Directed by:
J.J. AbramsCinematography:
Dan MindelComposer:
Michael GiacchinoCast:
Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Zoe Saldana, Karl Urban, Simon Pegg, John Cho, Benedict Cumberbatch, Anton Yelchin, Bruce Greenwood, Peter Weller, Alice Eve (more)VOD (2)
Plots(1)
When the crew of the Enterprise is called back home, they find an unstoppable force of terror from within their own organization has detonated the fleet and everything it stands for, leaving our world in a state of crisis. With a personal score to settle, Captain Kirk leads a manhunt to a war-zone world to capture a one man weapon of mass destruction. As our heroes are propelled into an epic chess game of life and death, love will be challenged, friendships will be torn apart, and sacrifices must be made for the only family Kirk has left: his crew. (official distributor synopsis)
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Reviews (15)
The screenwriters couldn’t resist. Honestly, it was just too enticing, but hats off to Abrams for saving fans from themselves (clever differences in the trailers) because he knows the value of a good secret. The story of Into Darkness is a solid political sci-fi thriller, working perfectly with the main characters and visually provokes nothing less that amazement. Both Kirk and Spock are given equal space. The divergence from the primary story line, caused by Nero’s intervention completely turns around some events and changes the context of certain events to a chilling extent. I’m afraid the creators just can’t afford to do this next time. The so acclaimed bad guy with a mug like Benedict Cumberbatch lives up to his reputation both mentally and physically (his hands are like skull-crackers). And Peter Weller is cool! - If Spock were here, and I were there, what would he do? - He’d let you die.
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I stared wide-eyed for two hours as if I were fifteen again. Nevertheless, I have two major criticisms to air. Abrams dragged on the concept of the first film without any significant innovation (the timing of the action scenes fits more or less one-to-one within the runtime) and, most importantly, he hardly works with the villain (and Cumberbatch provides him with what few others can). When I watch it the second time is when I'll decide if it was all on purpose and it's still all about the fire of catchphrases, perfect characters, and "absolute" moments like falling from space, or if J.J. is already on the other side of the galaxy with his thoughts.
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I can hardly abstract from the emotional factor because, as in the previous episode, I felt at home swallowing Abrams' upgraded poetics of the rigid Federation and the less-clamped crew of the Enterprise to the fullest. In some ways, the flight into darkness is a little less consummate than its predecessor - it was actually atypically brisk, functional, dynamically connected and clever for a prologue. He built the foundations of a new mythology, paid homage to the old, and economically sketched the new chemistry of the characters. The sequel toils more with the explanation of some motivations and events, the last instance being deus ex machina, or a reference outside the world of film (to The Wrath of Khan, to the series episode "Space Seed", to the first Abrams ST, to the accompanying comics, etc.). As a result, Into Darkness may seem like a nerd encyclopedia with poor logic. To some extent, I agree. Anyway, if we abstract from the occasional naivety, unsuccessfully pointed dialogue, and a certain sparsity (or rather evasion) of the script, the film simply works. The film elegantly uses the established motifs, cleverly re-interprets familiar events with a raster of "changed reality", all while not forgetting to work with a key element of the new ST: the relationship between Kirk and Spock. In many ways, it surprisingly brings them together (fatherly motif, anger) while not only acting as a derivative of the original film duo. Cumberbatch in the role of Khan is probably the most successful transcript - he was able to combine a certain human fragility with the theatricality of Ricardo Montalbán, and he also acts as a catalyst: in some ways he is similar to Spock (superior physical and mental abilities), and in some ways to Kirk (obvious interest in improvisation and problems with self-control and order). In any case, he puts them both in a situation where they have to reconsider their basic attitudes and views on their service. Fortunately, he does not resemble in any way the "destructive fateful" villains that Christopher Nolan so masterfully constructed, but he is actually old-fashioned at his core (good old fashioned revenge). The new ST is primarily an attraction. At times, it seems that the obsessive fondness for thinking and rendering that the Star Trek series is famous for was set aside and was replaced by pure dynamics. Nevertheless, observing the ingenuity and dynamism of often parallel and precisely constructed actions brings almost infantile pleasure. So does experiencing bursts of nostalgia from familiar scenes that shine again and, despite a certain rational calculation, still work and enrich the new story. A film where everything is in place for me. Sometimes it's a bit mysterious how it got there, but ST simply offers enough for a viewer raised on Rodenberry's world to come to terms with it.
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The story of the most genuine and strongest male friendship – and breathtaking action/adventure into places where many would never dare set foot as a little bonus. Chris Pine proves that the moment he puts on the yellow-black suit, he absolutely nails everything; Karl Urban traditionally expresses the emotions involved, even if it's just raising an eyebrow; and this time around the tried-and-true creative team is playing it safe Although in a few places they unnecessarily rely on the audience's knowledge of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Abrams and the screenwriters didn't miss this opportunity. Almost every bit of dialogue leads to explosive consequences, and in the face of an unpredictable character that Benedict Cumberbatch gives the power of a fallen angel, all criticisms must inevitably fade away. Not to mention that during the final half hour, it almost exclusively plays on the first emotional signal and rational considerations are definitively put aside. An astonished 90%, with a lingering slight trembling and eternal sadness that the creator of the best reboot in history has sailed off into a galaxy far, far away.
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Stay true to your geek enthusiast soul, making Trekkies happy with allusions and references, or pander to the demands of the blockbuster market? That is the question to which this time Abrams didn’t find a satisfying answer to. And so sways between these two approaches, a while this way, a while the other. The instability here rears its head in all aspects. On the one hand a seriously conceived (and criminally underused) villain with incredible motivation played by a charismatic actor and opposite him a comically fresh-faced crew full of puppets to make up the numbers. Although it’s Spock-style emotionally cold, more tears are shed here than at Kim Jong-il’s funeral. It pretends to be a popcorn movie where you don’t have to switch your brain off, but they start coming out with over-combined plans that would seem idiotic even in much dumber pastiches. We get tongue-in-cheek Indian Jones-style escapades and attempts at dark, fateful monumentality topped off with a convolutedly grafted on compulsory deus ex machina-style cameo, incessantly recycled music, unwanted, ridiculous metavariations (the worst being that awful scene “behind the glass) and the rather sudden ending which, rather than being a climax involving the inevitability of fate, looks more like the budget ran out and so the movie didn’t end as it was originally meant to... Simply a messy (and confusing due to the frenetic work in the cutting room) result where the biggest surprise is that Abrams had no problem with exactly the same things in part one.
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