Generally Excellent.

Rating: 9/10 (14 May 2009)

Like many I really enjoyed this movie. The pacing is fantastic. Its rare where you get a moment where you start thinking about something else. Its a captivating film for sure. The performances were excellent as were the effects.
I do have a criticism though and thats the enemy. Its sooooo tired. Another bitter angry man who is obsessed with destruction. My real criticism here is the man bit. I am so tired of seeing men in space with stupid colour schemes, enlarged foreheads, weird hairstyles etc. With all those amazing effects I would have liked to have seen an actual alien enemy. Considering the film doesn't even give that much air time to the enemy anyway surely they could have costed some interesting cgi for an enemy. The enemy craft design was rubbish. The enemy themselves were pretty rubbish. Totally disappointed with this element of the story. Also inside the craft it was just dark with lots of wires and stuff and looked so studio'ish.
The idea that every intelligent lifeform has to have evolved from an ape and ends looking almost identical across the universe is so dated its unbelievable. It was understandable in the past where effects were limited but we still seem to be in that mode now. It would have been nice if this film could have broken out of that mindset which was cast from limited budgets and effects possibilities.
So really thats my real complaint about the film I would of preferred it to have tried to move the star trek franchise away from the old rules to a more logical view of alien creatures.
We know how life has evolved and changed with the changing conditions of earth. How gravity, heat, radiation, the chemicals around us and the chemicals we eat can change life. How creatures change with natural selection. I'm sure most people would accept that using those rules will not equal near identical humans out in space with big eyebrows and funny haircuts.
Thats why as enjoyable as this film is it belongs in the same class as an old black and white flash gordon episode.
When science fiction starts portraying humans as the only humanoid type life in space and other species as massively different we will be on the right course. Personally I think that makes more interesting science fiction. The chances of man first stepping foot on some alien world and having sex with some alluring alien goddess are annoyingly slim.