Paramount+ Theatrical Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979) (1 Viewer)

[ScottRE]

I've seen a lot of discussion of this film in this forum and others, and there are actually people complaining about spoilers! The base film here is 42 years old! And this cut (minus the 4k) is 21! The statute of limitations for spoilers has expired.

I ran into this on Facebook, I had to laugh. There are literally zero changes to the plot and the outcome. The effects and pacing may have changed in parts, but it's still the same film.

Honestly, the only spoiler is in how underwhelming some of the new effects are.

 

[ScottRE]

The TOS shuttle lifting off at Starfleet HQ looks terrible. It’s an obvious video effect. Also, this is something that’s bugged me for some time. There were no subtitles in the film other than in the alien language scenes. When we saw the cloud and the Klingons, the audience was trusted to know what they were. When we first saw Vulcan, we were trusted to piece it together. When Epsilon 9 was revealed, we were asked to put it together. And in the theatrical version, when we saw San Francisco, the Golden Gate Bridge told us where we were and the logo on the floor told us the rest. Yet, for some reason, the DE guys needed to put a subtitle on the screen to tell us where we were and the stardate. This is the only time a subtitle is used in any version of the film. Why is this necessary? Kirk tells us the stardate later on. Everything we need to know about dates and locations is on screen or in dialog.

I haven’t finished the film yet, I switched it off after the wormhole sequence because, honestly, I’m not wowed. Other than the 4K transfer (which we had for months now), nothing is any better than before. Even the asteroid explosion seems wonky the way the velocity seems to come to a jerky halt. They still have the same edits that bugged me before: Kirk looks like he’s floating off the transporter pad because they didn’t kike his chest jerk (it’s an acting technique – it’s Shatner – jeez). They kept the “swish” they added in 2001 after the transporter accident, which dulled the shock for me. Removing the second “viewer off” lessens the impact the destruction of Epsilon 9 had on the crew. They could have dropped both commands and it would have been fine. Now saying “viewer off” one time feels weird.

I dunno. I am fine with fixing some effects that fell short in 1979 and adding the character bits in, but I am now hesitant to see this on the big screen when Fathom releases it. It doesn’t look convincing on my 75 inch TV, how will it hold up on a large screen? I’m glad this exists, but my go to will always be the theatrical.

 

[Nelson Au]

What happened to Ron’s Star Trek The Motion Picture Directors Edition Paramount+ discussion thread, did it get combined with this thread? I was about to post and it vanished.

 

[Nelson Au]

I honestly wanted to see the Directors Edition without knowing too much about the changes and upgrades made to the 2001 remaster. I made notes last night of all the changes and upgrades and when I have a free minute later today, I’ll post about them.

 

[JamesSmith]

Love that trailer with Orson Welles narration.
--jthree

 

[Josh Steinberg]

Having finished watching the new version, my feelings on it are basically unchanged from the edition that came out on DVD years ago. There are things I like, things I don’t like, and things I’m indifferent to.

The new sound design seems less aggressively different than the DVD mix did. I understand why they removed the computer voices throughout the film but I think in doing so, they didn’t take into account the effect them being there had on the film. The point is that Kirk is returning to a wholly unfamiliar, unwelcoming Enterprise, and those voices are part of a design that helps emphasize the foreignness of the ship.

Actually, little trims here and there do seem to add up to taking away a bit of Kirk’s being out of step with the ship and himself as a captain. And that’s actually his character arc for the film, to start in with good intentions but finding himself in over his head, and then finding his way back to himself. The subtraction of those moments makes Kirk seem more assured throughout and may be what people wanted to see, but it’s not the story the filmmakers intended to tell in 1979.

I still really dislike the new V’Ger exteriors. They’re better rendered now than then, but conceptually they feel wrong on two counts. The first is that the thing is supposed to be so terrifying, so massive, that there isn’t even a way to show it on camera - it should be bigger than my imagination. The second is, ok, if the decision is made to show it - let’s get the scale right. In the shots we see it approaching and orbiting Earth, it seems no different in relative size than the Enterprise does, which is simply wrong given how small we see Enterprise is inside it. At its last appearance, when V’Ger disappears and Enterprise is all that remains, Enterprise is actually shown as being much larger than V’Ger.

