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A few words about...™Star Trek (2009) -- in Blu-ray

post #1 of 10
11/18/09 at 6:37pm
Thread Starter 
Someone needed a good portion of plain old-fashioned chutzpah to take the Star Trek legend and do a "Batman Begins" with it.

But J.J. Abrams' film not only survives the exercise, but positions itself for a sequel.  While never a huge fan of either the original series or of the thirty or so features that seem to have followed in the wake, I can appreciate the new film.  I admire it for its audacity as well as for being a plain old great yarn.

Paramount's new Blu-ray, which is not a transfer, but a port of data files, shows that the studio, when given quality data that hasn't been messed with, can achieve an absolutely superb Blu-ray, that equals the best in the marketplace both from a visual perspective, as well as from the aural, via Dolby TrueHD.

Even someone who hasn't been a fan of the cult can appreciate this film.

A fun couple of hours brought to Blu-ray with perfection.

Live well and prosper!

Recommended.

RAH 
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post #2 of 10
11/18/09 at 6:48pm
 Your brief review was a great read RAH. Good to get an impression from a non-trekkie (oh my goodness did that just mean I admitted to being one?!?!).

I can't wait to open this one up and check out the apparent reference A/V transfer.

Live well...spoken like a true outsider! 

And let's hope this is indeed Abrams' "Batman Begins" because that would mean there is a "Dark Knight" coming! (which I thought to be vastly superior to the great Batman Begins)
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post #3 of 10
11/18/09 at 7:41pm
I, for one, absolutely hate the excess lens flares in this movie.  To me, they were very annoying.  It's funny how since the dawn of lenses, manufacturers have strived, with engineering and coatings, to minimize this phenomenon.  Here you have a director purposely causing them about five hundred times in the movie. 

Another thing that bugs me are the "CSI" jerky handheld shots (especially sideways movement) during close-up dialogue sequences.  Call me old school, but some aspects of modern filmmaking are hard to fathom.

The movie itself was good, but I don't know about the five star rating it has been getting from everyone. *** 1/2
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post #4 of 10
11/19/09 at 3:20am

Finally picked up my preorder from BB last night, and the wife had been anticipated it's arrival for some time now, so it jumped the queue and never made it into our pile(s) of backlogged titles.

Good flick -- just about as good as any from the ST franchise (though it's quite different in general as everyone knows by now) and a very worthy reboot(?) of sorts.  We didn't get around to catching it in the theaters even though it was one of the few movies we intended to catch this year.  I guess it lived up to expectations for us, which is a plus considering all the hype.

Although the ST franchise isn't known for being all *that* sound wrt the science and such, I found the "science"/logic used for the end of the climactic sequence to be noticeably problematic (and maybe a tad cliche now for something like that).  Maybe if that trick wasn't used so often in action flicks -- and the film didn't feel so ambitious (for ST fare) in that regard -- I might not have cared about that one flaw.  But as it was, that final sequence took me a bit out of the movie and had me mentioning to my wife that just seemed too implausible (and probably unnecessary) as soon as the end credits started rolling.

And yeah, have to agree the insane amount of lens flares got a bit annoying at times too.  I mean there does seem to be a lot of glass around the sets (much more prominently than I remember for any other ST flick/series anyway), but one would've thought Starfleet wouldn't want all that glass to yield loads of lens flares, glare, etc. that would distract/blind the ship crews, etc.   Either go w/ less glass or make them behave better in the presence of varying light sources, angles, etc.

I guess I have sorta gotten used to the jerky handheld cam approach to shooting.  It certainly didn't feel as queasy as the Bourne Trilogy for instance, but yeah, I guess more stable/steady/sure-handed shooting and composition would be appreciated in certain parts of the movie.

Can't comment much on the PQ as I just broke my glasses last week -- and hadn't gotten it fixed yet -- so it only looked modestly better than a reference quality DVD to my unaided eyes.

_Man_
 


Edited by ManW_TheUncool - 11/19/09 at 3:41am
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post #5 of 10
11/19/09 at 5:33am
Thread Starter 
The handheld look in John Adams didn't seem to fit the subject matter.  I'm not certain that I mind it quite as much here.  The purpose, I would think, well beyond the "look," is to move more quickly from shot to shot, avoiding locked down situations.

Quote:
Originally Posted by John Hermes View Post

Another thing that bugs me are the "CSI" jerky handheld shots (especially sideways movement) during close-up dialogue sequences.  Call me old school, but some aspects of modern filmmaking are hard to fathom.
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post #6 of 10
11/19/09 at 6:45am


Quote:
Originally Posted by Man-Fai Wong View Post

Can't comment much on the PQ as I just broke my glasses last week -- and hadn't gotten it fixed yet -- so it only looked modestly better than a reference quality DVD to my unaided eyes.


Duct tape
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post #7 of 10
11/19/09 at 7:39am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Man-Fai Wong View Post

I guess I have sorta gotten used to the jerky handheld cam approach to shooting.  It certainly didn't feel as queasy as the Bourne Trilogy for instance, but yeah, I guess more stable/steady/sure-handed shooting and composition would be appreciated in certain parts of the movie.


Watching it in IMAX, on a dome, laying almost on my back caused a bit of whiplash.  (Not to mention the Iowa and Vulcan labels being cut off, reading "Owa" and "Ulcan"...)

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post #8 of 10
11/19/09 at 10:10am

Quote:
Originally Posted by nolesrule View Post

Duct tape
 

Haha.  I guess that'd be functional enough for home use (even for my nearly frameless glasses) -- just won't be going out w/ that.

Maybe I just need Hermoine Granger to come to the rescue.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Jason_V View Post

Quote:


Watching it in IMAX, on a dome, laying almost on my back caused a bit of whiplash.  (Not to mention the Iowa and Vulcan labels being cut off, reading "Owa" and "Ulcan"...)

 

You know.  I felt much the same way watching The Dark Knight in a real IMAX presentation from circa 6th row in stadium seating, IIRC.  It was often so hard to follow the camera movements that I never noticed all the EE, etc. that was (supposedly) in the IMAX theatrical presentation.  Not saying the EE halos leap off my smaller (61") HT screen either, but the generally more digital (and gritty) processed look is certainly more apparent on my smaller screen since I wasn't busy trying to catch up w/ all the movement.

_Man_
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post #9 of 10
11/19/09 at 11:43am


Quote:
Originally Posted by Robert Harris View Post


Paramount's new Blu-ray, which is not a transfer, but a port of data files...

 

This was actually filmed using anamorphic lenses.  After that, it was all scanned and transferred, I'm sure, but there was some film developing going on.
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post #10 of 10
11/19/09 at 12:02pm

Quote:
Originally Posted by Joel Fontenot View Post

This was actually filmed using anamorphic lenses.  After that, it was all scanned and transferred, I'm sure, but there was some film developing going on.
 

RAH probably just meant data port from the DI master, which in practice, is all that's gonna matter for the purpose of the review.  It's not like they're gonna rescan the film neg and then redo all the digital SFX, etc. just for a BD release.  That may *never* ever happen at all (for any future releases), especially since we're talking about Paramount here.

_Man_
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