Star Trek: The Motion Picture Arrives (1 Viewer)

[TheLongshot]

Star Trek gets altered and nobody cares.

Oh, I care. I care that it needed it badly. I always fell asleep in the middle of it. I'm glad Wise has reedited the film. There were moments of greatness in there and I'd like to see it all brought out.
Jason
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My DVD Collection

 

[Jeff Kleist]

E.T. gets altered and everyone's all over it.
Star Trek gets altered and nobody cares

ET was CENSORED
Star Trek was COMPLETED
That's the difference. Speilburg FINISHED ET, Wise had the movie released before he was done.
I'm reserving judgement on the final quality of the film till tomorrow. I'm really hoping Wise fixed it.
Couldn't they have had Shatner ADR the line?

 

[Mike_G]

After reading posts on this newsgroup and avl and avd for 10 years, I find that the hatred people have to altering a film is directly proportional to the popularity of the film, regardless of whether or not the film was completed with 100% of the filmmaker's vision. I'll leave it at that.
Mike

 

[Jeff]

The DVD's cover says Directors Cut on the front.
'Nuff said!

 

[Dharmesh C]

Didn't Wise disown the film for 21 years?
I have no problems with WISE going back to produce the director's cut using *original* storyboards and notes.

 

[Kevin M]

quote: By the way, I am struck by how huge the mat lines around the Klingon ships (and some other objects) are. Gives new meaning to the term edge enhancement. I am also surprised at how blury the cloud is. I thought it would look sharper on DVD, as compared to the horrific cropped TV versions.[/quote]
Boy, I can't agree with you on that point because I have the old LD to compare the new "cleaned up" FX to and they really did clean them up as far as I can see, in the opening Klingon sequence there used to be bleeding (in the form of blue "orbs" & streaks) in the frame due to the rush to get the FX out on time and the matting and or optical printing let some of the (I assume) blue screen elements from the model work bleed through the starfield, this is no longer in the shot and personally I don't see any matte lines around the ships in this new version.
Another spot they cleaned up was the Enterprise leaving the space/dry dock. In the old shot you could see, at the lower left hand corner, the mounting rig that they used to hold the model up slowly making the dry dock disappear as it was also blue in order to make it photographically invisible in the FX compositing phase, but it unfortunately crossed over the model of the space dock during the shoot thus making the stars visible behind the model as the dock magically disappeared, this has been digitally filled in / painted.
Anyway I thought they did a great job on the newly added FX and old FX clean up. But perhaps my TV isn't large enough to see these matte lines, mine is a 45 inch monitor using component connects.
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-Kevin M.
I can brave the nastiest weather, even when it's eighty below.
My Pa was an Elephant, but that's irrelevant,
My Ma was an Eskimo." - Cannibal the Musical.
[Edited last by Kevin M on November 06, 2001 at 06:49 AM]

 

[John P Grosskopf]

I guess what I'm hearing from this crowd is that the new version for many may be "not-yo-cheese." STMP has always been a cheese fest, and if Wise didn't know it then, he surely knows it now.
The theatrical version of movie was never as he intended due to time constraints. When going to DVD, Paramount realized that it was going to need work to bring it up to current audio/video standards. Hell, that was the excuse for delivering only the theatrical cut on laserdisc years back.
STMP has always been a film that got no respect from the studio and public (with the exception of Trekkers like myself who are mostly immune to boredom due to our heathy diet of quadrotriticali and Sarian brandy).
Fans were overjoyed Wise got to go back to revisit it. Now some of those same people lament that it didn't fit their idea of how it should have been changed. We can't have it both ways.
The only reservations I have about director's revisiting their works is the passage of time. Wise is not who he was 22 years ago, so the new version will never actually be what he intended at the time. It is nothing more than an approximation. But since he was the dude behind the camera directing the show, he has dibs on how it turned out on the new DVD.
BTW, I read somewhere that Rodenberry himself was never happy with the "Oh my god." line being that he was essentially an atheist. Either Shatner or wise wanted that line in the film. So removing it might have been in deference to the Great Bird of the Galaxy himself.
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"If you can't hunt with the big dogs, stay on the porch with the puppies."
[Edited last by John P Grosskopf on November 06, 2001 at 09:23 AM]

 

[Britton]

Is it me, or is there a very high pitches "ringing" sound during some of the bridge scenes? It happens during the first scene on the brige, right before they all flock to Kirk in the turbolift, and I heard it during the first bridge scene in Chapter 12, when they are getting ready for departure. Is this just a new bridge sound effect? I'm asking since I can also hear it during the commentary when they aren't talking in these scenes
[Edited last by Britton on November 06, 2001 at 01:12 PM]

 

[Ken_McAlinden]

quote: ...the way ET was altered (removing guns for no reason)... [/quote]This is unfair. The reason the guns were removed has been stated by Spielberg and/or Kathleen Kennedy on more than one occasion. I would even go so far as to say that the "reasons" for the edits are the basis for why many give Wise a pass on Star Trek TMP and are upset with Spielberg on E.T.. Having a reason with which one disagrees is not the same as having "no reason".
Regards,
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Ken McAlinden
Livonia, MI USA
[Edited last by Ken_McAlinden on November 06, 2001 at 01:45 PM]

 

[Brad Cook]

