Star Trek (A Spoilerless Review)

Today, I did something quite unusual: I treated myself out to an early afternoon showing of “Star Trek”.

I normally never see movies when they are released. But today, on the eve of resigning my bachelorhood (Aarti and Sonia arrive on Sunday), I figured, why not do something different.

I’m familiar with Star Trek – I was a fan of Star Trek: The Next Generation. I’m only tangentially familiar with the original series (I’ve only seen one or two episodes), and even less so with Deep Space Nine, Voyager and Enterprise.

That being said, I really enjoyed the new Star Trek movie. The performances were uniformly good and the story moved along at a brisk pace. Good casting choices and character development for Kirk and Spock. Uhuru is eye-candy, for the most part, but I suppose there always has to be some type of love interest in these films to satisfy the female viewership.

The movie eschews the philosophical angle in favor of action. This is not your “typical” Star Trek movie, in that sense. The movie ran for 2 hours and six minutes. It’s fairly family friendly – just some sci-fi violence and mild sexuality.

Scotty plays up comic relief, with his scenes adding levity to an otherwise serious film. A familiar face returns and the divergence from Star Trek “cannon” is explained, so ST nerds should feel at ease.

Star Trek is a good summer flick and well worth seeing. (Aside: matinee prices are $7.50 now – which used to be the price for an evening show. No wonder we don’t go out to see movies too often.)

I give Star Trek 4 Weenies out of 5.

-Krishna

Krishna May 8, 2009 movie review, no spoilers, Star Trek