... and it's epic. Should appeal to trekkers and non trekkers alike. Great story, great acting. Simon Pegg was a little over the top as Scotty, but he made it work. It took me about a half hour to stop thinking that Spock was going to point his finger at someone and take his head off. Big step from Sylar but he is very good. No complaints about acting at all.

As someone who doesn't often go for action movies of this ilk, but this was fast-paced, funny, action packed and flew by at warp factor 9. I'm not much into the whole Trek culture, but Iwas in high school when the Tribbles episode first aired on NBC so I'm a fan and probably a bit biased.

One niggle about the cinematography. IMO, the overdid the light streak thing to the point that it was very distracting to me, but maybe it's that common these days.

Big fun that if you suffer at all from vertigo will seem like a two hour motion control ride. I needed the movie to end so I could catch my breath.

I just saw it, too. It was awesome. I grew up with the original series, and thought they did a great job bringing the original characters back.

I was also very impressed with how the plot allows them to start all over again, and continue making Star Trek movies for the foreseeable future. Very smart. And hey, I'll go see them if they're this good!

This movie also was one of the first I've seen that had convincingly real looking CGI. I had hardly any moments of being aware of the animation. Really well done.

Kurtzman and Orci have a very poor screenplay track record.

Legend of Zorro(they turned Zorro's daughter into a whining nagging housewife as if they didnt even watch the previous movie).

The Island

Mission Impossible 3 (I liked it at first but realized after a couple of viewings its really a bunch of loose scenes strung together)

Transformers (very bad script)

From what I hear their screenplay for Star Trek is the same(although
they can write a good joke here and there).
I am sure the fx and action are good.

I would have seen it if Shatner and Nimoy both were in it(Generations be damned)
but as it stands I'll probably wait for video.

I saw it last night and I agree it was epic, the light rays were over done (you shouldn't have to squint in a dark movie theatre) and it was a great movie. I felt the middle dragged a little but not for more than 15 minutes. It was a really brillant concept that allows for a complete reboot without losing the essence of a beloved series. I, for one, am glad there was no cameo from Shatner. I enjoy Boston Legal but Shatner doesn't look like Kirk anymore and with a reboot it is nice not to have to compare the old and new Kirks on film. I think many of the choices made in how to reboot an old serious were very bold but respectful of the fanbase at large. I thought the acting and effects were well done, some throwbacks were overdone, but over all it was well-written and a rollercoaster of a ride. i can't wait to go see it again.

Ha that's true. Shatner is rather bulgy now(and started to look that way by the time of Generations). I didnt care for how he died in it--although I am not sure that alternate reality sequence made sense. If they were in an energy ribbon that granted you any wish and gave you the illusion of it, and so was the Malcom McDowell character,and he wanted to see his family again, then whose to say they werent still in the energy ribbon and just believed they had escaped it?
I never liked the NG movies except First Contact to some extent.

They use time travel way too much in the ST movies.
And enough with the romulans.
How about some new aliens?

Good fun. Good time. I'm on board for wherever this crew is going next.

Just saw it. Wow. What a ride! Much better than I thought it would be. Director didn't take many short cuts.

I don't want to wreck the movie for anyone who has not seen it so I won't say who but I am curious if anyone else watches the movie if they think someone's face was way out of focus during the last few minutes. Not once, but multiple times. I can't tell if it was shot with a different camera or if the focus puller was working too late.

I am curious if anyone else watches the movie if they think someone's face was way out of focus during the last few minutes. Not once, but multiple times.

Yes, absolutely. His entire take was out of focus, and for some reason they chose to cut to it several times. I was amazed to see that. Why not reshoot it?

I can't believe it wasn't noticed at some point, so there's obviously a reason it wasn't redone. It will be interesting to see if it gets mentioned at some point.

Anamorphic is excruciatingly tough focus-wise on close-ups. I saw the shot in question also and while it was notable, I've seen worse, not that that is a good thing! Probably two inches of depth at best on that shot. For those who are eager to shoot with some of the cameras that have been announced that shoot larger than S35 (FF35, for instance), take note...it's brutal on focus (and even shallower digitally than on film).

Generally why this sort of thing makes it to the screen is that the take is noted as soft and subsequent takes are made to cover, but later in the edit the performance in the soft shot takes precedence. It may have been too late and too expensive to re-shoot at that point.

Up until recently, when Avid outputs were low-res at best, a lot of soft stuff got through because you wouldn't know until the negative matchback and the first answer print. These days the non-linear outputs are good enough that you can judge focus so that excuse is gone.

I got a kick out of the fact that they put dust on the lens of those opening CG shots. Great idea to bring a spot of realism in right away. I didn't mind the light streaking so much.

I thought they did a good job modernizing while keeping the "flavor" of TOS! Have to go cut out some paper triangles to tape to my ears like I did when I was little now :)

I thought they worked EVERY SINGLE ONE of the one liners in from TOS in a way that actually didn't seem too forced - and we still knew they were coming. Great fun, wife loved it for mother's day present. I'd see it again, it's definitely a theater film rather than a DVD wait for me.

