Star Trek Insurrection

When I was a kid, this movie was "The Star Trek movie with the Scary Man on the cover." This refers, of course, to the brooding alien the Enterprise is streaking toward on the case of the VHS. Yes, VHS. It was a while ago. But fundamentally, I don't hate the movie. I don't really like it, but it has a lot in common with The Search for Spock, at least as far as its ability to produce complete apathy in viewers.

It turns out that look is "apathy," not "brooding."

Insurrection is better than The Search for Spock for two very important reasons. First, the music was written by a composer who apparently doesn't watch movies before he scores them, and therefore doesn't give himself a chance to get depressed if they suck (seriously, Jerry Goldsmith rocks, all of his scores are lovingly tended works of art, and he has scored some fantastically terrible films. Look at his IMDB page sometime. It's baffling). Second, really great special effects. There's one space battle in here that ranks probably in my top ten favorite space battles of all time (which is an article that is coming soon, rest assured).

Because I know how excited you all are to read about that.

Some people have pointed out that Insurrection also has some funny bits. I then remind them that The Search for Spock also has some funny bits. I think as far as humor goes, they're pretty much on par. And as far as boring goes, and contrived plots, and general character silliness... In fact, this movie has basically all the same problems as The Search for Spock, with those two good points to push it ahead. There are a few specific problems with this production, which I shall now address.

"Definitely feeling aggressive tendencies, sir!" is certainly one of the most quotable lines from Star Trek, I'll give you that.

First, Picard. Now, Patrick Stewart was knighted for a reason. He's amazing. And Picard is one of my all time favorite sci-fi characters. He should probably be knighted as well. But in this movie, Picard is... not really Picard. Now that is not Sir Pat Stew's fault. He plays him to the best of his considerable ability, and of course the character is fine. But he doesn't act the way that, after seven years of TV and two other movies, I have come to expect. With a character that well developed and a fan base that devoted, you have to be careful with how you portray that person. Somebody behind the script was not careful, and the whole movie lost something as a result.

"No uniform, no orders" would NOT fly with this man, I don't think.

Second, the little boy. The other day I was trying to think of a young boy (think Wesley Crusher's approximate age) in sci-fi film that I didn't hate, and the only one I could come up with was Ender Wiggin. This little boy, like Anakin before him, is obnoxious, and I hate him.

Yup, innocence and "I bet I could make off with that before anyone noticed" perfectly encapsulated in this kid's every expression. But I'm sure the actual kid is a lovely person.

Third, because you were all expecting a third entry anyways, the plan. It's a sci-fi space opera. Of course there's a villain, and of course he has a plan. And his plan is to live forever, at, SPOILER ALERT, the cost of innocent people. Who turn out to be his family. Because obviously. If we compare that to other space operas, it seems pretty standard stuff. But here's my problem; the dude clearly doesn't have any qualms with killing innocent people, and he's ready to nuke the population of that planet out of existence. It's only thanks to the involvement of Starfleet that the Enterprise crew has the chance to save them. Since the Son'a already had the technology to extract the live-forevers out of the planet's rings, technology that Starfleet couldn't duplicate (and therefore had no hand in developing or implementing), why did they involve Starfleet at all? Why not just run in with their machine over the planet with no defenses, extract the life-juice, irradiate the planet, and leave? For such a bad dude, he sure seems to have his priorities mixed up. Or maybe he wasn't so bad? And maybe I was supposed to feel bad when he got blown up at the end? Cause that sure didn't seem to be how the movie wanted me to feel about him.

"Note to self: Lead with the doomsday machine next time."

All in all, the movie is weird and boring to a fault. Good music and good effects serve to make it bearable, but not infinitely re-watchable. And that is why it's so far down this list.