gloriously emotional space opera

Rating: 9/10 (10 June 2009)

How much of it is me and how much of it is the movie? While I'm a Star Wars guy myself, I did grow up with the series, a Spock fan before I could write, and it goes without saying that this movie fully exploits the cultural benchmark it franchises: everyone can have fun with the uncanny casting, largely played for surprisingly deft comic relief. And while I could care less about the Trekkies, you can't help but admire the way this film sets out to circumvent purist quibbles: by opening up a channel in time, it creates an alternate 'reality'. This happily relieves the filmmakers of many cumbersome obligations to the source material, thus allowing it to concentrate on the true nucleus, the 'logic versus emotion' conflict embodied in the Kirk-Spock partnership. And by exploring this tension both between and within these characters, it achieves something quite remarkable. Not that I've been keeping track, but I doubt there are many space operas out there with this much invested in its characters - and with this kind of sweeping emotional resonance. Which immediately removes it from the Star Wars column and puts it closer to the epic war-buddy films of the classic Hollywood studio era - although I've never cared for one of those the way I care for this one. Shout out to Scotty's little green buddy, who astonishingly establishes himself as the most empathetic secondary character with about thirty seconds of screen time and zero words spoken.