After being mildly disappointed with the quality of two of the three movies in the Star Trek Motion Picture Trilogy Blu-ray boxset I had decided that I probably wouldn't bother picking up any of the other Star Trek movies on Blu-ray until they received the proper restoration they deserved, well that still hasn't happened but I did pick up the two Blu-ray boxsets ( Classic Cast and Next Generation ) pretty cheaply online ( well I call 70% off pretty cheap ).
Today I watched Star Trek: The Motion Picture on Blu-ray, to say that Paramount's treatment of this Trek movie in particular has been a comedy of errors is probably an understatement, the version that has been released on Blu-ray is the original theatrical version of the movie, a version I hadn't seen since the movie was in the cinemas in the 70's ( I do have a rip of it on DVD that came from Laser disc but I just never got around to watching it ).
Watching this version of the movie was a strange experience after being used to the extended version of the film that was released on VHS and then the Director's Edition that was later released on DVD, it seemed that there were scenes that were either missing or had been trimmed and of course this was in fact the case as this was the original edit of the movie, I'm not sure why Paramount were unable to release the Extended Edition on Blu-ray but I think it would have been preferable and the story is a little clearer in that version.
In a perfect world the Director's Edition would've been the version released on Blu-ray but at the time is was being prepared Paramount was to short sighted to commission any of the new special effects in high definition meaning that all those effects sequences would need to be redone again for that version to be released in High definition, so of the three possible versions the Blu-ray release contains the most inferior version at least from a story telling perspective.
There have been a lot of complaints about the Star Trek movies on Blu-ray, I think based on what I've seen so far they have been a little over-stated, Star Trek: The Motion Picture for the most part looks great, especially for a movie of it's age but there are several moments during the movie ( mostly towards the end where the Enterprise crew discover the Voyager probe ) where the is an obvious loss of picture detail due to the excessive use of digital noise reduction in an attempt to remove film grain.
For what it is the theatrical version of Star Trek: The Motion Picture ( mostly ) looks and sounds good, I've never really appreciated the detail in the models used in the film before so that was an impressive aspect of this release but this is a flawed release of an inferior version of the movie and while I did enjoy seeing most of the movie in far greater detail than I ever had before I still came away feeling slightly disappointed.
I suspect the hardcore Star Trek fans have already bought this disc, for the rest I'd advise waiting until you can pick it up cheap.
Great review, Shayne. I actually know the answer to your question: the Extended Version could not be released on Blu-Ray because the re-done special effects for the Extended Cut were only created in 480p, which is fine for standard-def DVD, but would not transfer well to 1080p Blu-Ray. And Paramount, in their infinite wisdom, didn't want to pay to have the transfer re-done again. Still, I think it's kind of cool that the original theatrical cut is out now. I haven't seen that version since 1979!
ReplyDeleteHey Joe.
ReplyDeleteI believe you are thinking of the Director's Edition which was released on DVD, the original VHS release was an extended version of the film which didn't feature CGI effects at all but as is often the case restored character moments that were cut out of the theatrical release in favor of the special effects - most of which actually stand the test of time rather well, the Enterprise and Klingon models in particular were gorgous in High Definition.
The theatrical cut was an odd viewing experience for me since I was more familiar with the Extended Edition and the Director's Edition but I do agree it's a good thing it's available for the people who want to see it.