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Info About The First Star Trek Movie Of The Series:
Star Trek: The Motion Picture is a 1979 American science fiction film released by Paramount Pictures. It is the first film based on Star Trek, and a sequel to the Star Trek television series. The film is set in the twenty-third century, when a mysterious and immensely powerful alien cloud called V'Ger approaches Earth, destroying everything in its path. Admiral James T. Kirk (William Shatner) assumes command of his previous starship—the recently refitted USS Enterprise—to lead it on a mission to save the planet and determine V'Ger's origins.
When the original television series was cancelled in 1969, Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry lobbied Paramount to continue the franchise through a film. The success of the series in syndication convinced the studio to begin work on a feature film in 1975. A series of writers attempted to craft a suitably epic script, but the attempts did not satisfy Paramount, so the studio scrapped the project in 1977. Paramount instead planned on returning the franchise to its roots with a new television series, Star Trek: Phase II. The box office success of Close Encounters of the Third Kind convinced Paramount that science fiction films other than Star Wars could do well at the box office, so the studio cancelled production of Phase II and resumed its attempts at making a Star Trek film. In 1978, Paramount assembled the largest press conference held at the studio since the 1950s to announce that double Academy Award–winning director Robert Wise would helm a $15 million film adaptation of the television series.
With the cancellation of Phase II, writers rushed to adapt its planned pilot episode, "In Thy Image," into a film script. Constant revisions to the story and shooting script continued, to the extent of hourly script updates on shooting dates. The Enterprise was modified inside and out; costume designer Robert Fletcher provided new uniforms and production designer Harold Michelson fabricated new sets. Jerry Goldsmith composed the score, beginning an association with Star Trek that would continue until 2002. When the original contractors for the optical effects proved unable to complete their tasks in time, effects supervisor Douglas Trumbull was given carte blanche to meet the December 1979 release date. The film came together only days before the premiere; Wise took the just-completed film to its Washington, D.C., opening, but always felt that the theatrical version was a rough cut of the film he wanted to make.
Released in North America on December 7, 1979, Star Trek: The Motion Picture received mixed reviews from critics, many of whom faulted the film for its lack of action and over-reliance on special effects. The final production cost ballooned to approximately $46 million. The film earned $139 million worldwide, falling short of studio expectations but enough for Paramount to propose a cheaper sequel. Roddenberry was forced out of creative control for Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. In 2001, Wise oversaw a director's cut for a special DVD release of the film, with remastered audio, tightened and added scenes, and new computer-generated effects.
Plot
A Starfleet monitoring station, Epsilon Nine, detects an alien force, hidden in a massive cloud of energy, moving through space towards Earth. The cloud destroys three of the Klingons' new K't'inga-class warships and the monitoring station en route. On Earth, the starship Enterprise is undergoing a major refit; her former Captain, James T. Kirk, has been promoted to Admiral and works in San Francisco as Chief of Starfleet Operations. Starfleet dispatches Enterprise to investigate the cloud entity as the ship is the only one in intercept range, requiring her new systems to be tested in transit.
Kirk takes command of the ship citing his experience, angering Captain Willard Decker, who had been overseeing the refit as its new commanding officer. Testing of Enterprise's new systems goes poorly; two officers, including the science officer, are killed by a malfunctioning transporter, and improperly calibrated engines almost destroy the ship. The tension between Kirk and Decker increases when the admiral demonstrates his unfamiliarity with Enterprise. Spock arrives as replacement science officer, explaining that while on his home world undergoing a ritual to purge all emotion, he felt a consciousness that he believes emanates from the cloud.
The Enterprise intercepts the energy cloud and is attacked by an alien vessel within. A probe appears on the bridge, attacks Spock and abducts the navigator, Ilia. She is replaced by a robotic doppelgänger, a probe sent by "V'Ger" to study the crew. Decker is distraught over the loss of Ilia, with whom he had a romantic history. He becomes troubled as he attempts to extract information from the doppelgänger, which has Ilia's memories and feelings buried within. Spock takes a spacewalk to the alien vessel's surface and attempts a telepathic mind meld with it. In doing so, he learns that the vessel is V'Ger itself, a living machine.
At the heart of the massive ship, V'Ger is revealed to be Voyager 6, a 20th-century Earth space probe believed lost. The damaged probe was found by an alien race of living machines that interpreted its programming as instructions to learn all that can be learned, and return that information to its creator. The machines upgraded the probe to fulfill its mission, and on its journey the probe gathered so much knowledge that it achieved consciousness. Spock realizes that V'Ger lacks the ability to give itself a focus other than its original mission; having learned what it could on its journey home, it finds its existence empty and without purpose. Before transmitting all its information, V'Ger insists that the Creator come in person to finish the sequence. Realizing that the machine wants to merge with its creator, Decker offers himself to V'Ger; he merges with the Ilia probe and V'Ger, creating a new form of life that disappears into another dimension. With Earth saved, Kirk directs Enterprise out to space for future missions.
