Spock attempts to cure Kirk's hiccups.J.J. Abrams' Star Trek reboot is the kind of kick in the pants that the stodgy old franchise needed if the 40-year-old property was to survive another 40 years. Gene Roddenberry's creation and its spinoff series and movies had already become largely irrelevant to all but the most most ardent of fanboys, but Abrams' has delivered the kind of movie that old fans and the uninitiated can hang their hats on: a space opera for the 21st Century.
While someone else might have been content with trotting out younger versions of the USS Enterprise's crew, Abrams and Co. go the extra mile and crank up the cleverness factor to the brink that the characters themselves almost seem keenly aware that they are reinvigorating the Star Trek brand, but clever is never a bad thing in this Golden Age of cinematic retreads. The entire production is a go-for-broke, breakneck affair that takes such joy in blowing the roof of your local multiplex that you may forget to pay attention to the actual plot. For those who may have missed it, the script's time traveling premise and inherent paradoxes are embraced so wholeheartedly that any thought of questioning the story's logic flies out the cargo hatch. It helps that from the film's opening moments the action throttles forward in a way I have not seen since Raiders of the Lost Ark.
At the center of the action is relative newcomer Chris Pine. His James Tiberius Kirk is a thrill-seeking delinquent content to pick fights and generally wreak havoc on his terrestrial home before he enters Starfleet Academy and discovers that he's got the stones to captain a starship. It's a testament to Pine and the screenplay that he doesn't come off as snotty boy wonder. You see, this kid has some baggage. The same is true of Zachary Quinto's Spock. While the Enterprise's first mate had always been the spawn of a human mother and Vulcan father, Quinto's Spock is clearly a product of both childhood prejudice and adult tragedy. It will be interesting to see how Quinto's portrayal evolves over the life of this new series. For now, it is a virtual pantomime of his predecessor's, and the glimmers of Spock's idiosyncrasies are curveballs from the script rather than subtleties in Quinto's performance. The rest of the crew is filled with perfectly acceptable and oftentimes inspired casting decisions. Karl Urban's prematurely curmudgeonly Dr. McCoy and Simon Pegg's ebullient genius Scotty get relatively short shrift here, but look for them to play a larger role in the next installment as long as it doesn't take screen time from the mesmerizing Zoe Saldana, the crew's new Uhura.
Star Trek is clearly the product of our post-millennial society. Every scene is crammed with more stuff to look at than a Facebook page and moves as fast as a Bloomberg ticker. There are enough sly references to the old series for longtime fans of the franchise to feel like this Trek belongs to them as much as it belongs to the teenager with ADD sitting next to them, who wonders why it's so funny when John Cho's Sulu says he's skilled at fencing but doesn't dwell on it very long, because, you know like, things are exploding on screen. Star Trek is a rare balancing act. While some might quibble that emotional depth and weighty issues have been sacrificed for spectacle, true spectacle is a rare commodity these days. We've seen it all, but no one has seen a Trek like this before.
The film's 2:16 running time contains more lens flare lighting effects than you can shake a stick at and moves by briskly because time flies at warp speed when you're having fun.
