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Jules
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Chairman & CEO, Dallas Oil Company
Jul 2001
time: 00:24
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quote:
Review: 'Trek: Nemesis' its own worst enemy
By Ben Nuckols
Associated Press
Friday, December 13, 2002 Posted: 10:10 AM EST (1510 GMT)
(AP) -- If "Star Trek: Nemesis" is "a generation's final journey," as it's billed, Capt. Jean-Luc Picard and crew are going out with a whimper in the dark.
The 10th entry in the "Star Trek" movie franchise, and the third in which Picard has flown solo, is the dullest and drabbest of the lot. Simply plotted and feebly directed, it lacks the vigorous action that elevated Capt. Kirk's adventures into pulp art or the thorny ethical dilemmas that gave the "Next Generation" TV series its resonances.
Screenwriter John Logan's heart is in the right place; he looks back to past "Trek" movies to find the template for his villain. Kirk's most fearsome adversaries -- played by Ricardo Montalban in "Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan" and Christopher Plummer in "Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country" -- were able to outstrip his masculine bravado. Following that logic, what better nemesis for the introspective, solipsistic Picard than -- himself?
The bad guy is a young Picard clone, created by the always scheming Romulans in an effort to infiltrate the Federation. But they abandoned the project when the clone was still a boy, ditching him in the mines of enslaved sister planet Remus. The Remans, a nasty, militaristic bunch, raise him to be a leader, and as the movie opens he assassinates much of the Romulan Senate.
Nature vs. nurture
So Shinzon (Tom Hardy), as the clone is called, becomes Praetor of the Romulan Empire, and he makes overtures of peace to the Federation. Naturally, the Enterprise crew is called to negotiate, interrupting their journey to the second of two wedding ceremonies for Commander Riker (Jonathan Frakes) and Counselor Deanna Troi (Marina Sirtis).
With his sneering mug and a voice that sounds like sherry poured over sandpaper, Shinzon isn't very convincing when he talks about peace, and the Enterprise crew discovers in short order that the opposite is on his mind: He has a vendetta against humanity.
Addressing the nature-vs.-nurture debate, "Star Trek: Nemesis" comes down solidly on nurture's side. Shinzon, who shares Picard's DNA, torments him with the assertion that if Picard had been orphaned and brought up among the oppressed Remans, he would harbor the same resentments.
Similar themes turn up in the relationship between the android Data (Brent Spiner) and a prototype of himself that the crew has discovered.
Shrouded in darkness
Director Stuart Baird ("U.S. Marshals") pays lip service to these dualities; he's more interested in action sequences. But his work is lumbering. And the film's murky look -- the Remans, we're told, prefer darkness -- violates a principle that has informed the best space operas: Keep it sharp and crisp. The audience needs to believe it's seeing a future world brimming with technology, and that's not possible if it looks like nobody's invented the 60-watt bulb.
Baird relies on textureless close-ups and frames his shots as if for television. Worse -- particularly considering Baird apprenticed as an editor -- the cross-cutting limps and sags.
As every Trekker knows, Federation starships lack the firepower of Romulan or Klingon war birds, so a captain must use his wits if he's drawn into battle with one of them. This installment, though, values brawn over brains, with the measured Picard eventually borrowing a tactic from a monster truck rally.
The Enterprise crew retains its breezy rapport, though Worf (Michael Dorn), Geordi (LeVar Burton) and Crusher (Gates McFadden) are given little to do. Spiner, the loosest and most freewheeling of the cast, creates some nice comic moments between Data and his less sophisticated prototype, while Stewart appears lost in a reverie of contemplation.
Perhaps he's thinking about how his other sci-fi franchise, "X-Men," has a future, while "Star Trek" is going nowhere, slowly.
"Star Trek: Nemesis," a Paramount Pictures release, is rated PG-13. |
So anybody see it yet? Or, wait, when's it out again? I've been preoccupied with final exams. 
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Andrew1999
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Strangely, the L.A. Times reviewer really liked it, although he seems to be the only one.
