Haven't seen the new Star Trek yet? You are not alone... in the universe! Ha... is joke.
Seriously, this might end up being the first film in ages to actually draw in significant repeat business-- Trekkies are over the moon, film buffs are racing at warp speed to get home and blog, and we've run out of bad puns already. In other words, don't be left out this weekend...
10. This could be the Star Trek film that breaks the Oscar curse. The series is 0 for 10, mainly in sound and effects categories, and has never been nominated in a category bigger than cinematography. But we would not be surprised, given the quality of movies released this year, that Star Trek pics up nods in screenplay, effects, and even acting categories. You heard it here first.
9. Leonard Nimoy's cameo gives the movie great dramatic weight-- unlike 99.9% of all prequel cameos. Most of the time, when you bring back the star of a film's previous series, it results in mockery and cinematic travesty. For example, Sean Connery's return as James Bond nearly ruined the series, even more so than the casting of Timothy Dalton. Thankfully, this Star Trek is more, say, Diamonds Are Forever than Never Say Never Again.
8. It finally launched little known film director J.J. Abrams's career. Abrams, you probably didn't know, has spent years slumming it as the #1 producer of network television.
7. If this guy hates it, it must be good. The self-described Trekkie fails to see what's great about the movie-- it's Star Trek without all the hokey sci-fi goofing around that turned off so many casual viewers.
6. It makes us want to go watch the first four movies again. (Although, of course, nothing can make us want to watch any of the others.) That's the big difference with this and the Star Wars prequels-- it actually belongs in the series canon.
5. Because J.J. chose quality over a gimmick. Bill Shatner has made no bones (no pun intended) about his disdain for the filmmakers. We see his point-- Nimoy gets a huge supporting role, while Shatner doesn't even merit a walk-on. But Abrams & co. were right to leave that rumored cameo unfilmed-- the scene that would kind-of work, initially slated to follow the climax, could easily have stalled the movie's dramatic momentum and might have sent people out of the theater shaking their heads at the inappropriate side-tracking. Abrams made the very wise decision to not risk the movie's tension-- and it was clearly the right decision.
4. Because it will launch the career of a great young actor, Chris Pine. When we first saw trailers for the film, we kept saying, "Man, the new Kirk looks like a poor man's Ryan Reynolds." And saying someone is anything like Ryan Reynolds is a huge insult where we come from. That "annoying-looking pretty boy model," Chris Pine, turns in he year's best breakthrough performance-- are you listening, MTV?
3. All the ladies agree: Zachary Quinto is the thinking woman's sex symbol for the 21st Century. Spock, as Quinto plays him, is transformed into a studly romantic brainiac badass. Who could've predicted that?
2. This weekend, it will likely become the highest-grossing Tyler Perry movie of all time. Yes-- he's in two scenes and since no one knew he was in the film when it first opened, there were whispers all around: "Hot damn-- is that Madea?"
1. It's just that damn entertaining. We watched the film with a mild fan and two people who had very little interest in the movie-- and all enjoyed it tremendously. They agreed with this reviewer that Star Trek jump-starts a series that had been "mined to exhaustion." Best of all, this weekend, it goes up against Angels and Demons, the sequel to The Da Vinci Code, giving you yet another reason to help keep this atop the box office...
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