Review of Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979) by Jukka K — 02 Jun 2009

This is by far the most hurt Trek Movie in the 6 movie series mostly because of its menotinously slow story progression. The Blue Ray really depreciated the feel and look of the film as the extra boost in image detail makes scenes look less seamless such as making black lines around ships more visible creating a cardboard cut out look.

Make up looks plastered on the faces of the crew and flaws in the original filmstock are clearly visible. However this is the best the film has ever looked and a huge upgrade to the previous dvd release which was murky and awash in overstauration.

The story is alright if very, VERY slow. Sometimes you wonder if you ht the pause button on your remote by mistake. In one scene as the Enterprise is entering the alien anomalie, you literally spend 20 min watching the ship fly into it and every once in awhile your treated to an expression of awe and wonderment from one of the starships crew, then back to the ships onscreen video viewer during the ascension and then back again to another amazed crewship member with looks of more awe and wonderment.

Seriously like 20 minutes goes by before the story kicks back in. Even a romanticized scene of Captain and ship where Kirk is taken around his vessel before docking takes a good 7 to 9 minutes. The outfits of the crew are another matter and almost look like the crew are wearing their pyjamas on the deck of the ship.

This film is so terribly slow that I literally had to stop this film and watch it in 3 parts to get through it. This is funny because as a child I rather enjoyed it and thought it was much better than most people gave it credit for and now I stand here corrected and joining the masses of people who dislike this film.

The Motion Picture is just barely a better version of the old series and much worse than a TV made film of today. I know this film is old but so was Star Wars that came out 2 years earlier so it really could have been made much better than it was.

Trek fans need only put themselves through this mess and the rest should probably just avoid it.