From: utzoo!decvax!ucbvax!sf-lovers Newsgroups: fa.sf-lovers Title: SF-LOVERS Digest V5 #70 Article-I.D.: ucbvax.7668 Posted: Tue Jun 15 11:03:53 1982 Received: Thu Jun 17 01:00:50 1982 >From JPM@Mit-Ai Tue Jun 15 10:50:31 1982 SF-LOVERS Digest Monday, 14 Jun 1982 Volume 5 : Issue 70 Today's Topics: SF Movies - Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Random Topics - Commercials at the movies ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: 13 Jun 82 13:11-PDT From: mclure at SRI-UNIX Subject: trek article Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan By Don McLeese (c) 1982 Chicago Sun-Times (Field News Service) BEVERLY HILLS - ''When we were making the series, maybe the second season, the Spock character was well-established and people were liking him,'' Leonard Nimoy reminisced. ''There was this whole thing about this character who has no emotions - or controls his emotions, which is a better way to put it, I think. ''Dorothy Fontana, who was a writer on the series, said, 'I'm gonna write a love story for Spock.' I objected. I said, 'I think it's a mistake; I think it will destroy a major element of the character. We can never be believable again saying that Spock controls his emotions if he plays a love story.' ''She went ahead and wrote it, and we did it. It was called 'This Side of Paradise.' It's still one of my favorite episodes. It was a wonderful story, very well done, very touching, a poignant love story that made sense for the character. Instead of destroying the character, it enhanced it. What it did was redevelop that repressed side of Spock, exposed it. ''It taught me a big lesson - and that is that if you don't take chances, then you're limiting yourself to predictable behavior. And if it's all predictable, why should anybody pay to see it?'' Relaxing in his Beverly Hills hotel room, Nimoy was explaining how the chances taken within ''Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan'' had him excited about the series all over again. Just the previous evening, Nimoy had seen the completed movie for the first time, along with an enthusiastically appreciative crowd of press and film folk, and he professed to be as moved by its ending as anyone. While the ending has created quite a stir as the end of Spock - the half-human, half-Vulcan master of rationality who has long been one of the series' major draws - Nimoy talked of Spock as a character reborn. ''I think what's happened here, amazingly enough, is that by doing what we've done with Spock, we may have created an entirely new future for 'Star Trek' and Spock. Now, if we can get some imagination going, we've got the potential for doing some very exciting stuff in the future,'' he predicted. ''The end, in a sense, may be an entirely new beginning.'' Nimoy's enthusiasm seems to be shared by everyone connected with the project. Throughout its peculiar history, ''Star Trek'' has been beset by problems along the timespace continuum. As a less-than-successful late '60s TV series, it may have offered too much, too soon. As a sensation in reruns, it offered its participants too little, too late. As a belated effort to capitalize on the appeal of the series, 1979's ''Star Trek: The Motion Picture'' attempted too much, too late. Finally, with the entertaining and intelligently crafted ''The Wrath of Khan,'' it appears that ''Star Trek's'' time has come. Let's backtrack a little. ''Star Trek'' debuted as an NBC-TV series in September, 1966. More ambitious than most television, its combination of literate scripts, effective ensemble performances, and science-fiction intrigue won it critical plaudits and a modest but loyal following. After three years of less than exceptional ratings, the Starship U.S.S. Enterprise was grounded, apparently for good. After its 79 episodes went into syndication, a curious phenomenon occurred. Year after year, the syndicated reruns attracted larger and larger audiences, winning a lot more fans than the show had the first time around. Fanatics, popularly known as ''Trekkies'' (actually, they consider this a term of disparagement; ''Trekkers'' is the preferred description), began memorizing everything there was to know about the series. Conventions where they could share their passion attracted thousands. ''Beam me up, Scotty'' became a common catchphrase; Nimoy's Mr. Spock and William Shatner's Capt. Kirk were hailed internationally as heroes. Today, 13 years after its cancellation, the series is televised in more than 100 American cities and in almost 150 additional markets worldwide. There are more than 350 fan clubs throughout the world. The series has inspired more than 50 books and numerous postgraduate dissertations. For a while, Shatner and Nimoy considered