This morning I learned that it was forty-six years ago today that the first Star Trek movie was released. In March of 1978 I was listening to Toronto radio station CKFM when a news bit announced: "Paramount Pictures will spend fifteen million dollars on a Star Trek movie . . . It will be released in December of next year."
On Friday, December 7, 1979, Star Trek: The Motion Picture finally hit movie theatres after much anticipation and fanfare, and on that very day I stood in line with friends for some movie that ended up disappointing many people ― even though it went on to make a lot of money ― but became the favourite film 'in the series' for some.
Picture a dozen teenagers meeting at the big picture house to see one of the most anticipated pictures ever. Try and imagine our disappointment when the end credits rolled: not that we wanted the show to go on, but more a case of "that was it?"; or as friend Mike said after he turned to me from the seat to my left: "I thought it would be better than that."(The next morning I shuffled to the living room, where siblings were watching the Star Trek episode "Wink of an Eye". Is this some sort of joke? An editorial on what I saw last night? You thought this episode was bad? Last night's event flick made "Wink of an Eye" look like a masterpiece?)
Star Trek: The Motion Picture was, and still is, a polarizing strip of celluloid. "We get it, you hate this movie." (The dirty little secret is a lot of Trekkies do not like ST: TMP for the simple reason that there are virtually no "starship battles". Boo. Hoo. Trekkies!)
One thing's for sure, it is still the biggest budget Trek of the bunch, the only one given "A-picture" status by Paramount Pictures ― not that it means anything outside of trivia circles. However, the studio was not entirely happy with the box office results; even though the film brought in the bucks it was not highly "profitable", which is proportion of money made compared to money put in. While touted as soaking up 42 million production dollars, its real cost was about 28 million. (In its zeal to promote TMP as being epic in cash outlays, Paramount included the costs of the aborted Treks: the motion picture of a planned 1976 release, and a return to television scheduled for 1977.)
More importantly, that great cast was back, even if their magical chemistry was seemingly put on hold for 132 minutes. One hundred and thirty-two minutes.
What do I think of the picture now? Well, I watched it over the Christmas holidays last year, as it had been many years since I last saw its pictorial shimmerings... if somewhat static standings. My brother mentioned to me a couple of years ago that he had recently watched it: "It actually has some pretty solid science fiction concepts."
After my rewatch: "I agree! It's a better movie than what our own reviews indicated in nineteen seventy-nine." And that score! That element has always been great: one of cinema's greatest.
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On December 7th of last year, I took a look-back at Star Trek: The Motion Picture. If you, dear reader, have been mercifully spared the Blushings of Geekdom, you might not want to bother.
The fun started here: Star Trek Motion Picture Day: AMT Klingon Cruiser
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