Jeff Kleist wrote:
"ET was CENSORED
Star Trek was COMPLETED"
Censored? Who censored ET? Spielberg changed it, sure, but censored it? That implies some other entity came in and made changes to the film against Spielberg's wishes.
And considering that both versions will be available on DVD, there really isn't an issue of censorship. The original version will still be available for everyone to see, if they choose to.
Which is fine with me. Lucas and Spielberg (and whoever else) can change their films all they want. I just think it would be nice if they kept the originals intact and available for all to see as historical records. I hope that, in the case of E.T., both versions of the film come on the same release.
- Brad

 

[John Deurbrouck]

I understand the concept of authors' rights, but aren't there any rights for the audience?
When a work is published, people make it part of their lives. Surely some consideration should be had for those who love a work as it was created?
Why do you think DIVX failed? It wasn't just the business model -- DIVX Gold was very like open DVD. I think what really made consumers (particularly collectors) uneasy was the knowledge that they no longer owned the movie, and that the ability to watch it could some day be revoked.
An audience is part of what makes art, and a part of what makes art possible. I would always think an author or director has the right to produce revised versions of a work, but I also think there should be at least some weight given to the feelings of those who have an attachment to a version that was once offered for their enjoyment, however flawed that version might be thought to have been.
In this particular situation, I sure wish the unaltered version was somehow available. I always chuckle at the "Oh my God!" line, but that is a part of my peculiar attraction to this movie. I'll miss it, bad as it is. I'll welcome the new version, but I'd have gladly paid a few bucks to get the original too. Paramount and the inestimable Mr. Wise would do well to remember that only part of the audience for the Star Trek franchise is there for the pure cinematic excellence -- some of us are there more for nostalgia.
--- John

 

[Michael Reuben]

I understand the concept of authors' rights, but aren't there any rights for the audience?

Of course the audience has rights: the right not to patronize a work if they disapprove of its alteration. Beyond that, the audience doesn't have any rights, and they shouldn't.
M.

 

[RickardL]

I would have liked to have both the theatrical version
and the director's edition with seamless branching.
The new version looks and sounds ok but that is not
what I saw in theatres 22 years ago and what I have
been watching ever since!
It is like telling everybody that what you have been
watching is wrong, bad, cheesy, corny and you should
not watch that stuff anymore...
I wish that they had followed the path of The Abyss
and T2: Ultimate Edition on this.
But, as I said, the disc looks and sounds good enough
and the commentary and supplements seems nice
and it is a fine set!

 

[GerardoHP]

Censored? Who censored ET? Spielberg changed it, sure, but censored it? That implies some other entity came in and made changes to the film against Spielberg's wishes.

Not necessarily. There is such a thing as self censorship, you know, and I think it has to do more with the change in the ideology of a piece rather than the change in the aesthetics of it, which would seem to apply to ET and STMP, respectively.
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Gerardo

 

[Eric Huffstutler]

Think of it this way...
If Wise would have had time to finish the film like he wanted to in 1979 (what you now have), you would have never known the difference as to what was missing or changed.
Like others said, it happens all the time in the editing lab. For what ends up on the cutting room floor - one person may deem as priceless material another would view it as crap. You may not agree on either the director's or editor's choice but if you never saw what was missing, you would never miss it!

 

[Britton]

Has anyone out there checked for the sound I described on their disc? I'd appreciate any word on the subject. Please cite my original post for the question.

 

[Joel Fontenot]

I would have liked to have both the theatrical version and the director's edition with seamless branching.

Seamless branching wouldn't work in this case as there is almost nothing the two versions have in common to share disc space with - between tweaked effects, new effects and a completely new soundtrack. Unlike The Abyss or even ID-4 where the player either played an added scene or it didn’t – where the added material is just tacked on to what is otherwise the same basic movie.
Paramount would have to simply provide us with another disc that included the theatrical cut. Now then, with that version they could seamless branch in the ABC "special longer version" added stuff too.
Joel

 

[Nelson Au]

Britton-
I don't have the disc yet. I hope to have it tonight!
From the way you describe the sound, it sounds like the insertion of the bridge sound effects. I have read that the sound effects are similar to the bridge sounds used on the TV series. I'll bet that's it.
I just might have to leave work early to get this disc. Finally the day is here!
Nelson

 

[Britton]

Yeah, the thought did cross my mind that it was a new sound effect for the bridge. I'm just so used to my old, crappy VHS dupe of the theatrical cut in half-screen.
[Edited last by Britton on November 06, 2001 at 06:03 PM]

 

[John_Berger]

To put my $20/1000 in, I'm incredibly pleased with the new transfer. There were some new CGI scenes that really seemed to be more appropriate with the intent and also hid some quickly-done special effect faux pas.
(If you don't want spoilers, don't read the next paragraph.)
For example, the switch from an interior screen view and the exterior view when the final V'Ger "missile" dissipated was great. It was always very evident that the original version faked the oncoming "missile" by zooming in on everything on the screen - including the background! It looked more like the Enterprise was closing in rather than the other way around. That was a definite welcome fix.
I liked the new CGI shots of V'Ger's vessel as well as the 5.1 mix. Very nicely done!
The only thing that didn't make it for me was the meeting of the Enterprise and V'Ger's core location. That just seemed to be *too* hokey.
But otherwise, I have to say this was an exceptionally well-done release.
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