Right as I did a review of Star Trek II, I thought I might as well follow it up with one on Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, which saw Leonard Nimoy make his directorial debut back when it was made in 1984. So let's gie it a look. (As usual PLOT SPOILERS ARE AHEAD!!)
Right right right, I might as well start with a bit of the old plot, which begins with the USS Enterprise returning back to Earth, in the aftermath of Kirk's battle with Khan, who tried to destroy the Enterprise by detonating the Genesis torpedo, and as a result Spock sacrificed his life to save the ship. As they are about to dock, Kirk (Shatner) receives word that someone has broken into Spock's quarters, and he goes to find McCoy (DeForrest Kelly) there who is acting strangely as he tells Jim to "climb the steps to Mount Selaya" which is on Vulcan, but McCoy passes out before he can say more. Once back at Starfleet command, Admiral Morrow (Robert Hooks) tells the crew that the Enterprise is to be decomissioned and that Genesis is now a taboo subject and not to be discussed with anyone, as a result of a political fallout over the device. Kirk back home receives a visit from Spock's father, Sarek (Mark Lenard) who confronts him over his son's death. Sarek mind melds with Kirk but he finds no trace of what he had hoped was his son's "katra" or living spirit, however Kirk suggests that Spock might have joined with someone else. This is revealed to be the case when they check the engineering room video tapes and they find Spock performed a mind meld on McCoy, on which Sarek tells Kirk that he must find Spock's body and bring him and McCoy to Mount Selaya where they can restore Spock's mind.
Meanwhile Kirk's son David Marcus (Merritt Butrick again) one of the main scientists involved in the Genesis project, is now assigned to the USS Grissom, where investigates an unidentified lifeform coming from the Genesis planet. Along with Lt Saavik (Robin Curtis) David beams down to the surface of the planet and they find that Spock's coffin chamber is empty, and they soon find a Vulcan child, which as it turns out the Genesis wave has regenerated Spock back to life. However the planet itself is becoming highly unstable as David admits to Saavik that he used "protomatter" in constructing the Genesis device, which means that Spock will age rapidly and the planet will be destroyed within a matter of hours.
Elsewhere Kirk with help of Sulu (George Taeki), Scotty (James Doonan) and Chekov (Walter Koenig) manage to steal the Enterprise from space dock and fly off to find Spock. However to complicate things a Klingon crew have learned of the Genesis device, and the commander, Kruge (Christopher Lloyd) intercepts and destroys USS Grissom and he beams down to the planet, taking David, Saavik and the rapidly aging Spock hostage. As the Enterprise reaches the Genesis planet, Kruge is informed of their arrival and beams up to his Klingon bird of prety, where he does battle with the Enterprise, and knocks out the ship's engines and weapons in the process. Kruge tells Kirk that he has David and Saavik hostage below and he orders one of them to be killed, and on the surface, David prevents one of the Klingons from killing Saavik, but he is killed himself in the struggle. Kirk is devastated by news of his son's death and surrenders to Kruge, but in the meantime he activates the Enterprises's self destruct sequence, and he sets the transporter to beam down to the surface of the planet, just in time before Kruge's boarding party arrive on the ship as it self destructs. On the surface Kirk and the others soon find Saavik and the aging Spock, who by this time has fully growing into the adult Spock we know. But before they can escape, Kruge beams down and seeks revenge over the death of his crewmembers, as he confronts Kirk as the planet collapses around them...
Although it isn't quite in the same league as its predecessor, STIII: The Search for Spock has alot going for it as a film, and Leonard Nimoy makes an impressive directorial debut here taking over from Nicholas Meyer, who was set not to return. It also sees the second part in what is something of a trilogy of its own as the story arc of finding Spock is a continuation from the events of the second film, and this continues into Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home. I also quite like the concept that Spock can be brought back to life by placing his "katra" or living spirit into McCoy's mind and it also allows for McCoy behave in an amusingly strange manner, as he takes on some of Spock's personality traits, which I'll mention more about a bit later on. And the Genesis theme is again used well here, although it does seem a bit of a change-up that all of a sudden Genesis, which is supposed to have the power to create, turns out to be a scientific failure, as the Genesis planet becomes unstable and destroys itself later on. Its also refreshing to see the return of the Klingons to the franchise as well, and this time they are far better represented than they were in Star Trek The Motion Picture, where they hardly had any screen time at all.
