Introduction:
For a long time I hesitated to fill this section dedicated to the Star Trek movies. I don't want to claim that the movies are bad but they don't correspond entirely with my view of Star Trek - why I will point out when dealing with the details of the movies. My problem is mainly based on the changed atmosphere when comparing series and movies.
That's why it is a little difficult to be sufficiently objective - but I will try. I hope that this way also fans of the movie series will be satisfied.
Star Trek: Phase II
When Star Trek was first aired in the USA 1966 to 1968 it was impossible to foresee the later success. Partly the viewer ratings were so bad that even the third season of the original series was at stake. Back then this third season was saved by a letter campaign that made clear that Star Trek had much more fans that the ratings had indicated. Bad timeslots and a reduced budget brought the end after the third season after all.
At first, it is likely that nobody would have put a penny on a future of Star Trek. The 1970s brought some changes, though, that finally led to a rebirth. For one thing, science fiction became sociable. The landing on the moon in 1969 was THE event of the decade and drew plenty of public interest. Parallel, the three Star Trek seasons were aired repeatedly in TV.
This time the series was much more successful and the idea of a sequel was born. Which form this sequel should have - another series or a motion picture - was in question for a long time.
The financing of the project was also not assured so the whole matter was delayed again and again. What made things worse were the lag of the original sets. They were not available any more even Spock's ears had not survived. New, expensive sets would have to be taken into account.
Whether Paramount favored the series or the motion picture is not really known, the information on this matter is contradictory. Fact is that nearly all actors agreed to play their roles again. The only important exception was Leonard Nimoy. He signaled his consent to take part as Spock in a movie but he didn't want to play again in a weekly series. Nevertheless, for a long time the revival of Star Trek as a series with the working title "Phase II" was likely. Scripts were written in which Spock were replaced by other characters. For his function as first officer, the human Will Decker should be his replacement, the alien Xon should have been the science officer.
Why in the end everything was turned upside down will most likely remain the secret of the persons in charge. Fact is that "Phase II" was canceled and Star Trek's sequel became a movie. Most likely, the premiere of "Star Wars" in 1977 had some influence as well as Steven Spielberg's "Close Encounters of a Third Kind" in the same years. While ones claim that this way the decision for a movie was supported others say that the success of "Star Wars" did the contrary so that the same ground was not raided again.
Today, it is not unusual for well-known movie actors to take part in a series. Some decades ago, that was quite different. Actors of a weekly show were supposed to stay in TV, movie actors keep working solely for cinema. So it was quite unusual that finally the decision was made favoring the motion picture since the frontier between cinema and TV had to be disregarded, too.
Be that as it may, even though there had been some scripts ready to be filmed "Phase II" was cancelled even before it really started. One of these scripts was published decades later as a book ("The Joy Machine") others were altered and used in the 1980s for "Star Trek - The Next Generation". Only the script of the pilot episode was used for its original purpose: "In Thy Image" was the basis for "Star Trek - The motion picture" in 1979.
Overview
| ||||||||||
"Star Trek - The Motion Picture"
| |||||||||||||||||||
Story:
Stardate 7412.6:
Almost 3 years after the end of the original five-year-mission:
Spock is on Vulcan to undergo the "Kohlinar" to reach a condition of pure logic without all human emotions. In the meantime, Kirk has been promoted to Starfleet "Chief of Operations" and is riding a desk as an admiral in San Francisco. Scotty is surveying the radical refit of the Enterprise which is almost done. The ship is waiting to be reassigned to active duty again under the command of the young Captain Will Decker.
When a deadly and till now unstoppable object is nearing Earth and threatens to destroy the whole planet, the Enterprise is the only ship within range. Kirk pulls his rank and took command again by reducing Decker to first and science officer. He reactivates all of his bridge crew, at first with the exception of Spock. Newly assigned is the Deltan Ilia as navigator who has been in love with Decker.
Spock, while completing his education on Vulcan, receives a telepathic message. He leaves Vulcan, quits the ritual of Kohlinar uncompleted and joins the crew of the Enterprise. Decker offers him the position of science officer. Still dedicated to the pursuit of logic and non-emotionalism, Spock keeps his distance to his former friends.
In the meantime, the Enterprise has reached the object where the Deltan Ilia becomes absorbed by it. She returns as a probe of the object that declares itself as "V'Ger". Through the Ilia-probe the Enterprise crew ascertains that V'Ger heads for Earth to find its creator there. Unnoticed by everyone Spock melds his mind with V'Ger on his own responsibility, almost loosing his life in doing so. In the meld, Spock encounters his ideal of pure logic without emotion. He recognizes that his pursuit of that goal was wrong as was his rejection of his friends.
