Friday, May 02, 2008

J.J. Abrams talks about his vision for Star Trek


From filmstalker, J.J. Abrams has been talking about what made him take on the new Star Trek film, what we can expect to see, and just who he's aiming it at. As a Star Wars fan it seems he is coming at the film from a different angle, not that of a director who was obsessed with the franchise before.

Abrams spoke to Yahoo! Movies and explained why he was excited to get his hands on the Star Trek film:

It was an opportunity to take what I think has been a maligned world — to sound crass, a franchise — and treat it in a way that made it something that I wanted to see. To take the characters, the thoughtfulness, the personalities, the sense of adventure, the idea of humanity working together, the sense of social commentary and innovation, all that stuff. To take it and apply it in a way that felt genuinely thrilling.

It's interesting that he's honest enough to basically say, that the movies that went before were maybe not to his liking. It also sounds like he's going to do something different with the series.

The whole point was to try to make this movie for fans of movies, not fans of Star Trek, necessarily. If you're a fan, we've got one of the writers who's a devout Trekker, so we were able to make sure we were serving the people who are completely enamored with Star Trek. But we are not making the movie for that contingent alone. You can't really make a movie for them. As soon as you start to guess what you think they are going to want to see, you're in trouble. You have to make the movie in many ways for what you want to see yourself, make a movie you believe in. Then you're not second-guessing an audience you don't really have an understanding of.

That's good news for people who like Star Trek but are not die hard fans. Maybe not so good for Trekkies out there, it may be that it's a very different film to it's predecessors. Maybe we shouldn't worry too much just yet though, according to Abrams the special effects are unlike anything seen before in Star Trek films.

I feel like this is so unlike what you expect, so unlike the Star Trek you've seen. At the same time, it's being true to what's come before, honoring it, I can say the effects for Star Trek have never, ever been done like this. ... I can only tell you the idea of the universe of Star Trek has never been given this kind of treatment.
Wow, nothing like upping people's expectations! I was always a fan of Star Trek Voyager and Next Generation, and I've watched a few of the films but not all. For me this sounds like good news, if I like films and Star Trek then apparently I'll be happy. It's interesting though that he seems to be preparing devoted Trekkies for something a bit different. What do you think, is it about time there was a different slant to the Star Trek films? Or are you worried that Abrams is messing with Star Trek history, and changing too much?

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