke and darkness is a great shot. It’s like he is torn about what to do and he
probably is because McCoy and Spock comfort Kirk in different ways and neither
one seems exactly sure what to do. Also
Kirk and McCoy’s exchange as the crew watched the Enterprise burn up as it
enters the Genesis atmosphere is marvelous, but there doesn’t get to be
anything else but those scenes. We don’t
really get to see Kirk struggle with these issues as the movie progresses, or
grow stronger from trying to cope with that loss. So Kirk’s line of “I have had enough of you!”
rings hollow because although Kruge has been behind everything in the film
really Kirk doesn’t know that or have that have any impact on him at all until
the end of the film. If they had maybe
tied the whole Starfleet not being very supportive of Kirk and the crew with
Kruge and the whole peace idea it might have made everything come together just
a bit tighter.
Another good performance here was Robin Curtis as Savvik. Curtis plays Savvik as more of your standard Vulcan
than Kristie Alley did and I like that.
With the loss of her mentor, her teacher, her father figure essentially
she must grow to be more mature and more confident in herself. But I wish they had kept the kind of sloped eyebrows she had in Wrath of Khan it gave the character a really nice distinct look.
A few other things of note.
Costuming wise I like that we get to see civilian clothes on the
characters and I honestly think they look good, except for Chekov’s pink
suit. Thank goodness they got something
else for him for The Voyage Home. I also like that a lot of the Vulcan culture in
the film ties back to what was introduced in the show. The ceremony is mysterious. The person running it is female, just like T’pau
when she oversaw Spock’s wedding in ‘Amok Time’ and the priestess who oversaw
Kolinahr. She leaves after the ritual in
a Sedan chair, and we see all the Vulcans, even Savvik, seeming to connect with
Spock and the priestess to help the re-fusion.
Also the foreplay shown in the pon farr sequence with Savvik and Spock
was great, even if it doesn’t really work seeing as Spock didn’t have his first
pon farr until he was in his thirties.
But hey they also screwed up how old the Enterprise was, but they didn’t
have memory alpha or the episodes on VHS to just go rent from the local video
store so I’ll give that a pass.
Overall the film does hold up as being pretty okay. It’s not bad, but it also isn’t all that good. The threads are all there to have an epic story with Kirk and the crew sacrificing everything for their friend, and showing that loyalty contrasted by the villain, but it doesn’t tie everything together well enough. There’s great ambition here, but it falls short in execution. Whether that was from a lack of time, Bennett being new to movie writing, or Nimoy being too restricted by the studio as a first time director I don’t know, but the end result is a film that while it is certainly watchable and re-watchable isn’t all that it could be.
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