The relative scale also seems off in the newly reanimated sequences where the crew leaves the ship and the walkway forms. The proportions of the different elements (the ship, the crew, the floating walkway, the practical set adjoining it) don’t seem right.

In general, the CGI still doesn’t seem to be at the photorealistic level it needs to be. Remastering the actual 65mm special effects elements in pristine digital quality raises the bar much higher because the digital effects have to match at a much higher standard to be seamless, and they don’t, so they’re not.

Nitpicky? Totally.

On the positive, the shots that were recomposited from Trumbull’s 65mm elements are breathtaking in their detail and scope.

There also appears to have been an additional layer of cleanup and digital removal of dirt and imperfections in VFX shots that didn’t have original elements available, compared to the 4K release of the theatrical version. This is certainly a cleaner presentation.

I was watching in HD as my projector is 1080p. The HD streaming master appeared to have some DNR/grain management applied to make for more even compression. At least, I hope that’s what it was, and that the eventual disc will have more detail. I hope it wasn’t a creative decision by the remastering team to obliterate fine detail and film grain. There was one shot when Kirk, Spock and McCoy are chatting in the lounge about Spock’s return to Enterprise and when they get up to leave, McCoy’s face was a digital blob. It’s like the digital cleanup algorithm was so aggressively treating the matte lines for the window behind them that McCoy got overly smoothed out in the process.

The thing is, warts and all, I still very much enjoyed this new version. I’d just say, if I was putting on my critic’s hat rather than my fan one, that the original practical effects are at such a high level, with so much more richness and detail than ever before thanks to being recomposited from 65mm, that the new effects don’t come anywhere close to that same standard and therefore stand out more than they should. I understand they had a limited budget, limited time, and I’m sure the pandemic didn’t make it any easier. Nonetheless, I wish the threshold for doing new effects was that they’d only be used if they could seamlessly match the 1979 work. I wish they would have looked at their potential new shot designs and been more honest about “we don’t have the resources to match this perfectly, and anything that doesn’t clear that threshold we’re not gonna do.”

But that’s me being critical about stuff that 99.9% of people won’t notice or care about. This is still a triumph.

And I still like the Special Longer Version better

 

[Sam Favate]

The first is that the thing is supposed to be so terrifying, so massive, that there isn’t even a way to show it on camera - it should be bigger than my imagination.

That's actually one thing I never felt comfortable with. Just like with Discovery's latest season, objects that span light years are impossible to visualize at all. Such an object would be a region of space, albeit a movable one. I think you lose the audience when you're talking about that kind of scale.

 

[ScottRE]

It just strikes me as odd that they never cut any of the Epsilon 9 establishing shots. They go on forever and that guy in the spacesuit doesn't amount to anything other than being a special effect to show off the scale. Today, that guy would be a character. I mean, if you're gonna keep in the entire trip to and around the Enterprise (and so you should) then slice this down to the bare essentials and put up one of those subtitles I complained about. It's just a communications station. Not even Regula 1 got that much attention.

 

[Nelson Au]

My impressions of the new 2022 Star Trek The Motion Picture DE are below. And spoilers below!

I viewed this on a new Sony OLED and Paramount+ was streamed to an AppleTV 4K. I do not have Atmos and have a 5.1 system. Here are my notes of what I noticed. And just for reference, I’ve not seen the Directors Edition for a few years in anticipation of this day. Plus the 2009 blu ray of the theatrical cut just looks better:

1. Klingon attack on the cloud seemed faster. Perhaps it was due to the added new sound effects of what is shown on the Klingon tactical screen image.

2. Thunder sounds within the V’Ger cloud seemed loud.

3. On Epsilon, when a commander Branch and the woman are looking at the transmission from the Klingon Battlecruiser Amar, the image of Captain Barak played by Mark Lenard was altered with pixelation, not sure that was necessary. I think it was done to show how dangerous the situation was.

4. Sequence on Vulcan, not much to say about the new CGi Vulcan of the landscape and giant statures, those looked great. But the subtitles used for the Kolinar Masters seemed different. I don’t know the subtitles by heart, I just know what the Kolinar Masters say to Spock. So the subtitles seemed to have changed, I’ll need to check that.

