Synopsis
18 months after the end of the events of the Star Trek TV series, a powerful alien force - in the shape of a cloud - is detected to be heading for Earth, destroying starships and other objects it encounters. Starfleet decides to dispatch the starship Enterprise to intercept the thing, requiring that its lengthy refit process be quickly finished and tested while in transit.
As part of this plan, now-Admiral James T. Kirk (William Shatner) assumes his old command of the ship, angering Commander Will Decker (Stephen Collins), who had been overseeing its refit and its nominal new captain. After gathering many of the former crewmembers of the ship, the Enterprise embarks on its journey, but testing of its new systems goes poorly, resulting in further steress between Kirk and Decker. Many problems are resolved by the addition of Mr. Spock (Leonard Nimoy), who had been on his home world of Vulcan trying to expunge his last trace of emotion. His failure to do this led him to conclude that his destiny lay with humanity and Starfleet.
The Enterprise meets with the alien cloud, survives its initial assault, and is brought inside the cloud, which the crew learns is named V'ger. The ship gradually journeys to the center of V'ger, suffering some casualties along the way, as well as experiencing the strange transformation of Lt. Ilia (Persis Khambatta). It all leads to a transcendent finale at the center of V'ger.
TMP exhibits a pair of themes familiar to viewers of Star Trek and Star Trek: The Next Generation. First is the notion of "Kirk as destroyer of machines". Kirk often encounters and destroys computers which have become too powerful for the humanoids around them. TMP takes a slightly different tack, as V'ger is not actually destroyed.
Second is the notion of a being transcending the material plane to become something greater, usually represented as a being of light. Creatures such as the Organians from the original series episode "Errand of Mercy" have this characteristic, as do several beings from TNG. Star Trek almost always portrays this transformation in a positive light, something to which humanity can aspire, and V'ger's transformation here certainly is in this mold.
The theme of rebirth is a minor one in the film as applied to the characters. Decker and Ilia are removed from the stage through their own rebirth, while Kirk comes to command the Enterprise again as a sort of rebirth.
The film is very short on conflict or excitement; other than Kirk's conflicts with Decker and the obvious threat of V'ger, there is precious little conflict in the film, and both of these elements are dealt with by the deus-ex-machina nature of the ending. The story, in effect, is a relatively straightforward puzzle for the characters to solve, and, having done so, their other problems evaporate.
An extended cut of the film on videotape and network television consisted of little more than an additional 11 minutes of special effects and reaction shots. However, the 2001 DVD release had certain effects sequences re-done and the film itself re-edited to the way director Wise had originally intended but did not have neither the time or money to do so 22 years earlier.
Early pitches for a Star Trek movie included: "The God Thing" by Gene Roddenberry about a vessel visiting Earth claiming to be God, a story about alien-reptiles changing Earth's past to make snakes evolutionarily dominant by Harlan Ellison and "The Planet of the Titans."
"The Planet of the Titans" was very-nearly produced as the first Star Trek motion picture. Written by Allan Scott and Chris Bryant, the script involved the crew of the Enterprise rescuing the Starship Da Vinci from a disaster. During the rescue Kirk suffers a shock to the brain causing him to go mad and dissapear. Years later, the Enterprise (under Captain Gregory Westlake) is dispatched to a planet near where Kirk dissapeared. This planet is slowly being sucked into a black hole, and contains a wealth of information that the Klingons (who have also dispatched ships) want as well. Kirk is found, but the planet and the Enterprise are pulled ,via the black hole, into Earth's past, where they become the Titans of Greek mythology. It was to be directed by Phil Kaufman. Ralph McQuarrie did pre-production art (Including a very Star-Destroyer-like Enterprise) and Ken Adam storyboarded the script. The movie was abandonned after the premiere of Star Wars - Paramount executives believing that Star Wars had taken away it's audience. This lead to the creation of (the eventually aborted) TV series, "Star Trek: Phase Two."
The film, as it was finally shot, was originally intended as the pilot episode for the aborted TV series. It likely would not have been made were it not for the success of Star Wars, though creatively it owes more to 2001: A Space Odyssey. The final draft follows the Pilot Episode "In Thy Image" only generally, as disputes between screenwriter Harold Livingston and producer Gene Roddenberry (as well as numerous requests from Paramount Executives) lead to extensive daily rewrites of the movie right up to the last day of filming.
Major changes from the Phase II pilot episode include: Scenes of Kirk trying to recruit McCoy in a park in San Francisco, a conference of Admirals discussing the Intruder, Lieutenant Xon's entire role, the destruction of the Cruiser Aswan, an invasion of the Enterprise by mechanical probes, scenes of the Ilia-probe attempting to seduce Kirk and Sulu, and scenes of Kirk and Ilia beaming down to San Francisco to show her footage of Nasa's Voyager project at Starfleet Command. The director of the pilot episode, Bob Collins, was briefly set as the director of the Motion Picture before Robert Wise was chosen.
The entire segment of Spock entering V'Ger alone was refilmed at the last minute by Douglas Trumbull, who wrote and directed the sequence. The original sequence, showing Spock and Kirk entering V'Ger's memory core was mostly filmed but abandonned when the scripted rigging effects proved too complex.
Another sequence scripted and abandonned at the last minute involved the Enterprise being attacked by the Klingon ships from the beginning of the movie, who had rematerialized as V'ger moved to it's new plane of existence.
The film was scored by Jerry Goldsmith. Its theme to the film was later reworked as the theme for the TV series Star Trek: The Next Generation. Other elements of the film were also preserved in TNG, such as the dashing young executive officer, who once had a personal relationship with the empathic alien woman, and the pyjama-like Starfleet uniforms.
It's been theorized that Will Decker is the son of Matt Decker from the original series episode "The Doomsday Machine".
The next film in the series is Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.Themes
Notes
The film was directed by Robert Wise, supposedly after the studio decided they wanted a better-known film director than Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry at the film's helm. It displays state-of-the-art (for the time) special effects, set design and use of models. Despite this, the film is widely regarded as ponderous and even boring, especially in the second half, which often consists of little more than scenes of the Enterprise flying through the interior of the cloud, with the awed reactions of the crew. The story is clearly little more than an hour-long TV episode fleshed out to two hours. Despite this, the first hour of the film contains some witty moments and good character moments.