I saw it at the Empire Leicester Sq.
The sound system there is awesome and so loud it borders on deafening but I didnt' mind.

I thought the casting was excellent (especially Uhura..mmm) and I look forward to them growing into their roles in more episodes.

Going to buy the original movies on Blueray now.

Going to buy the original movies on Blueray now.

Haven't seen the new film, but just picked up the BluRay version of the original movies. Have only watched about half of the first one, but it looks really good. I was glad to see that they went back to the original theatrical version instead of the CGI enhanced DVD version.

But you really are more aware of the inconsistent quality of the effects shots when watching in HD. The model work is spectacular and I really admire that. But then there are some pretty hokey matte paintings in other shots. I guess that replacing these was the rationale for the CGI director's cut version on DVD, but it's fun to see the film in its original form anyway.

It's playing in IMAX here in Honolulu. Did everyone else see it in IMAX too? Picture quality was superb, and yes, the audio was so loud that it almost hurt my ears! They weren't kidding when they said 12,000 watts of power will knock your socks off!

The movie itself wasn't shot in Imax, was it? Was it scaled up? I didn't see anything in the credits about Imax cameras.

Everything about the movie was stunning, the best ST made to date, however.....
They completely screwed up everything in regards to the star trek story line. Not just a few inconsistancies... totally absoutely screwed up!!!

It is a shame because the character development, casting, acting, production and everything else were perfect. They just alienated a huge Star Trek fan base for no good reason.

Anamorphic is excruciatingly tough focus-wise on close-ups. I saw the shot in question also and while it was notable, I've seen worse, not that that is a good thing! Probably two inches of depth at best on that shot.

Hey Charles, why is that? I have no experience shooting Anamorphic (and thus don't completely understand the nature of it), so I am intrigued to know why focussing will be tougher when shooting on Anamorphic lenses as opposed to standard.

Karl Urban impressed the hell out of me with his Bones. I though he took the cake for apeing the orginal cast member.

Uhura was a bit overdone and trying to infuse a love story with Spock was awkward.

A 25mm anamorphic lens has the same depth of field characteristic as a 25mm spherical lens, however due to the anamorphic element it will deliver twice the field of view. So you have to go to a 50mm anamorphic lens to deliver an equivalent shot, which of course has a shallower depth of field.

Fortunately anamorphics tend to be slower lenses, so you don't have to deal with the madness of T1.4. However, the use of a de-anamorphoser in the eyepiece causes the viewing system to lose some sharpness and thus it is tough to judge critical focus in the eyepiece.

I forgot about the change in field of view. Cheers, that makes sense.

But am I right to assume that if you're used to shooting 16:9 (with no cropping to obtain 2.39:1), and you wish to start shooting 2.39:1 by anamorphic lenses, then the DOF you're used to remains unaffected as the headspace should be the same? (Confusing question, I know)

I'm not sure I understand the question. Standard 2X anamorphic lenses have a 2X horizontal compression factor, so a 50mm anamorphic lens sees the same horizontal view as a 25mm spherical lens, more or less (Super-35 uses a slightly wider gate that anamorphic, 24mm wide instead of 22mm wide, so the equivalent focal lengths when shooting Super-35 framed for cropping to 2.40 are not exactly half the focal length as an anamorphic lens. So if you were using a 50mm anamorphic lens, you'd use probably a 27mm spherical lens in Super-35 to match horizontal view, not a 25mm.)

What affects depth of field is the focal length you end up choosing, assuming you don't change the f-stop nor the distance to the subject when trying to match field of view. But this assumes you are composing for the same aspect ratio otherwise it's a bit apples and oranges.

Practically speaking, 2X anamorphic photography is almost like opening up two stops in terms of the loss of depth of field compared to spherical photography, hence why an f/4.0 in 35mm anamorphic looks similar to shooting at an f/2.0 in Super-35. It's a little more complicated than that because in theory, anamorphic lenses produce an oval circle of confusion so the depth of field is somewhat different horizontally than it is vertically. But rather than get confused by this, suffice to say that you are dealing with less depth of field with anamorphic photography because you are compensating for the wider view by using longer focal lengths.

Now when anamorphic was first used in early CinemaScope movies, some DP's and directors claimed erroneously that it had more depth of field -- because instead of a 50mm spherical lens, they used a 50mm anamorphic lens and got double the field of view, and thus a more wide-angle shot, making them think they were getting deeper focus. They weren't compensating for the wider view by using a longer focal length because one of the reasons for shooting CinemaScope was to see more horizontal information.

I'm guess what I'm trying to say is that, say I'm shooting 50mm spherical lens at a 16:9 aspect ratio. And I have my talent framed with the correct head space I want. And then I decide to shoot anamorphic to get a wider field of view. Because the compression factor of anamorphic lenses is only along the horizontal, to maintain my original framing of the talent (head space), I'm just gonna use a 50mm anamorphic?

In other words, the DOF is the same right? (without considering the nuances of CoF for anamorphic lenses)

If you switch from a 50mm spherical to a 50mm anamorphic and don't change anything, then yes -- you're getting the DOF of a 50mm lens either way, more or less.

