Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979)

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Overview

Star Trek: The Motion Picture is the first theatrical film based on the Star Trek series from the 1960's. The film's plot is that a mysterious alien cloud called V'ger approaches the Earth, laying waste to everything it's path crosses. Now Admiral Jim Kirk re-takes command of the USS Enterprise and defeat V'ger.

Creation

After the original series had been cancelled, Gene Roddenberry pressured Paramount to continue the franchise through feature films. After the original series became successful in syndication; Paramount then agreed to making a feature film based on the series in 1975. Paramount had a series of writers create a script with an epic but were disappointed by the results and dropped the project in 1977. Instead of going the feature film route, Paramount decided to back to the series root's and make a new television series entitled Star Trek: Phase II. However the success of films like Close Encounters of The Third Kind and Star Wars proved to Paramount that big budget Sci-Films would work. So the the series was cancelled and work began on what would become Star Trek: The Motion Picture.

In 1978, Paramount held a press conference at the studio to announce that Robert Wise would helm a $15 Million adaptation of the show. With the show cancelled, writers began to adapt the show's pilot episode into a film script. The Enterprise set was redesigned and entirely new uniforms and costumes were created Robert Fletcher while Harold Michelson created the new sets.

Plot Summary

Admiral James T. Kirk

While on their daily Routines, a Starfleet monitoring station detects an alien life form hidden in a cloud of energy that moving through space on a course for Earth. The cloud destroys three Klingon Vessels and the Monitoring Station as it passes through space. Meanwhile, Kirk promoted to Admiral is The Chief of Starfleet Operations in San Francisco. Starlfeet sends the Enterprise- it's flagship vessel and only ship in range to to investigate the strange entity that is within the cloud. Kirk seizes command of the ship, much to the dismay of it's present commanding officer Captain Willard Decker who is overseeing the ship's refitting. However the ship hasn't been properly tested yet and as a result two officers are killed including the ship's science officer by a malfunctioning transporter. Tension between Kirk and Decker is high already but increases after Kirk admits to being unfamiliar with the new Enterprise. Meanwhile Spock arrives to serve as the replacement science officer and says he felt a consciousness emanating from within the cloud.

The Enterprise intercepts the cloud and travels into it but are soon attacked by an alien ship and a probe sent by "V'Ger" appears on the bridge, attacking Spock and kidnapping the navigator Ilia. She is replaced by a Doppelganger sent to study the crew; complete with her memories and feelings. Decker is distraught over her disappearance as they were romantically involved with one another at one point in time. Spock then walks to the ship's surface and attempts to mind meld with whatever organism is in there. In the process, he discovers the ship is V'Ger and V'Ger is a living machine. At the heart of it, it is revealed that V'Ger is in reality a long lost Earth probe from the 20th Century called Voyager 6. It was damaged when an alien civilization stumbled upon it and mistook it's programming as instructions to learn all knowledge there is to know, and return that knowledge to it's creators.

The machines within it upgraded the probe as it made it''s journey across the stars to return to Earth. Spock discovers that along the way it learned so much information that it actually gained consciousness and became sentient. He realizes that it doesn't have the ability to give itself a focus other than it's original programming and that having learned what it had on it's journey; it finds it's life meaningless Before it transmits all the information it contained, V'Ger insisted the creator meet it in person to finish the final phase. Realizing that all it wants is to merge with it's creator, Decker offers himself to V'Ger and merges with the Ilia Probe and V'Ger and disappears off into another dimension. With the Earth saved, Kirk rejoins his crew and sets off into space.

Production

Filming

From Left to Right: Robert Wise, William Shatner, Gene Roddenberry, DeForrest Kelley, and Leonard Nimoy

Principal Photography began on the film's first scene on August 7, 1978. The first scene shot was actually the first scene on the bridge.Before the cameras rolled, several ceremonies were conducted with Roddenberry giving Robert Wise a baseball cap with the words Enterprise emblazoned on it in gold. The cap was a gift from the then Captain of the US Nuclear vessel Enterprise. The scene planned was the scene before the crew prepares the ship for space travel. Wise shot the scene fifteen times in one day before he was satisfied.

For the special effects, Alex Weldon was hired though many of the effects had been completed by the time he was hired and so he had to make the higher budget effects. Richard Kline was hired as the cinematographer and would work from sketches provided by concept artist Maurice Zuberano to ensure he had the correct look for the film. He also worked off of storyboards, sort of guiding him through a shot. For the Bridge, he had it lit with a low density of light to make the console displays brighter. Kline was very concerned with the lighting for the film so he could shoot while the script supervisor Bonnie Prendergast kept notes which she wrote up every day after filming. She wrote down any ad-libbed pieces of dialogue or any changes dialogue. The production managers were tasked with keeping everything on time as every day on the set cost $4000 so as to prevent any delay that could seriously impact the project.

Filming was mostly conducted to allow for secrecy. All the scripts were numbered and were checked each day to make sure that none had been stolen. Lists of all those that had copies of the scripts were also kept. During construction of the sets, one younger visitor "lifted" a blueprint of the Enterprise bridge and sold them to any fans who wanted them for $75. Once Paramount discovered it, they reported it to the FBI who turned it over to the LAPD. The police found the culprit, convicted them, and fined them $750 thought it was discovers that the blueprints stolen were not the final blueprints. Visitor badgers were created to keep track of visitors, fans, crew, family, and even other actors. Even actors like Mel Brooks, Clint Eastwood, Tony Curtis, and Robin Williams had to wear visitor badges. Security sweeps of cars for stolen props were conducted daily.

By August 9, the production was already one day behind schedule. Despite the delays and the fact he was going to be causing more, Wise refused to shoot more than 12 hours on set because he felt he "lost his edge afterwards". Shooting ran on past expectations due to Wise shooting scenes (the wormhole scenes) twice with two different speeds. First the scene was shot in the standard format of 24 frames per second and then the scene was shot again at 48 frames per second. If the faster speed didn't turn out as expected, then the 24 fps shot would be used. The faster speed was used to create a slow motion effect for the film. The scene was eventually completed on August 24. The film wrapped production on January 26, 1979 over a year after the film began principal photography.

Music

Composer Jerry Goldsmith whom Roddenberry originally wanted to score the original series' pilot episode was brought onto the project to score the film. Goldsmith imagined the score to be like John Williams' score for Star Wars. Director Robert Wise however felt differently and ended up having Goldsmith write an entirely new score after rejecting his first one. He composed the score over three to four months and ended having to bring in fellow composers Alexander Courage who composed the original series' theme and Fred Steiner who composed music for various episodes of the original series.