All "beats and shouting" is how one character describes the classical twentieth century strains of The Beastie Boys, and it could just as well describe Justin "Fast & Furious" Lin's entry into the Star Trek cinematic canon, its thirteenth instalment.
Three years into their five-year mission and life aboard the Enterprise is getting pretty boring. (I know, right? Our hearts bleed for these brave handsome space explorers.) They park up at a moon-sized starbase called Yorktown, where they are visited by an alien refugee who says her people have been attacked.
The Enterprise investigates, traversing a nebula before finding a hostile swarm of ships. (Incidentally, the pacing by this point is typical of the film as a whole: insufficient build-up to an overlong action payoff.) The Enterprise is overwhelmed, and boarded by the swarm's commander, Krall (Idris Elba). Krall wants an alien artefact in Kirk's (Chris Pine) possession.
As a result of the battle the Enterprise crew crash land on a local planet. Separated, some are captured by Krall and his drones. Kirk's scattered team, with the help of clichéd huntress Jaylah (genuinely named after J-Law, and played by Sofia Boutella), must find a way to rescue their friends and escape the planet before Krall and co destroy Yorktown.
An opening gag, a comical encounter involving a bestial alien race, sets the cartoon tone for the movie. The set even resembles the Klingon courtroom from The Undiscovered Country – and it was the first of many times that I felt the series' heritage was being referenced in a faintly mocking way. When every line involving that rich pseudo-science jargon is being flipped into a joke it comes across as dumbing down to the point of contempt.
I feel this point is important enough to labour, particularly as some of the marketing has harkened back to the likes of The Motion Picture – a thoughtful work of philosophical sci-fi to which this bears no resemblance. Being stupid isn't in itself a problem, but when a film continually references its forebears, both on screen and off, one cannot but feel that history is being exploited.
When nu-Spock is coming to terms with his mortality and his fearful exclamations are laughed off by his supposed friends Bones and Kirk (who, in a diluted allusion to Wrath of Khan's birthday scene, had themselves earlier discussed mortality), you question whether these characters – the very soul of Trek – are being taken seriously.
Being co-written by Simon Pegg, it should come as no surprise that the bro-banter is in full force; and, in Beyond's defence, it sometimes works in the quieter moments. When the crew is paired off we do get some interesting matchings: Kirk and Checkov (the late Anton Yelchin); Spock (Zachary Quinto) and Bones (Karl Urban); Scotty (Pegg) and Jaylah. The strongest scenes are the simple ones where they're exploring this strange new world and mutually building their characters.
However. Maybe it's a reference to the original third film's subtitle, but poor Spock is missing for large parts; and when he is on screen his moodiness comes across less like a character's grief and more like an actor's embarrassment. You can almost see his despair at the direction the series is taking: A franchise hungrier than ever to knock the techno-babble on the head and move on to the next starship-flipping setpiece.
(Just wait until you get to the part with the musical weapon. It will determine if you're on board with this mission or it'll be your escape pod moment. I found it risible: not smart-silly, just shark-jumping.)
Another Star Trek movie, another frustrated madman having a tantrum. But unlike Nero or Kahn, Krall's motivations are vague and implausible, and Idris Elba's performance is unconvincing. It's not helped by his character's obsession with the ancient artefact he covets: a MacGuffin so mysterious that it cannot be adequately explained through exposition, and which produces a lame CG effect like something out of The Mummy.
Lin mimics JJ Abrams' kinetic style but it's all bluster and no rhythm or rhyme. His clunky direction and the chaotic editing (four editors, seemingly at odds with each other) undermine any sense of local geography or the relationship between subjects. This particularly comes to the fore in the final act, where any narrative ingenuity gives way to video game plotting (complete with tool tips and checkpoints) – a succession of confusing complications in lieu of real narrative complexity – and Lin is not up to the task of keeping us informed of the rules and the stakes.
Beyond lacks the vitality and novelty of Star Trek '09 and has none of the thrilling personal conflicts or emotional sensitivity of Into Darkness. And more than those films, which were already more flash than flesh, it lacks depth. This is the cinema of spectacle, not ideas. Once, this film series could do both. But Beyond doesn't go beyond passable. And for a crew of this calibre, that's not good enough.