Meanwhile, V'Ger has reached Earth and is close to destroy it. By using a bluff Kirk is able to communicate directly with V'Ger. It turns out that V'Ger was indeed built on Earth that is to say as the NASA probe
Voyager *). Later, it merged with alien technology and became something new. V'Ger is still following its old programming to learn everything possible and to bring the information back…
Opinion:
The story alone shows clear similarities to the TOS episode "The Changeleing". Taking a closer look the situation remains the same. Obviously, nobody realized soon enough that they weren't creating something new but producing a remake instead.
Director Wise "prepared" himself by watching a few episodes of the original series only and it is easy to see that in his movie. He does not only reuses an old script by accident, there is little left of the old Star Trek, too.
The movie has so many weaknesses that it is difficult to find a starting point.
The most important deficit is the one visible in the relationship of the characters. Star Trek had been brilliant in using fine nuances and subtle hints to make the crew something special. This was most visible in the relationship of the triumvirate Kirk - Spock - McCoy but the other bridge crew was important as well. They were real humans that had hobbies, strengths and weaknesses. Instead of continuing that way and using the potential that was offered by the extended time frame compared to the one of an episode the movie put a focus on special effects. Admittedly, plenty of the visual effects are pretty to look at and even after all these years impressive. You can see where all the money went and that was pretty much especially regarding the budget of an average TOS episode (around 300,000 Dollars). The special effects of the movie took alone 10 Million Dollars, the whole production took 44 Million Dollars - 15 Million Dollars had been originally planned with. To be fair it has to be mentioned that 4 Million Dollars were spend in vain because the special effects ordered first were not ready to be used. This way, the costs were raised on the one hand, on the other the premiere was delayed additionally.
Therefore, it is almost a miracle that Leonard Nimoy and all the other actors took part, especially regarding the long discussion how Star Trek should return, TV series or movie. It is especially worth mentioning that not only the bridge crew returned but also Majel Barrett, known as Nurse Chapel and since 1969 Roddenberry's wife but also Grace Lee Whitney aka Janice Rand. While Chapel rose to be a physician, the former Yeoman Rand was now a transporter chief. The fact that Kirk pushes her aside in the transporter room when problems occur made her look incompetent, though. It was also never explained what happened to her in between. Also missing are scenes with the crew. The people are part of the movie but they are not really present in the story. Most of the screen is filled with epical pictures. Everybody who favors shots of space in real time is better of watching Kubrick's "2001: Odyssey in Space". In a time when the crew would have rescued the galaxies three times over in a normal TOS episode, "The Motion Picture" just began to warm up and bring everybody
together. **)
The story takes place about 2.5 to 3 years after the original five-year-mission. When assuming that the animated series fills the fourth and fifth year although it is explicitly not a part of the official history and only parts of it were integrated into that so called "canon", there are at most five years gone since the last episode of TOS. In reality, it is a ten-year-gap between the end of the series and the motion picture, though, and you can't help but notice these ten years. That the actors grow older is normal but the script should have been altered accordingly. The way it is should it really be realistic that Kirk has forgotten how to command in 2.5 years only? Besides, the whole Enterprise looks like having taken a shower in pastel colors. Real colors are missing the uniforms are literally uni-form and have more resemblance to pajamas. There is no red, something which was about to be corrected to overkill in the subsequent movies. At least, the women were allowed to wear something less provocative (although Ilia is able "compensate" that fact). Nevertheless, the TOS uniforms had much more style than the ones of "The Motion Picture". Be that as it may, the new Enterprise needs to get accustomed to. Obviously, Kirk feels the same - he didn't set his foot on the ship for 2.5 years. In addition, he apparently didn't even take a look at the blueprints since he looks for the first time in Trek history really incompetent when Decker saved the worm whole problem. Does that sound as the known Kirk at all?
Then, there is Spock who has buried himself on Vulcan, dedicated to logic. He has dropped all of his friends and yet, during the series, Edith Keeler had stated that Spock belongs at Kirk's side. Nevertheless, Spock's absence can be far better explained than Kirk's transformation from dynamic Starfleet captain to egoistic nostalgic prone to the past although that past took place only 2.5 years ago. The whole development is even more incomprehensible when comparing the Kirk out of the series with the other commanders presented in the course of the episodes: all had been considerably older, e.g. Matt Decker (the father of the same Will Decker to captain the Enterprise here) and Ronald Tracey, to name only two of them.
Most likely that initial situation was chosen so that more potential for further development was given. To gain a nice effect it is always best to show a change from bad to good. Concerning Spock, that development can be seen starting from his all-over dedication to logic back to his actual self. Kirk goes back from "old geezer" back to starship captain. Considered all the facts this potential is not even fully used which makes the development the characters had taken during the lost period between series and movie the more regrettable.
Kirk's behavior towards Will Decker is not proper, either. It doesn't fit to the man he was described as formerly.
McCoy's share of the action is only marginal. There are only few nice McCoy moments so again there is much potential wasted.
