Star Trek: The Motion Picture- Hot Hot Take

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 Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979 US, Klingon) Google has the language for this film as English and Klingon. That's how much Star Trek is part of our society. I am loving being able to talk about this first film in the franchise in context of the 1980 Oscars. Not my favorite Star Trek product but it is still Star Trek and I will watch it. After TOS went off the air in 1969 there was quite a movement of people missing the series. Hence the ST conventions were born. Paramount caught wind of this and decided to make a movie. They hired the insanely talented Robert Wise to direct (Westside Story, Andromeda Strain, The Day the Earth Stood Still) Wise was a once in a generation director with a strong SciFi background. Yay! This is gonna be great! The story was by veteran SciFi writer Alan Dean Foster. Double great! Script by newbie Harold Livingston with very little on his resume much less SciFi. Ooooh ummm. Decades later its pretty clear that it didn't hit the mark. I do think that Wise was having a hard time wrapping his head around this franchise. There are people now that are having a hard time with it. I can only imagine what it was like for Wise (a member of the Greatest Generation in a post moon landing society). It really felt like a "what?" type of film. The Academy acknowledged the film with nominations in several categories including music, visual effects and art direction. No wins though. The new Klingons was a big win though for me. I just love the complete switch with no explanation. How??? did this happen? I did not like the new uniforms. Glad they didn't stick around.  Find it on Hulu and HBO and available to rent on most streaming. Don't see it on Paramount though. Hmmmm. 

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