Another great Hollywood movie!

Rating: 1/10 (11 June 2009)

Every Star Trek fan knows the ST movies aren't that good. This is because they try to be different from the series in appealing to the mainstream. But Star Trek is rock solid and it can handle some of the absolutely silly scripts we have seen in some past movies.
In this case we have a prequel that recasts the original cast. Questionable, but if there is a lot of story to tell then that should be acceptable. But that is exactly the problem. There was no way to tell a new story without destroying the existing storyline. So they made a new one. Makes no sense right? Well, in Star Trek you can just call it an alternative timeline and suddenly it's acceptable.
The movie starts and any fan of Star Trek will be shocked by the cinematic style. The camera shakes like crazy, lighting effects literally blind you. They can't get a solid shot of someone face or of two people talking. No, they give you shaking closeups with only part of their face actually on screen, quickly switching between the two persons.
The 4 of the 5 first scenes with Kirk are horrifying. In the first he apparently tries to commit suicide. Or he almost accidentally wins a Darwin award, can't tell. In the second he gets beaten to bloody pulp while touching breasts. Then afterward his father's friend just bluntly tells him to join Starfleet, and he does it. Makes no sense. In the third he has sex with a female Shrek-lookalike. I had to press stop again and regain my composure. The fourth is where he has a conversation with McCoy. This is stiff as wood and not redeeming, but the contrast with the previous scenes is big. They throw out some old one-liners but that doesn't work either. In the 5th he takes the Kobayashi Maru test for the third time, while eating an apple and acting like it is one big joke. Apparently this is this movie's attempt at humor.
Here I had to stop the movie for a third time.
Now you have to remember the comments the director made. He said he disliked Star Trek and thus never watched any of it himself. This explains the complete lack of the slow-paced dialogue driver story. Isn't that what Star Trek is all about? Social issues, ethical dilemmas, philosophical explorations. And what about Gene Roddenberry's vision? Wasn't Star Trek to inspire kids not only to be inspired to study very hard on math and science but also to instill hope in them that in the future we would be able to improve our societies and values?
Star Trek was able to do what it did by not requiring the viewer to suspend disbelief in many cases, so you were able to do it when it mattered. In this movie even basic dialogue seems awkward. Why the hell does Kirk join Starfleet? Just one stupid fight? Or just because this Pike guy wants him to? This movie has no story to tell. They decided they wanted to make another ST movie first. Then they had to make up a story: "Big evil ship piloted by the big bad guy is out to destroy the universe, merely out of spite." They decided upon that. Didn't we already have exactly that with Star Trek Nemesis? And isn't that already the most basic SF storyline you can come up with? Khan?
One of the most glaring problems of this movie is the decisions the characters make. You expect all decisions to be reasonable or at least within a certain range making it believable enough. Sometimes the writer may want to move the story in a certain direction and it is difficult or apparently impossible to make the characters sway in that direction. This is where writing skill comes in. But they decided that at any point the story can do whatever they want no matter what. This is why Starfleet can load up their flagship with fresh cadets. This is why McCoy desperately tries to get Kirk on the ship as if he already knows why Kirk has to be on the ship. This is why for example Kirk can take over as captain of the ship while Starfleet judges him to be completely incompetent.
The third biggest problem about this movie is that every dialogue is unnatural. There has been this trend in Hollywood where a natural dialogue is going to be awkward because the viewer expects an artificial style dialogue. People speak a certain way in Hollywood movies which is different from a natural dialogue. This makes them look fake even more.
We all know Hollywood can't tell a story. But what is best about Star Trek is worst about this movie. This movie is to Star Wars as Star Wars is to Star Trek. If you think Star Wars was too cerebral then maybe this movie is for you. This movie is literally intentionally made for people that hate Star Trek. This movie is literally made so that people that like Star Trek hate this movie.
So the big question to me is: why? Why make this movie. Why make a movie that is nothing like Star Trek in the Star Trek universe and even with a recast of the original characters? Money of course. And I don't really blame them. But the fact that they succeed amazes me. How the hell does this movie have such a high score on IMDb. And also on Rotten Tomatoes. WTF is wrong with you people? Look at the insane box office revenue. This movie literally is Star Trek from a parallel universe; a universe where humanity isn't smart enough to get into the industrial revolution even if it hit them in the face. I blame the people liking this movie. They create demand for this kind of trash. Shame on you!