such belated adulation less a blessing than an albatross. ''You can imagine, here I was, working at various and sundry projects,'' explained Shatner. ''And people would be coming up and saying, 'There's Capt. Kirk.' It got more and more popular, and the identification became closer and closer.'' Nimoy expressed even more resistance, venting his spleen in an autobiography entitled ''I Am Not Spock'' (leading some to wonder, if he were not Spock, why anybody would want to read the autobiography of Leonard Nimoy). As both attempted to push forward, being tied to a long-dead television series was holding them back. Still, neither man resented the typecasting enough to reject the offer for ''Star Trek: The Motion Picture.'' The continued popularity of the series and the overwhelming success of the ''Star Trek''-influenced ''Star Wars'' convinced everyone concerned that the film couldn't help but be a smash. ''It didn't take me long to make the decision to do Capt. Kirk (again),'' said Shatner. ''It was hard not to be a part of a large-budget motion picture. The script hadn't been written, but I was thinking if the people who had written the series were going to be part of the film, I was expecting the best.'' With Gene Roddenberry, the man who had created ''Star Trek,'' in charge of the production, there was every reason to assume that the film would build on the values that gave the series its appeal. Where the series had depended on the interaction of well-rounded, well-defined characters, however, the film seemed both more ambitious and more hollow - an expensive special-effects demonstration. Costing almost $50 million, it more than doubled its money, but it didn't have quite the impact expected. Did the film somehow get off the track? ''I think it was set down that track intentionally,'' said Nimoy. ''I wasn't there, but some people decided that to do 'Star Trek' as a motion picture, it had to be different (from the television series). I got the feeling that someone had seen an awful lot of '2001.''' According to Shatner, the project was plagued by problems: ''The filming took a lot longer than expected. The film had been promised to distributors for a particular date, and through accidents of production and post-production, that time slipped away. There was no preview time. ''Essentially, there were two films being made: one in the special-effects houses under Doug Trumbull and one in the studios under Bob Wise. The two (films) were married, but it was a shotgun marriage.'' When the principal actors returned for the new ''Star Trek'' film, there was a new team at the helm. Gone were Wise, Trumbull, and Roddenberry (who's listed as ''executive consultant'' for the film, but whose participation on the project was minimal). In their places were people who had proven that they could deliver quality work within strict time and budget limitations. Executive producer Harve Bennett, who exerted most of the control over ''The Wrath of Khan,'' came from a strong television background (''Mod Squad,'' ''Rich Man, Poor Man,'' et al.), and was originally offered the project as a made-for-TV film. Producer Robert Sallin was an award-winning producerdirector of television commercials. Director Nicholas Meyer, something of a 36-year-old whiz kid, penned the best-selling ''The Seven Per-Cent Solution'' and wrote and directed ''Time After Time.'' ''They showed me the (first) movie, and I thought it would be impossible to make a movie as boring as this one,'' said Meyer, when asked whether the task of making a successful sequel had intimidated him. Made for a quarter of the budget, ''The Wrath of Khan'' is not only better entertainment than its predecessor, but it's expected to do better at the box office as well. ''There was obviously a very conscious attempt to go back to the best qualities of the series,'' said Shatner, ''and to use the special effects as an escape valve, to keep the audience on the edge of its seats, but never to forget that relationships were what made the series popular.'' Beyond such superficialities, neither Shatner nor Nimoy is much for analyzing what specific qualities have given ''Star Trek'' longevity. ''It's so hard to answer the question,'' responded Nimoy. ''You put an actor together with the role and you hope it'll work. What is the appeal of Sylvester Stallone in 'Rocky'? Can you put somebody else into the role and make it work? Is it the role? Is it the man? A combination of both? ''It's chemistry. At the same time, it's not scientific. If it were scientific, you could repeat it.'' Both agree, however, that ''Star Trek'' aims a little higher than most space-adventure fare. ''I think that science-fiction films as a rule, for example the Lucas films - 'Star