| Review : |
I want to make the case for this being a good film, although I'm probably biased because it's the only one I had on video for a very long time. Maybe it's not perfect, it certainly undoes a lot of what the previous film did. Not just by bringing back Spock, but Kirk's reconciliation with his family came to nothing. David was killed, and we didn't even see Carol Marcus. Genesis was obviously far too good to be true, that you could just make planets inhabitable in a few minutes, so it had to fail really. That just turned it into a plain weapon, and that was that really. One thing that doesn't make sense about it is where the star came from. Perhaps there was a protostar in the nebula that got activated, but Regula was far too small for planet or star. And what happened to Kirstie Alley? However, there was some excellent stuff in there. I absolutely loved the whole 'Stealing the Enterprise' sequence, right from "Make it quick, Admiral." to "Best speed to Genesis.". The whole flight out of Spacedock was dramatic and eventful, and my absolute favourite bit of motion control ever. Mind you, the flight in was graceful and smooth, and it had me looking up at the sky wondering if it ever will hold something that vast. As for the final battle and loss of the Enterprise, it was unfortunate, but meaningful. Nothing could ever bring the Enterprise down, her own captain destroyed her in a desperate measure to save a friend. Finally, this film gave us the elegant Excelsior, the trim little Obarth and the ever-reused Klingon Bird of Prey, which looked menacing enough to make a decent adversary. The story worked very well, and the Klingons made a fair antagonist, although certainly not up with Khan. There's also an odd twist where the Grissom's over-cautions captain accidentally saves Saavik, Spock and David (for the time being) by calling Starfleet before beaming them up, otherwise all three would have been blown to bits. Perhaps it's also worth mentioning that all the main cast got a decent line or two (my favourite was Scotty's "Up your shaft.") which was supposedly a touch Leonard Nimoy put in. He made a very good director, and it would have been good even if he had come back only to direct. OK, so the film wasn't perfect, but it certainly doesn't deserve some of the flak it takes sometimes. By the way, I wonder if 'Federation battlecruiser' was the Klingons being more honest than Starfleet. |