Cast
- William Shatner as James T. Kirk, the former captain of the USS Enterprise and an Admiral at Starfleet headquarters. When asked during a March 1978 press conference about what it would be like to reprise the role, Shatner said, "An actor brings to a role not only the concept of a character but his own basic personality, things that he is, and both Leonard Nimoy and myself have changed over the years, to a degree at any rate, and we will bring that degree of change inadvertently to the role we recreate."[5]
- Leonard Nimoy as Spock, the Enterprise's half-Vulcan, half-human science officer. Nimoy had been dissatisfied with unpaid royalties from Star Trek and did not intend to reprise the role, so Spock was left out of the screenplay. Director Robert Wise, having been informed by his daughter and son-in-law that the film "would not be Star Trek" without Nimoy, sent Jeffrey Katzenberg to New York City to meet with Nimoy. Katzenberg gave Nimoy a check to make up for his lost royalties, and the actor attended the March 1978 press conference with the rest of the returning cast. Nimoy was dissatisfied with the script, and his meeting with Katzenberg led to an agreement that the final script would need Nimoy's approval.[6] Despite the financial issues, Nimoy said he was comfortable with being identified as Spock because it had a positive impact on his fame.[5]
- DeForest Kelley as Leonard McCoy, the chief medical officer aboard the Enterprise. Kelley had reservations with the script, feeling that the characters and relationships from the series were not in place. Along with Shatner and Nimoy, Kelley lobbied for greater characterization, but their opinions were largely ignored.[7]
- James Doohan as Montgomery Scott, the Enterprise's chief engineer. Doohan created the distinctive Klingon vocabulary heard in the film.[8] Linguist Marc Okrand later developed a fully realized Klingon language based on the actor's made-up words.[9]
- Walter Koenig as Pavel Chekov, the Enterprise's weapons officer. Koenig noted that the expected sense of camaraderie and euphoria at being assembled for screen tests at the start of the picture was nonexistent. "This may be Star Trek," he wrote, "but it isn't the old Star Trek." The actor was hopeful for the film, but admitted he was disappointed by his character's bit part.[10]
- Nichelle Nichols as Uhura, the communications officer aboard the Enterprise. Nichols noted in her autobiography that she was one of the actors most opposed to the new uniforms added for the film because the drab, unisex look "wasn't Uhura".[11]
- George Takei as Hikaru Sulu, the Enterprise's helmsman. In his autobiography, Takei described the film's shooting schedule as "astonishingly luxurious", but noted that frequent script rewrites during production "usually favored Bill" [Shatner].[12]
- Persis Khambatta as Ilia, the Deltan navigator of the Enterprise. Khambatta was originally cast in the role when The Motion Picture was a television pilot.[5] She took the role even after Roddenberry warned her that she would have to shave her head completely for filming.[13]
- Stephen Collins as Willard Decker, the new captain of the Enterprise. He is temporarily demoted to Commander and First Officer when Kirk takes command of the Enterprise. Collins was completely unfamiliar with the franchise, having never seen an episode of the series. Kelley's dressing room was next to Collins', and the older actor became his mentor for the production.[14] Given the preexisting television cast Collins' casting was the only one that director Wise participated in; he called Collins' performance "excellent—in a difficult role."[15]
Selected Contents:
Reception
Release
To coincide with the film's release, Pocket Books published a novelization written by
Roddenberry.[n
3] The only Star Trek novel Roddenberry wrote, the
book adds back story and elements that did not appear in the movie; for example,
the novelization mentions that Willard Decker is
the son of Commodore Matt Decker from
the original series episode "The Doomsday
Machine"—a plot element intended for the Phase II television
series.[140] The novel also
has a different opening scene to introduce V'ger and Kirk, concentrates in
sections on Kirk's struggle with confidence in taking command of the Enterprise
again and expands on Ilia and Decker's relationship. In addition to the novel,
Star Trek printed media included a coloring book, ship blueprints, and a
comic book adaptation published by Marvel Comics as Marvel Super Special #15 (Dec.
