Star Trek in IMAX (Spoilers Alert)

Star Trek was one of my favorite childhood TV shows.  I remembered watching Kirk and Spock strutting their stuff on a 12″ TV in the 70’s.  Back then, the ridiculous props, cheesy music, and fuzzy visual effects were captivating to a little boy, like me.

Now, they’ve upped the ante with the latest Star Trek movie.  The director, JJ Abrams, rebooted the series by giving it over the top special effects, high energy music, shiny new (and expensive) sets, and fresh young faces.  Topping it off, it’s presented in glorious IMAX sight and sound in the theaters.

SPOILERS ALERT BELOW!

I tried my best to lower my expectation, but I can’t help but hold the movie to a higher standard.  Overall it’s not a bad movie, but it had too much energy.   It was pretty much non-stop action.  There were also too many “lens flares” on the screen, which JJ Abrams admitted overdoing it.   The camera work jitters too much, and with the big IMAX screen, it gave me a little motion sickness.  Also, it looked like the movie was upconverted to IMAX resolution, so it was kind of blurry during fast camera pans.

Then there’s the story itself.  It’s clever that they made a “reboot” as an “alternate universe” story.  As far fetch as it is, I have to forgive it because it’s Star Trek , where time travel is always the best story to tell.  The story flowed quite well from beginning to end.  A minor exception with Montgomery Scott plot hole:  How the heck did he know how to fix the Enterprise’s engine, when he spent most his time stranded in an icy outpost before?

Of course, the main attraction is the new set of actors playing the famous original series cast:

• I give kudos to Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, and Karl Urban for their superb job emulating Shatner, Nimoy, and McCoy, respectively.  It’s a good thing too because The Original Series is pretty much about this trio.  They must work, otherwise the new franchise won’t go anywhere.
• I didn’t find the new take on Uhura, Sulu, and Scotty particularly good.  Uhura was too slutty.  Sulu became a ninja.  Scotty just became too darn annoying with his one-liner quips.  And what’s up with the alien sheep dog accompanying him?  They could use a rewrite, or at least a more dignified character development.
• The new Chekov is amusing because of the way he speaks.  The inside joke is the mispronunciation of words with “V”, made famous from Star Trek 4: The Voyage Home, such as  “Wictor” and “Wessel”.  This character has potential, but ended up as a side show – which is too bad.

Overall, the new series is going to make many people happy.  Some of my friends, who are not Trek fans, enjoyed it as an action movie.  For me, a mild Trekker (as much as I want to admit), the movie has enough tie-ins with the Original Series, it’s fun to watch.  The IMAX screen & sound enhanced the experience.  So I’m glad to have watched it.  I’ll most likely watch it again on DVD.

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Tags: imax, movies, star trek