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H Tower
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that would be so out of character with the borg though as to create a huge cry from any trekky worth his salt
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Gatekeeper
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United States of America
Feb 2000
time: 23:24
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Everyone:
OK, I watched the movie and, briefly, here's what I thought:
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1. The opening scene in the Romulan Star Empire Senate was eerie, to say the least. To see all those senators basically being turned into some sort of "stone" by that bio-genetic weapon and then shattering into pieces.
On a related note, I expected the Senate to be grander in scale and number of senators. I mean, c'mon! This is the Senate of a starfaring empire! There should be more than 20 senators present, IMHO. Yeah, I know it's "only" the Romulans who would be represented in such a body (since the relationship is like Imperial Rome; the real power lies with the Praetor, and only Romulans would be represented in the Senate, and not any of their enslaved and/or subject races).
2. I did enjoy the interplay between Cap. Jean-Luc Picard and Shinzon Remus, although I did think that the former went a little overboard in trying to "convert" the latter to the "light," so to speak. Heck, if I'd been Shinzon and listening to that pap (especially towards the end of the prattling), I'd probably think the Federation was even more fairy-like than before.
The way Shinzon died was somewhat torturous. Nothing quite like Khan, though. His death scene is still tops, IMHO, with Spock a close second (hell, tied for first!).
3. The ship battles were cool, especially when the E-E rammed the Scimitar (56 photon torpedo tubes and 26 phaser banks ... talk about freaking firepower!). Heh. I found it fascinating how quickly the E-E was carved up (even w/the assistance of two Romulan warbirds on her side) by the Scimitar — it took only one blow by the Scimitar to knock the shielded E-E's warp drive offline. Those helpful warbirds got socked pretty bad, too, and at least one was blown apart.
That said, I was hoping for more fleet action, so to speak. But the movie was logical in why there wasn't fleet action (a perfect cloak, it seems). Plus it seems that Shinzon made an alliance with rebellious Romulan military leaders, and once this alliance broke down (hence the two helpful warbirds for the E-E), Shinzon could no longer command the Romulan Star Empire's fleets as praetor.
4. I thought the story was rushed at the end. Too little time was spent on Data's death, and the subsequent rise of B-4 as a potential replacement. We never did get to see Riker's new command, the USS Titan (I hope it's at least a Galaxy-class ship, and maybe even another Sovereign-class ship). The spacedock shots of the E-E being repaired in Earth orbit (above Italy and Sicily, specifically) were neat.
5. I thought the story was a bit rushed at the beginning. Some in-movie dialogue is all we get to explain Shinzon's rise to power among the Romulan-enslaved Remans. We never fully learn just how the enslaved sister planet to Romulus managed to rise to such prominence so quickly (to be fair, it sounded like the Remans made for excellent shock troops [cannon fodder] during the war against the Dominion, and that Shinzon himself was a very good warbird captain, having won a dozen battles against Dominion forces).
6. Great to see the cameo of Guinan at the wedding of Troi and Riker. I didn't see Wesley, though.
7. It appears that Riker is now Mr. Troi. Apparently the female surname is used after marriage on Betazed ... least that was the impression I got from a bit of movie dialogue between Picard and Riker.
That's about all I can think of for now — oh, wait: The movie theater I watched "Nemesis" in was having occasional audio difficulties during parts of the film (and before). You'd go from having booming surround sound (DTS) to having only the front speakers working to having no sound (thankfully, that happened only during one of the previews). I much preferred DTS, thank you, and it stayed there for the most part. But, boy, you could tell when it wasn't in DTS ...
Gatekeeper
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Comrade Tassadar
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quote:
Originally posted by Gatekeeper
Everyone:
OK, I watched the movie and, briefly, here's what I thought:
S
P
O
I
L
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R
S
Whatever he said. |
So is it worth it?
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14-12-2002 01:52
but unless you're a trekky, i think you could be in for a dissapointment
What happened with The Borg? I liked a lot these cubes destroying these new-hippies spaceships.
Well the idea was that everyone was allied but at the bottom everybody conspires to each other. 
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