1979).[141] Toys included
action figures, ship models, and a variety of watches, phaser mockups and
communicators. McDonald's
sold specially designed Star Trek Happy Meals.[142] The marketing
was part of a coordinated approach by Paramount and its parent conglomerate Gulf+Western to create a sustained Star
Trek product line.[143] The Motion
Picture novel started Pocket Books' Star Trek book
franchise, which produced 18 consecutive bestsellers within a decade.[144]
Owing to the rush to complete the film, The Motion Picture was never screened before test audiences, something Wise later regretted. The director carried the fresh print of the film to the world premiere,[123] held at the K-B MacArthur Theater in Washington, D.C. Roddenberry, Wise, and the principal cast attended the function, which also served as an invitational benefit for the scholarship and youth education fund of the National Space Club.[145] While thousands of fans were expected to attend,[145] rain reduced fan turnout to around 300.[146] The premiere was followed by a black-tie reception at the National Air and Space Museum. More than 500 people—consisting of the cast and crew, working members of the space community, and the few "hardcore Trekkies" who could afford the $100 admission price—filled the museum.[147] The film was the first major Hollywood adaptation of a television series that had been off the air for nearly a decade to retain its original principal cast.[148] The Motion Picture opened in North America on December 7, 1979, in 859 theaters and set a box office record for highest weekend gross, making $11,815,203 in its first weekend (generally considered to be a slow time for the movie business). The film beat the record set by Superman (1978), which had opened in a similar number of theaters but had been released in late December—a busier time.[149] The Motion Picture earned $17 million within a week.[18] At its widest domestic distribution, the film was shown in 1,002 theaters; it grossed $82,258,456 in the United States.[150] Overall, the film grossed $139 million worldwide.[3] The Motion Picture was nominated for three Academy Awards: Best Art Direction (Harold Michelson, Joseph R. Jennings, Leon Harris, John Vallone and Linda DeScenna), Best Visual Effects, and Best Original Score.[151] In the United States, The Motion Picture sold the most tickets of any film in the franchise until 2009's Star Trek, and it remains the highest-grossing film of the franchise worldwide adjusted for inflation,[152][153] but Paramount considered its gross disappointing compared to expectations and marketing. The Motion Picture's budget of $46 million,[2] including costs incurred during Phase II production,[154] was the largest for any film made within the United States up to that time. David Gerrold estimated before its release that the film would have to gross two to three times its budget to be profitable for Paramount.[99] The studio faulted Roddenberry's script rewrites and creative direction for the plodding pace and disappointing gross.[2] While the performance of The Motion Picture convinced the studio to back a (cheaper) sequel, Roddenberry was forced out of its creative control.[155] Harve Bennett and Nicholas Meyer would produce and direct Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, which received better reviews and continued the franchise.[156] With the successful revival of the Star Trek brand on the big screen setting an example, Hollywood increasingly turned to 1960s television series for material.[148] Critical response The Motion Picture met with disappointing reviews from critics;[157] a 2001 retrospective for the BBC described the film as a critical failure.[158] Gary Arnold and Judith Martin of The Washington Post felt that the plot was too thin to support the length of the film, although Martin felt that compared to such science-fiction films as 2001: A Space Odyssey, Star Wars and Alien, The Motion Picture's pretense was "slightly cleverer".[159] Time's Harold Livingston wrote that the film consisted of spaceships that "take an unconscionable amount of time to get anywhere, and nothing of dramatic or human interest happens along the way". Livingston also lamented the lack of "boldly characterized" antagonists and battle scenes that made Star Wars fun; instead, viewers were presented with lots of talk, "much of it in impenetrable spaceflight jargon".[160] David Denby said that the slow movement of ships through space was "no longer surprising and elegant" after films such as 2001: A Space Odyssey, and that much of the action consisted of the crew's reacting to things occurring on the viewscreen, which the New York Magazine critic considered to be "like watching someone else watch television".[161] Variety disagreed, calling the film "a search-and-destroy thriller that includes all of the ingredients the TV show's fans thrive on: the philosophical dilemma wrapped in a scenario of mind control, troubles with the space ship, the dependable and understanding Kirk, the ever-logical Spock, and suspenseful take with twist ending".[162] The characters and acting received a mixed reception. Stephen Godfrey of The Globe and Mail rated their performances highly: "time has cemented Leonard Nimoy's look of inscrutability as Mr. Spock [...] DeForest Kelley as Dr. McCoy is as feisty as ever, and James Doohan as Scotty still splutters about his engineering woes. At a basic level, their exchanges are those of an odd assortment of grumpy, middle-aged men bickering about office politics. They are a relief from the stars, and a delight." Godfrey's only concern was that the reunion of the old cast threatened to make casual viewers who had never seen Star Trek feel like uninvited guests.[163] Martin considered the characters more likable than those in comparable science fiction films.