Pushing all personal opinions aside what should have become of the characters after the series or not, the movie doesn't get better anyway. Till today, when a series manages to make the jump from small to large screen, it is one of the goals to reach a new audience. In this case, no one who hasn't seen an episode of "Star Trek" before would be able to understand what is going on. Most conflicts are not clearly shown. Spock's telepathy, Ilia's Deltan heritage and her celibacy, her former relationship to Decker, practically everything is mentioned only casually. In any case, Decker has a hard time. At first, he is demoted to first and science officer. Till then I had assumed that the position of the science officer does require a special scientific qualification. I doubt that Decker has that qualification but then there is nothing known about him anyway - so why not? Afterwards, Decker is demoted a second time when Spock arrives. This time he takes his degradation quite lightly and at the end he acts pretty friendly towards Kirk. It is most convenient that Decker gets rid of himself then.
At any rate, the end of the movie does contain some of the Star Trek that has made so many fans in three seasons so that the movie was able to draw much attention and bring in 175 Million Dollars. Kirk uses a bluff and some traces of the old relationships become visible. The best of the whole movie is, however and without any doubt, the soundtrack. It was used afterwards for "The Next Generation". TNG inherited further aspects. The "somehow we must spend our money" changed look of the Klingons is one example but also the relationship of Ilia and Decker is practically transferred one to one to Deanna Troi and Riker.
Additionally, it is interesting to know that there are several versions of the movie. Besides the original cinema version there is another one several minutes longer shown in TV. Cut scenes were integrated so that some contexts become clearer, e.g. the scene in which Chekov is injured and "treated" by Ilia.
Since 2002, there is also a "Director's Edition" likewise longer containing new effects. Some details were corrected, e.g. Vulcan's moon is removed. In "The Man Trap" Spock had explained to Uhura that Vulcan doesn't have a moon but on the premiere of "The Motion picture" one was clearly visible.
Even more interesting than the differences between the movie versions are the differences between movie and book. Usually, books to movies are merely add-ons. This one, however, is different since the author is named Gene Roddenberry. Roddenberry, the "Great Bird of the Galaxy", was Star Trek's creator and therefore everything that he had to say or to write has some significance although Star Trek novels are never part of the official history which is of course also true for this one. His book, the only one he contributed in this form to Star Trek, is not exactly brilliant but it fills some gaps and explains some details here and there. Sometimes it differs from the movie. The movie, for example, indicates that Spock didn't finish the Kohlinar on Vulcan because he felt the logical presence of V'Ger. Roddenberry's novel states that it was Kirk who called Spock telepathically. In addition, Roddenberry used the term "t'hy'la" which is Vulcan for "friend, brother and lover". The extent of this simple "t'hy'la" was astounding, especially since the term was, at least to my knowledge, never officially used in a Star Trek production. It nourished the theory of some people that wanted to make more of the friendship Kirk/Spock - Slash was born thus stories which are dealing with Kirk and Spock as lovers. Even though I don't agree with that theory I value the more emotional aspects of the book that are missing in the movie.
One way or the other I had to admit that I was never able to fully appreciate "Star Trek - The Motion Picture" and, because it is the basis for all subsequent movies, also the later ones. Regarded from an objective point of view the great soundtrack and some of the special effects alone make the whole lot worth seeing- but the movie is not able to really continue the tradition of Star Trek.
*)
There is indeed a Voyager program of NASA. Till today, there had been two Voyager probes which were launched both in 1977. Both are still active and they carry greetings ("Sounds of Earth") with them. Both belong to the objects that gained the largest distance from Earth ever. In 2006, NASA announced that Voyager 1 had reached a distance of 100 Astronomical Units (about 15 Billion kilometers). This way, Voyager 1 will reach interstellar space within the next ten years. It is expected that contact to both probes will cease around 2020 since then there won't be enough energy left to supply the critical systems with energy. Maybe then there will be indeed further Voyager probes launched with the ciphers 3 to 6…
**)
Ralph Sander named some alternative titles for the movie in his book "Das Star Trek Universum". They should have their origin in disappointed fans and some are indeed partly more fitting:
Star Trek - The Motionless Picture
Star Trek - The Slow Motion Picture
Star Trek - Where Nomad Has Gone Before
Star Trek - Spockalypse Now
Sources and Remarks:
All information (no guarantee) is based on the original (US) version of the movies.
All texts are written by me. Mainly, I used information out of my mind I gathered over the years. For verification, I used some literature:
- "Das Star Trek Universum - Volume 1" by Ralph Sander, Wilhelm Heyne Verlag München 1989
- the German version of "The Nitpicker's Guide For Classic Trekkers" by Phil Farrand, Wilhelm Heyne Verlag München 1996
- http://www.episodenguide.de/startrek/ by Florian Heidinger
- http://www.nasa.gov official homepage of NASA