Which brings me onto the performances in the film which are again pretty good, and the regular cast once more deliver some nice performances. William Shatner once again is great in his role as James T. Kirk, and he shows great decency, courage and loyalty in doing all he can to find Spock and bring him back. Bill also has some funny moments in the film, one of which being when he finds McCoy who has been arrested in put in a holding cell after having an argument in a bar, and Kirk does the Vulcan peace sign and says "how many fingers am I holding up??". Also later on he has an amusing moment when he takes the remaining Klingon crew hostage, and he says "help us or die" to the Klingon officer, Maltz (played by John Larroquette) who says "I do not deserve to live!" and Kirk replies "fine, I'll kill you later!", which he doesn't to which Maltz angrily says "wait, you say you would kill me!" and Kirk says "I lied.". Bill however does have a rather silly dramatic and cheesy moment where he learns that David has been killed and he collapses in his chair on the Enterprise bridge, and says "you Klingon bastard you killed my son!". Bill also has another great moment in his climactic fight scene with Kruge on the Genesis planet as it destroys itself, and he tries to save Kruge from falling over a cliff, but Kruge tries to take him with him, and Kirk says "I... have.... had....enough... of.... you!!!" as he kicks him off.
DeForrest Kelley is great again as McCoy, and this time he is given more to do as he holds the burden of carrying Spock's katra in his head, and as a result he takes on some of Spock's logical personality, which provides some amusing moments in the film. McCoy's best scene is of course where he meets with a strange looking alien with big ears, whom he tries to arrange a space flight with to go to Genesis, and he says to him angrily "I wan't to go to Genesis, how can you be deaf with ears like that??!". He also has a funny moment in the same scene where a barmaid asks McCoy what he wants to drink and he asks for something different to which the barmaid says "that isn't your usual poison" and McCoy replies in Spock fashion "you don't expect one to order poison in bars, its not logical".
And while they three of them have limited screen time, Walter Koenig, George Taeki and James Doonan also provide nice performances. And James Doonan in particular get's one of the film's best lines where he is about to sabotage the new USS Excelsior starship he has been assigned to, and the automated elevator voice asks him where he wants to go and he says "up your shaft!". George Taeki as Sulu also get's a funny moment where he teases a big security guard who stands up over Sulu and says "don't get smart. Tiny!" and later Sulu knocks the big guy out and says "don't call me tiny!". And I will quickly mention Nichelle Nichols as Uhura, who get's an amusing moment in the film where she locks an ambitious cocky wannabe starfleet officer in a closet, "the old adrenalin going?? Good now get into the closet!".
Of the new cast members, Christopher Lloyd is excellent as the Klingon commander Kruge, an meglomaniacal Klingon who is out to seek power, glory and the usual stuff renegade Klingons look for! Lloyd overall makes for quite an effective villain, and he has some good moments one of which is where he kills a crewmember who mistakenly destroys the USS Grissom when Kruge asked him to target only the ship's engine, and the victim officer says "A good shot sir!" before being vapourised! Robin Curtis who takes over the role of playing Lt Saavik also does a good job here although she is arguably not quite as good Kirstie Alley, but she does play Saavik in a more logical way, and her most notable moment is when David has been killed, she calmly tells Kirk on the radio "Admiral, David is dead". This might appear to be a badly acted moment, but considering that she is Vulcan and they are a logical race, it makes sense that she wouldn't be overcome by emotion. Merritt Buttrick again as David provides a good performance and his last scene is quite poignant as Kirk speaks to him over the radio and asks "David what went wrong???" and he replies "I went wrong!" before sacrficing himself to save Saavik and Spock. And finally Mark Lenard as Sarek does a fine job playing Spock's father, and his scene with Kirk at the start when they join minds is quite a sad moment in the film, where Sarek sadly reflects about Spock "that every he knew, everything he was is lost".
In regards to the special effects, once again they were provided mostly by Industrial Light and Magic (ILM) and this time we have four spaceships on display with the USS Enterprise, Grissom, Excelsior as well as Kruge's Klingon bird of prey. Overall once again the special effects for the ships are all very impressive and one of the new effects we see in the film is the Klingon cloaking device, which is well used. However the most notable effect in the film is of course the destruction of the Enterprise, and its one of the film's most memorable images as Kirk, McCoy, Sulu, Scotty and Chekov have safely beamed to the Genesis planet, we see the smouldering remains of the Enterprise fire down in the distance.
And regarding the film's music, we are again treated to a great score by James Horner, who follows up his terrific work from Star Trek II with another wonderful effort here, which has the perfect mix of drama, adventure and atmosphere. Horner reprises some of the themes from the second film, but he also adds in plenty of great new cues, such as the one used in the Enterprise self destruct sequence, and the scene where they attempt Spock's "refusion" on Vulcan.
So that's it for my look at Star Trek III, which to this day is still a very entertaining and worthy addition to the franchise. It might not be quite as good as Star Trek II but it still stands tall among some of the efforts to be later found in the Star Trek world.
And with that I shall leave it there. Live long and all that.
No comments:
Post a Comment