[159] Conversely, Arnold felt that the acting of the main cast (Shatner in particular) was poor; "Shatner portrays Kirk as such a supercilious old twit that one rather wishes he'd been left behind that desk", he wrote. "Shatner has perhaps the least impressive movie physique since Rod Steiger, and his acting style has begun to recall the worst of Richard Burton."[164] Vincent Canby of The New York Times wrote that the actors did not have much to do in the effects-driven film, and were "limited to the exchanging of meaningful glances or staring intently at television monitors, usually in disbelief".[165] Stephen Collins and Persis Khambatta were more favorably received. Gene Siskel felt the film "teeter[ed] towards being a crashing bore" whenever Khambatta was not on screen,[18] and Jack Kroll of Newsweek felt that she had the most memorable entrance in the film.[166] "[Khambatta] is sympathetic enough to make one hope she'll have a chance to show less skin and more hair in future films", Godfrey wrote.[163] Many critics felt that the special effects overshadowed other elements of the film. Canby stated that the film "owes more to [Trumbull, Dykstra and Michelson] than it does to the director, the writers or even the producer".[165] Livingston felt that Trumbull and Dykstra's work on the film was not as impressive as on Star Wars and Close Encounters due to the limited amount of production time.[160] Godfrey called the effects "stunning", but conceded that they threatened to overpower the story two-thirds of the way into the film.[163] Kroll, Martin, and Arnold agreed that the effects were not able to carry the film or gloss over its other deficiencies; "I'm not sure that Trumbull & Co. have succeeded in pulling the philosophic chestnuts of Roddenberry and his co-writers out of the fire," Arnold wrote.[159][164][166] Later assessments of the film have echoed these criticisms. The film holds a 44% "Rotten" rating on the review aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes, based on 34 critical reviews.[167] James Berardinelli, reviewing the film in 1996, felt that the pace dragged and the plot bore too close a resemblance to the original series episode "The Changeling", but considered the start and end of the film to be strong.[168] Terry Lee Rioux, Kelley's biographer, noted that the film proved "that it was the character-driven play that made all the difference in Star Trek".[169] The slow pacing, extended reaction shots, and the film's lack of action scenes led fans and critics to give the film a variety of nicknames, including The Motionless Picture,[170] The Slow Motion Picture,[6] The Motion Sickness,[171] and Where Nomad [the probe in "The Changeling"] Has Gone Before.[168] Home media In 1983, an extended cut of the film was released on videotape and premiered on the ABC television network.[172] It added roughly 12 minutes to the film.[123] The added footage was largely unfinished and cobbled together for the network premiere; Wise had never wanted the footage to be included in the final cut of the film.[173] Two members of Wise's production company, David C. Fein and Michael Matessino, approached Wise and Paramount and persuaded them to release a revised version of the film on video; Paramount released the updated Director's Edition of the film on VHS and DVD in 2001. Wise, who had considered the theatrical presentation of the film a "rough cut", was given the opportunity to re-edit the film to be more consistent with his original vision. The production team used the original script, surviving sequence storyboards, memos, and the director's recollections. In addition to cuts in some sequences, 90 new and redesigned computer-generated images were created.[171] Care was taken that the effects meshed seamlessly with the old footage.[123] The edition runs 136 minutes, about four minutes longer than the original release.[174] Included among the special features are the deleted scenes which had been part of the television cut.[173] Aside from the effects, the soundtrack was remixed. Ambient noise such as the buzz of bridge controls were added to enhance certain scenes.[171] Goldsmith had always suspected that some overly long cues could be shortened, so he made the cues repetitive.[175] Although no new scenes were added, the MPAA rated the revised edition "PG" in contrast to the "G" rating of the original release. Fein attributed the rating change to the more "intense" sound mix that made scenes such as the central part of V'Ger "more menacing".[176] The Director's Edition was better received by critics than the original theatrical release. The DVD Journal's Mark Bourne said that the Director's Edition showcased "a brisker, more attractive version of the movie" that was "as good as it might have been in 1979. Even better maybe."[177] Complaints included the edition's 2.17:1 aspect ratio, as opposed to the original 2.40:1 Panavision.[123][178] Jeremy Conrad of IGN felt that despite the changes, the pacing might still be too slow for some viewers.[179] The film's original theatrical cut was released on Blu-ray Disc in May 2009 to coincide with the new Star Trek feature,[180] packaged with the five following features as the Star Trek: Original Motion Picture Collection.[181] The Motion Picture was remastered in 1080p high-definition. All six films in the set have 7.1 Dolby TrueHD audio. The disc features a new commentary track by Star Trek authors and contributors Michael and Denise Okuda, Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens, and Daren Dochterman.[181] Above Extracts Taken From: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Trek:_The_Motion_Picture More Info: http://www.startrek.com/page/star-trek-the-motion-picture - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0079945/ Trailer & HD Trailer From YouTube: .bmp) |
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