Reboots often do not work simply because no level of respect or homage is shown to some of the previous installments, but JJ Abrams made Star Trek in a way that every film with the original cast of the 80s and 90s were relevant and simply occured during that time. Now, that is purely brilliant!By now, I've come to strongly dislike The New Generations films and have strongly disliked 2 of the old crew films. Star Trek is one that, not only do I enjoy, but I just love it so much. Currently, I am making a top 25 favorite films list and had I not being half done, Star Trek would make a place in my top 25!
Spoilers throughout: Star Trek begins with a sequence regarding James T. Kirk's parents, who are aboard a spaceship called the Kelvin, which is suddenly under attack by Romulans following a lightning strike in space. George Kirk, father of James, is put as captain of the Kelvin and within the 12 minutes of captain, he saved the lives of 800 people by allowing them to escape whilst taking his life to defend them. In this ensuing chaos, James T. Kirk is born and his mother is able to escape. This was "the" perfect start to a Star Trek film, carefully and brilliantly telling us a little about how Kirk was born and what his father was like. This makes all the more sense and all the maturity into previous installments when we realize that Kirk is actually attempting to live up to his father's heroics. This sequence was the perfect way for JJ Abrams to have his audience completely engaged in the story by providing amazing visuals and action scenes and extremely well done storytelling.
'Star Trek' then tells the story about James T. Kirk who tries to live up to his father's legacies and become who his father would've wanted him to be whilst Vulcan Spock decides to not attend the Vulcan Science Academy, regardless of his extreme wisdom, but instead attend Starfleet as an officer. This was fantastic! The scenes with Vulcan early on were absolutely necessary and brilliantly done, paying complete respect to Spock from the earlier films and TV shows.
If this film has any issue for me, it is actually the villain who is definitely a tad weak and not extremely threatening. Thankfully, this is made up by fantastic writing and direction, mindblowing visual effects and action sequences and an extremely emotional storyline that dwells deep into the characters of Kirk and Spock. Whilst everyone liked Spock and Kirk from the old films, never was there any depth to the characters to this extent and so, when JJ Abrams decides to add extreme depth to his characters, it could either work or not. In this case, it worked and worked brilliantly.
Though for most of the time, I regretted watching every previous Star Trek film, by now I am completely pleased by this. Not only does it flesh out the characters more but it makes for a more mindblowing and entertaining experience. None of the other Star Trek films were this fast, this action packed or this mindblowing for its time period. However, the best thing about the film is the relationship between Spock and Kirk, who are portrayed absolutely brilliantly by much younger and much more active actors, Zachary Quint and Chris Pine. The way they become friends throughout the course of the film is done extremely well and in a realistic manner as is the rest of this film. More specifically, one of the best aspects of the film is how JJ Abrams had a character called 'Spock Prime' who is portrayed by Leonard Nimoy from the old Star Trek films. This character was extremely interesting and the way they incorporated him as a man from the future, which clearly tells us that the events in 'Wrath of Khan' take place due to the fact that Spock Prime recites the lines "I have and shall always be, your friend!" Lines that are direct references to Wrath of Khan, my second favorite Trek film, were a delight to be heard in this film!
If any director needs to learn how to reboot a film, it is most definitely essential to get a tutoring class by JJ Abrams, who has successfully turned a slow and vastly inconsistent film franchise into an epic reboot that is much more lively, visually stunning and action packed. Every actor does play their part really well, even those such as Simon Pegg and Zoe Saldana. Star Trek is most definitely my favorite movie of the year and one of my top 5 favorite films of that decade.
Grade- 10/10
Mindblowing in every aspect. Quite possibly, the greatest reboot of all time.
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