Three years into their five-year mission and life aboard the Enterprise is getting pretty boring. (I know, right? Our hearts bleed for these brave handsome space explorers.) They park up at a moon-sized starbase called Yorktown, where they are visited by an alien refugee who says her people have been attacked.
The Enterprise investigates, traversing a nebula before finding a hostile swarm of ships. (Incidentally, the pacing by this point is typical of the film as a whole: insufficient build-up to an overlong action payoff.) The Enterprise is overwhelmed, and boarded by the swarm's commander, Krall (Idris Elba). Krall wants an alien artefact in Kirk's (Chris Pine) possession.
As a result of the battle the Enterprise crew crash land on a local planet. Separated, some are captured by Krall and his drones. Kirk's scattered team, with the help of clichéd huntress Jaylah (genuinely named after J-Law, and played by Sofia Boutella), must find a way to rescue their friends and escape the planet before Krall and co destroy Yorktown.
An opening gag, a comical encounter involving a bestial alien race, sets the cartoon tone for the movie. The set even resembles the Klingon courtroom from The Undiscovered Country – and it was the first of many times that I felt the series' heritage was being referenced in a faintly mocking way. When every line involving that rich pseudo-science jargon is being flipped into a joke it comes across as dumbing down to the point of contempt.
I feel this point is important enough to labour, particularly as some of the marketing has harkened back to the likes of The Motion Picture – a thoughtful work of philosophical sci-fi to which this bears no resemblance. Being stupid isn't in itself a problem, but when a film continually references its forebears, both on screen and off, one cannot but feel that history is being exploited.
When nu-Spock is coming to terms with his mortality and his fearful exclamations are laughed off by his supposed friends Bones and Kirk (who, in a diluted allusion to Wrath of Khan's birthday scene, had themselves earlier discussed mortality), you question whether these characters – the very soul of Trek – are being taken seriously.
Being co-written by Simon Pegg, it should come as no surprise that the bro-banter is in full force; and, in Beyond's defence, it sometimes works in the quieter moments. When the crew is paired off we do get some interesting matchings: Kirk and Checkov (the late Anton Yelchin); Spock (Zachary Quinto) and Bones (Karl Urban); Scotty (Pegg) and Jaylah. The strongest scenes are the simple ones where they're exploring this strange new world and mutually building their characters.
However. Maybe it's a reference to the original third film's subtitle, but poor Spock is missing for large parts; and when he is on screen his moodiness comes across less like a character's grief and more like an actor's embarrassment. You can almost see his despair at the direction the series is taking: A franchise hungrier than ever to knock the techno-babble on the head and move on to the next starship-flipping setpiece.
(Just wait until you get to the part with the musical weapon. It will determine if you're on board with this mission or it'll be your escape pod moment. I found it risible: not smart-silly, just shark-jumping.)
Another Star Trek movie, another frustrated madman having a tantrum. But unlike Nero or Kahn, Krall's motivations are vague and implausible, and Idris Elba's performance is unconvincing. It's not helped by his character's obsession with the ancient artefact he covets: a MacGuffin so mysterious that it cannot be adequately explained through exposition, and which produces a lame CG effect like something out of The Mummy.
Lin mimics JJ Abrams' kinetic style but it's all bluster and no rhythm or rhyme. His clunky direction and the chaotic editing (four editors, seemingly at odds with each other) undermine any sense of local geography or the relationship between subjects. This particularly comes to the fore in the final act, where any narrative ingenuity gives way to video game plotting (complete with tool tips and checkpoints) – a succession of confusing complications in lieu of real narrative complexity – and Lin is not up to the task of keeping us informed of the rules and the stakes.
Beyond lacks the vitality and novelty of Star Trek '09 and has none of the thrilling personal conflicts or emotional sensitivity of Into Darkness. And more than those films, which were already more flash than flesh, it lacks depth. This is the cinema of spectacle, not ideas. Once, this film series could do both. But Beyond doesn't go beyond passable. And for a crew of this calibre, that's not good enough.