5. San Francisco and GG Bridge looked great!

6. Nice to see the tram station toned down. Without all the extra shuttles on the right area. I always felt Daren got carried away there in 2001. (The behind the scenes guy in the silver jacket is still on the left edge of the screen)

7. The Worker Bee Cargo tug moving in front of orbital station had some matting issues as it passes in front of the station. Surprised that got through.

8. Shuttle pod model shots looks sharper! As it passes the Enterprise in space dock and reaches the last vertical structure of the space dock, the clouds on earth do not pass in front of the structure! On the original theatrical version, I always noticed that element was a goof.

9. I expected or hoped that the reflection of the Enterprise on the shuttlepod windshield would be toned down On that close-up of Shatner’s face and his sort of goofy look. But it’s the same.

10. The Enterprise fly over does look sharper! It was looking at the model in person! Though the one shot from behind Kirk and Scotty looking out the screen, the images of the Enterpruse were incredibly soft. They must not have had those elements.

11. Once on board the Enterprise, as Kirk is heading into engineering, they added Chekov’ s voice on the intercom speaking technobabble. That must have been one of the tapes they found of audio not used.

12. When the transmission from Epsilon was playing on the viewer and it ends, I noticed they added a graphic on screen that said: End transmission……. That was a cool little extra. By the way, for some reason, this time around looking at all the extras on the red deck as Kirk addresses them, it looked so clear and almost seemed like a different set of shots.

13. Yes, Enterprise leaving space dock is sharp and the new image shows off the pearlescent hull plating paint job so clearly now! I’m super happy about this shot! Paul Olsen, the man who spent months airbrush painting the red, gold, blue and green pearlescent hull plating should be happy to see this. His work is much more visible here. Look him up if you are curious.

14. The Captain’s log sequence after the Enterprise passes Jupiter sounds like a different take? His inflections sound like a different reading.

15. In the Officers lounge sequence with Kirk, Spock and McCoy, I was super surprised they altered the windows. The view of the engines is probably a more accurate view and perspective angle. In some parts, the rotoscoping to remove the background behind Shatner and Nimoy does show a little. But overall, a nice job.

16. I didn’t notice the digital scrubbing Josh mentions on De Kelley’s face.

17. Later in the film, when V’Ger begins to send a signal, we hear off screen Kirk say, “Who the hell is it sending a signal to?” That is a neat new little bit of dialogue.

18. The new effects of the bridge that forms off the saucer section to V’Ger looks a lot better rendered this time. There’s one angle we see Kirk, Spock, Decker and Ilia walking that looks CGi. And it appears they might have used unused footage of cast walking on those polygonal steps.

19. The sequence as Decker realizes he wants to join with V’Ger really sent chills down my back when I watched the film a few years ago. This is when he’s looking at Ilia and she’s looking at him, they are non verbally in communion and she knows it. I never realized that before and in this new version, I was watching for that and it’s still well telegraphed by the shots.

20. The deep reds in the V’Ger room seemed way darker then the theatrical cut.

21. After Decker and Ilia are melded and the V’Ger ship is transforming, the exterior shot of V’Ger transforming was kind of odd. That’s new as it dissolves and we see the Enterprise cruising towards the camera. I didn’t feel it was out of scale, it was just very far away and the Enterprise heads to the camera fast to enlarge as it approaches the camera.

Over all impressions, the music was sometimes drowned out by the new sound effects. I get it that the new bridge sound effects are jarring as we are not used to it when it was first done on the 2001 cut. On this viewing, I noticed the new sounds on the bridge more. But it didn’t seem too jarring, it was definitely noticed.

Story-wise, I felt it was tighter and felt like it moved along faster then the theatrical cut. Of course this cut is exactly the same as the 2001 cut, except for the little added bits of dialogue. I think after reading Mr. Fein‘s interview that his focus was to follow Mr. Wise‘s direction which was story first, that the added effects didn’t detract or overshadow, they were there to help tell the story. So the added sounds and images in some cases does ramp up the sense of urgency or danger.

I only watched it once so far. There was so much to see that it demands more viewings I think. There is a lot of thinks I probably missed.