But since an anamorphic lens has double the horizontal view, it looks quite wide-angle compared to the spherical lens so I don't see a situation happening like you are describing. It's sort of a pointless "what if" question. You pick lenses generally for their field of view and their compression/expansion of space. This is why it is rare to use a lens much wider-angle than a 35mm in anamorphic photography, which is comparable in effect to something like an 18mm in spherical photography. You can't say "I'll just keep the same depth of field in anamorphic by using the same focal lengths as I would in spherical photography."

Also, you'd have to use a unique 1.3X anamorphic to fit 2.40 onto a 16x9 sensor -- most anamorphic lenses have a 2X squeeze, which gives you a 3.56 : 1 image on a 16x9 camera, so you end up cropping the sides to get back to 2.40.

The anamorphic format uses a 1.20 : 1 negative area and the lens has a 2X optical squeeze.

Plus again, you really should be comparing things composed for the same aspect ratio.

Assuming you can get a 1.3X anamorphic lens for your 16x9 camera... that would give you a 2.40 image (once unsqueezed) on a 16x9 recording. So let's say you had a 50mm spherical lens on a 16x9 camera and then you switched to a 50mm 1.3X anamorphic lens, getting a wider angle view horizontally. You say that you would keep the vertical framing the same, but if you were matching aspect ratio, you'd have to crop the vertical area of the 16x9 spherical version to get the same aspect ratio (2.40). So once you do that, you aren't even comparing two images with either the same vertical or horizontal view, so what's the point? Both versions are using a 50mm lens, but they don't have to same view in either direction once you match aspect ratio.

But to answer your question, the DOF is affected by the lens being a 50mm, let's say, whether or not it is an anamorphic lens or not.

Thanks, that makes a lot more sense to me. I guess because I have yet to experience anamorphic photography, I haven't considered the practical implications of looking at things with double the horizontal view. But your explanation of 35mm anamorphic approximating to 18mm spherical was golden -- which was what Charles basically told me but I didn't click on. Cheers guys. :)

Everything about the movie was stunning, the best ST made to date, however.....
They completely screwed up everything in regards to the star trek story line. Not just a few inconsistancies... totally absoutely screwed up!!!

It is a shame because the character development, casting, acting, production and everything else were perfect. They just alienated a huge Star Trek fan base for no good reason.

The storyline was totally changed because of the time travel factor. Everybody's lives were forever changed by what happened in the begining of the movie. In the past we all know about, the crew got to know each other in a very different way. This helps open up StarTrek to a whole new future that we can explore in future movies or TV series. If the timeline stayed the same there wouldn't have been much to work with since they would have had to force fit all the facts. Now they can just enjoy the characters and create all new stories that none of us know.

This method does a good job by still making the origional series and movies valid from a certain point of view. They are valid in that alternate timeline but now there is a new timeline. It's like living a full life and then going back in time to now live a whole new life. Very well done in my opinion. I can't wait to see if they take ST to the next level.

Saw it last weekend and thought it was very well done. These are my thoughts for what it's worth:

1) Does every shot NEED anamorphic lens flares? Half way through the movie my wife leans over to me and asks, "what's with all the blue things on the screen". If it's distracting to the average viewer, don't do it as much. Just a suggestion.

2) Loved Kirk, Spock, and Chekov (really liked Chekov for some reason)

3) Bones. I didn't really like Bones in this one. Something about him just didn't work as well as the old Bones.

4) Where was the old Star Trek Movie music? Did I just miss it? I was hoping to hear that somewhere just to feed my nostalgia. Not a big deal.

5) What's with J.J. Abrams and time travel/alternate dimensions? I think he's obsessed.

6) Out of focus old Spock. How did they let that go? How did that stay in the movie for as long as it did? As a production guy I was appalled that was allowed to go in a big budget movie. And they kept cutting back to it. Wow. I read what Charles wrote about anamorphic focus being tough but someone didn't see this on the dailies and request a re-shoot, or schedule Nemoy for a green screen session sometime later or something.

7) Why did they give Scotty a JarJar sidekick?

Aside from these mostly nitpicky things I thought it was really well done, very entertaining.

The storyline was totally changed because of the time travel factor. Everybody's lives were forever changed by what happened in the begining of the movie. In the past we all know about, the crew got to know each other in a very different way. This helps open up StarTrek to a whole new future that we can explore in future movies or TV series.

Exactly. For example, in the alternate timeline the buttons on the consoles will be labeled with their function.

As a kid watching the old series, the consoles all had these random lights and buttons. I wondered if they just memorized what the buttons did? Why not just put labels on everything?

Smarta** comments will be discontinued. Great movie.

I don't know if you are a "Firefly" fan, but David Tudyk ("Wash"), the pilot from that series, said in a special feature on the DVD that no matter what was going on, he had a series of buttons that he went to "make things happen." I would imagine on the old ST series it was much like that too. Now push this button, now that...make it look complicated...and repeat.

I really like the Enterprise update, she was always a great ship but now she looks like the flagship of a multi-planetary fleet...all the way around just awesome, can't wait to go see it again...