Rating of
3.5/4
Most underrated of the series.
Drive-In Massacre - wrote on 01/20/10
It's really starting to become difficult to find a lot of negatives about the better films on the list, but for one, out of all 11 movies in the series, this one feels the least like a Star Trek film to me. Maybe it's the color scheme or the writing, or the enhanced makeup and effects, but for me, it looks more like another 90's sci-fi film, and less like another Star Trek film. Other than that, this film runs low on the jokes and the jokes that are in it, are pretty forced and usually unfunny (especially a moment in which Shatner kisses an alien who eventually morphed into looking exactly like him, in which the original Kirk says "I can't believe I kissed you." and the alien responds "Must have been your lifelong ambition. "...ha?
I think of all the directors of the Star Trek series, Nicholas Meyer has become my favorite. The 2 films he directed put the Star Trek films in genres they had never been in and would never be taken in again. One of his two Star Trek films is basically a Space-Pirate movie, and the other, STVI, is a great Murder/Mystery. It's very creative, and at times brings the series in all sorts of fun places: Film-Noir, Courtroom-Drama, Fantasy, Adventure, it's all over the map. Much of the film is actually pretty dark, not something I would normally expect from the original crew movies, maybe Next Generation, but not Kirk & Spock. In fact, I would consider this the second darkest Star Trek film only behind First Contact. There is a scene in which Dr. McCoy and Cpt. Kirk are being tried by the Klingons for a murder of their crew, and the lighting in this giant arena-like courtroom is brilliant, dark, and atmospheric, a very cool tone and mood is put all over this movie. Star Trek VI is a dense, poetic, proverbial, and thougtful film, and personally, I feel that the final scene in this movie is the most inspiring moment of all the Star Trek films.
