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Saturday, May 18, 2013

Star Trek Into Darkness

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It's next to impossible to review Star Trek Into Darkness without diving into some form of spoilers, so I'm warning all of you from the beginning.  I will do my best to keep this as spoiler-free as possible, but I can't make any solid promises.  With that out of the way, let's boil down what I thought.  As a summer thrill ride movie, this is almost as good as it gets.  The effects are some of the biggest and grandest seen in a Star Trek movie, there are some memorable action sequences, and the movie on the whole works.  Where I'm slightly less certain is whether it works as a Star Trek movie.

picIt's not that it does any grand disservice to the characters, although judging by some fans' reactions, I may be wrong on that point as well.  That's something else I should get out of the way early on - Outside of the Next Generation TV series, I've never really followed Star Trek.  Oh, I've seen all the movies, but that hardly makes me an expert.  I'm sure there will be many fans who would be able to point things out in this movie that I wasn't even paying attention to.  With that said, one thing I do know for certain is that the series has never exactly been a "thrill ride".  Not that it doesn't work as one, but director J.J. Abrams (returning from his successful 2009 film reboot of the franchise) almost seems to be making this one for the non-fans as much as for the fans.  To me, Star Trek has always been a grand space opera about exploration and discovering alien worlds.  This movie seems less concerned with exploration, and more focused on blowing stuff up real good.  It creates some unforgettable moments (like when two characters jettison themselves into deep space, dodging through a field of space debris), but they may seem out of place to some fans.

picIn fact, Abrams seems to take a lot of inspiration from outside sources.  The film's opening sequence, for example, reminded me of the opening of a James Bond movie.  You know how a lot of those films start off by throwing you right in the middle of a wild action and stunt sequence?  Abrams does the same thing here by throwing us right in the middle of a scene where Captain Kirk (Chris Pine) and Bones (Karl Urban) are running away from some hostile alien natives who kind of look like they stepped out of an Indiana Jones movie.  While this is going on, Spock (Zachary Quinto) is being lowered into an active volcano so he can drop off a device that can prevent it from erupting, thereby saving the planet and its people.  It's a lot of frantic action and chasing, and it so closely resembles the opening of a Bond flick, I half expected the opening credits that follow this sequence to feature the silhouettes of Klingons dancing seductively to the theme music.  Fortunately, we are spared of this, and are instead dropped right into the main plot.

picBecause they disobeyed the orders of their mission, the next scene finds Kirk and Spock being chewed out by their superior officer (Bruce Greenwood), which follows another time honored movie genre - the buddy cop movie.  However, instead of being asked to hand in his badge, Kirk is simply demoted.  Shortly after this happens, a rogue Starfleet Commander named John Harrison (Benedict Cumberbatch) starts a war against Starfleet itself, instigating bombings and even an attack on its main headquarters in San Francisco.  Kirk is given back command of his ship by Admiral Marcus (Peter Weller), under the condition that he track down and kill Harrison, who has gone into hiding on the Klingon home planet Kronos.  Not wanting to start a war with the Klingons, the mission is intended to be small and largely covert.  However, when they track down John Harrison and manage to take him alive, it is revealed that this is a much more complex mission than initially stated.

picIn respect for those who haven't seen the film, I won't go into too much detail, but the truth behind John Harrison has to be one of the worst-kept secrets in recent movie memory.  With that said, once his true identity and motives are revealed, the specter of a past Star Trek movie looms heavily over the entire film.  Once again, out of respect, I won't reveal which one, but fans probably already know which one I'm talking about.  Here is where the movie begins to lose its way somewhat.  Up to this point, Star Trek Into Darkness has been a fast-paced and thrilling adventure.  And while it never lets up, this is also the point where Abrams, along with the screenplay, seems to be trying a bit too hard to invoke past memories of the earlier fan-favorite film.   What made the 2009 reboot successful is that it paid respect to the original series, while at the same time charting its own path.  Here, it pays a little too much respect, by recreating famous pivotal moments, and even pulling a role reversal on one of the most famous moments of the original film franchise.

picThis didn't really bother me up until the last 15 minutes or so of the movie, which is when the "role reversal" moment occurs.  It just does not work, and the way that the actors play it just does not have the same impact that it did the first time around.  The scene doesn't work because it's a tribute.  Not just that, it screams that it's a tribute to the earlier scene.  It so desperately wants to be the earlier movie, it becomes distracting.  It's supposed to be a dramatic moment, but instead, it feels like the movie is winking at us.  It's being cute, and so it comes across as being cheesy.  And because this is intended as a prequel to the earlier films, the fact that it's built around the life or death struggle of a character is greatly diminished.  We know the character is going to be okay, because they're in the later movies.  It's kind of like the climactic light sabre duel at the end of The Phantom Menace between Obi-Wan and Darth Maul.  We kind of know who's going to come out on top before the fight even starts.

picGlancing over what I have written, I seem to have veered to a somewhat negative stance.  This was not my intention, as I had a lot of fun while watching this movie.  It's only when thinking back on it that the cracks and faults show themselves.  That being said, this is an expertly crafted film.  There is some dazzling imagery and action sequences on display here.  The performances also do a great job of invoking nostalgia, while at the same time, coming into their own.  While I'm still not entirely sold on Chris Pine as Captain Kirk, Zachary Quinto as Spock, and especially Karl Urban as Bones have their respective characters down to a science.  I also admired Alice Eve, who enters in this film as the daughter of Admiral Marcus, and goes on to play a large role.  She's quite likable here, and she somewhat reminded me of a young Nicole Kidman (before she became Mrs. Tom Cruise in the 90s).

picI also should single out Benedict Cumberbatch, who as John Harrison, is a large reason as to why the film works.  One of my big problems with the 2009 reboot is that it did not have a very memorable villain.  This movie, and especially his performance, fixes this problem.  He gives his character depth.  He's much more than the one-dimensional terrorist villain he initially comes across as, or could have been with a lesser actor.  The movie gives Cumberbatch enough screen time for him to flesh out his character, and make him one of the more interesting villains we're likely to see this summer.  I loved the way this movie handles him.  We feel like he's constantly in control of the situation, even when he's shackled and contained within a cell.  I can only hope the inevitable sequel gives us a villain of equal menace.

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Star Trek Into Darkness is the second great movie thrill ride of early summer 2013.  I wasn't as taken with it as I was by Iron Man 3, but that does not take anything away from what this movie does accomplish.  It's fast-paced, it's highly energized, and I can easily see it winning over those who normally don't follow the franchise.  The fans may be a different story.  I'm sure they'll find something to like, but certain parts are likely to bug them more.  Whatever the case, this movie is certain to cause a lot of discussion when it's over.

See the movie times in your area or buy the DVD at Amazon.com!

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