Pretty good beginning to an interesting new franchise

Rating: 6/10 (19 November 2015)

"Star Trek" was another step to directing stardom for J. J. Abrams after "Lost" and "Mission Impossible 3". And also his success with this film here may be the main reason that he got the nod for directing the new Star Wars movie that will come out in roughly a month. But back to this one. Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto play the main characters and both do a fine job with what they are given, especially Quinto. The film runs for slightly over 2 hours and the inclusion of the late Leonard Nimoy, the original Spock, will be appreciated by fans of the series. But it should also be appreciated by everybody else as Nimoy's parts were heart and soul of the movie. But also all the other actors that I haven't mentioned so far did a fine job. It was actually a nice, surprising development for me that Saldana's character ended up with Spock and not with Kirk as I thought early on in the film.
Apart from the really well-written story that is really smart and has many interesting details, this film's strength is as well that it does not take itself so seriously. There are quite a few funny parts in here, mostly coming from Kirk interacting with others, especially Urban's character. This film was nominated for 4 Oscars and won one in a year of famous alien films with great special effects. I personally would rank it below "District 9", but above "Avatar". "Star Trek" got me curious about the sequel too and I hope Abrams can make the next "Star Wars" just like he succeeded with this 6-year-old film here. Good job by everybody involved. The introduction was good, the character development was a success and the final battle sequences were not truly memorable, but I'd take that any time about a movie which comes short on the other aspects I just mentioned. Still, the ending was nice and not a failure after all. I must say I found Bana's character a bit uninteresting, which is a shame as I quite like him as an actor (especially in "Munich"), but maybe that is just personal perception. This is a good movie and you will probably even really love it if you appreciate the sci-fi genre more than I do. Thumbs up.