Overall, after all the years of wishing and posting here and elsewhere for this to happen, it’s is so wonderful we have this now! Is it perfect? No. Is it better then before? Yes. I think this version is finally the definitive one to watch. Though it’s also great we have the theatrical cut to see too. I’m not sure if Kirk’s arc is diluted as Josh mentioned. Another viewing is needed I think.

Thanks to Paramount+ and Mssrs Fein, Matessino, Dochterman and their team!

 

[Neil S. Bulk]

I've seen a lot of discussion of this film in this forum and others, and there are actually people complaining about spoilers! The base film here is 42 years old! And this cut (minus the 4k) is 21! The statute of limitations for spoilers has expired.

That was me making a joke. I even used the "" emoticon and several people clicked on "Haha." But Ron accidentally deleted most of that thread, so the joke is gone forever.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

But the subtitles used for the Kolinar Masters seemed different.

Yeah, they changed the text back in 2001. Originally the scene was shot with the actors speaking in English, and then after the fact they decided to switch it to alien language to make it seem more exotic. James Doohan was tasked with coming up with sounds that fit the lip movements. If you watch the theatrical cut, you’ll see the subtitles there match the English words they were saying on set exactly, which has the effect of making it easy to tell that it’s English sounds being mangled. (“Logic” becomes “ogic-ah” for instance.) The director’s edition changes the translation slightly so that it’s not the exact same English words that came out of the actors’ mouth, making it slightly less obvious.

 

[Nelson Au]

Thanks Josh, it’s been a long time since I last watched the Directors Edition on the 2001 DVD. I think before that, the translation was always in my head as the theatrical version since I‘d seen it so many times. Just goes to show, I never read the subtitles on the original DE. Yes, I’m familiar with Doohan’s work. It’s great he got that extra work. Led the way for Marc Okrand later to do Klingon.

 

[Nelson Au]

But Ron accidentally deleted most of that thread, so the joke is gone forever.

Hey Neil, is that what happened to the Paramount+ Star Trek The Motion Picture announcement thread? I was trying to post there this morning and I got an error message. Then I could not see the thread anymore! I thought he might have merged it with this thread.

 

[Neil S. Bulk]

how will it hold up on a large screen?

We all thought it looked and sounded spectacular at Paramount the other night, so I'd say it holds up well.

 

[Neil Middlemiss]

That was me making a joke. I even used the "" emoticon and several people clicked on "Haha." But Ron accidentally deleted most of that thread, so the joke is gone forever.

"It's not gone, so long as we remember it..."

 

[ScottRE]

I watched the rest of it and there are a lot of great things (lemme focus on the positive). I haven't watched the DE in years, so I'm used to the theatrical pacing, This version does move more quickly while not being anything close to an action film. The trims during the cloud entry and trip over V'Ger work like gangbusters and the film doesn't flag in the center anymore.

The sound mix is incredible. Dialog is crisp and really very pleasing. The music/dialog mix is well balanced and is very natural. Some of the new sound effects really work very well and open up the soundstage. I don't miss the computer's instructions during the thruster pack scene at all.

The assembly of the walkway works so incredibly well with the score. There is more emotional resonance in the film and I was actually more involved with the back half than I used to be. I think that actually becoming my favorite part of the film now.

I'll give this a look in the theater, mostly because I think this deserves to be seen where it was made for. I also don't want to judge the effects I was hard on based on my TV settings.

I must have seen TMP dozens of times and it feels like a much more solid experience with the trims.

OH! And I totally appreciate putting the theatrical version of the opening theme back. The original DE had the album cut which, I understand, was Jerry Goldsmith's preferred version. But, you know, I love ya Jer, but this is the Director's Edition, not the composer's edition.

 

[Nelson Au]

Scott,

 

[Osato]

Wow!

 

[Osato]

Tickets ordered for the directors cut screening!

Star Trek: The Motion Picture—The Director’s Edition - Fathom Events

www.fathomevents.com

 

[Nelson Au]

Wow, Tim, I’ve never seen that footage before of the premiere in Washington DC. I knew it happened and read about it. Thanks for finding that and sharing.

The comments from the cast are interesting in retrospect as they all are there to enjoy the evening and promote the film. Looks like they were at the Smithsonian afterwards.