Wars,' 'Raiders of the Lost Ark,' even - are pure, wonderful, fantasy entertainment,'' said Shatner. '''Star Trek' treads both categories: It is a film about the human condition, mixed with pop villians and science-fiction paraphernalia. But the reason people cried in that theater last night is because it touches something universal in them.'' Added Nimoy, ''I think that when 'Star Trek' is at its best, there are some ideas involved. They're not pretentious, they're not pounded into your head, but there are ideas that resonate. As long as we have that, it sets us apart.'' Sixteen years after the original series began, Shatner and Nimoy are busier than ever. Shatner is starring in the ''T.J. Hooker'' television series, and continues to act in and direct a variety of theatrical projects. With featured roles in ''Marco Polo'' and ''Golda,'' and as host of ''In Search of...,'' Nimoy has recently been all over the tube. As busy as both are, each indicated that he'd be eager to participate in further ''Star Trek'' sequels, especially after the creative resurgence evinced by ''The Wrath of Khan.'' While no one has signed anything yet (and director Meyer has already indicated he's done with ''Star Trek''), there's little doubt that a new ''Star Trek'' film will be made. How long can the series continue? ''If you had said to me in 1970 that we'd still be dealing with this in 1982, I'd have said you're crazy,'' said Nimoy. ''So now, if you say to me in 1994 we'll meet again and have a discussion about the new 'Star Trek' movie, I'm not gonna laugh.'' ------------------------------ Date: 14-Jun-82 10:51:55 PDT (Monday) From: Reed.ES at PARC-MAXC Subject: Re: SF-LOVERS Digest V5 #65 I have about had it with misspellings: Star Trek: The WRATH of KHAN. "The Rath of Kahn" (Dolata at SUMEX-AIM). What is this, 'Morning for Jews'? The misspelling 'Kahn' is very widespread - I've seen it in a newspaper review, and even on the billboard of a local theatre, not to mention almost every SF-Lovers submission on the subject for the last 10 digests. (It is to JPM's credit that he didn't pass these misspellings on in the digest titles.) Come on, folks - you are willing to nitpick the details like "Chekov wasn't in 'Space Seed'" but you can't even remember the spelling correctly from the movie title and the ads? As to David Miller's comment about Khan's foolishness - he suffers from two problems which conflict with his superior intelligence. First and foremost, EGO. It is his ego which subverts his intelligence over and over again. But in the end, it is ignorance which does him in. No amount of superior intelligence could prepare him for the results of his ignorance, initially with respect to the operation of the Reliant, and subsequently with respect to the properties of the nebula. In any case, the point here is that superior intelligence is nothing if it isn't backed by a clear head and accurate knowledge. As for the return of Spock - all they have to do is show an episode from the past. Spock's final log comment at the end is an indication of this. Re: movie theatre commercials. I have been seeing LATimes ads in the movies for the last year. Disgusting, but at least they don't break the movie in half like they apparently do in Switzerland. Even "Reds", which had an intermission, did not have commercials in the midst of the movie. Remember when they used to show cartoons and newsreels? Many comments seem to imply that particular commercials go with particular movies. I have not noticed this to be the case - they seem to be entirely independent as far as I can tell. ------------------------------ Date: 14-Jun-82 2:27PM-EDT (Mon) From: B.J. HerbisonReply-to: Ben Lotto Subject: Commercials at the movies Date: 10 June 1982 18:11-EDT From: Thomas L. Davenport Subject: Commercials at the movies! And what about commercials IN the movies? I hear that E.T. features Star Wars "action figures" and a national pizza chain. A while ago Richard Dreyfuss came to Yale. This was fairly soon after Close Encounters was released, so naturally I asked him about the film and about Spielberg. He said that "...Spielberg is in love with the middle class..." and pointed out the home scenes from Close Encounters as an example. If you recall, there are coke cans scattered around, kids watching television all day, all the things that one would consider Modern American Decedent Middle Class. I don't recall whether he said that any of these companies paid for these items showing up, (that was the basis for my question, but we got sidetracked), but their appearance is attributable more to Spielberg than to the Coca Cola Corp. -Ben Lotto (lotto@yale-comix) ------------------------------ End of SF-LOVERS Digest ***********************