The Librarian: Return to King Solomon’s Mines (2006)

Director: Jonathan Frakes

Cast: Noah Wyle, Gabrielle Anwar, Robert Foxworth, Bob Newhart

Have I Seen it Before: Nah, just as with The Librarian: Quest for the Spear (2004), the adventures of Flynn Carsen (Wyle) have flown outside of my radar all of these years. As Lora watches the eventual series, I tend to be in the room while these films are happening around me.

Did I Like It: It’s clear almost immediately that this movie is far superior to the original. Wyle sheds at least some of that “aww, shucks” quality that made him a TV star in the first place, which goes some of the way to giving the pacing of the adventure a less halting quality.

What’s more, this feels far more like an actual movie than an above average weekend weather report, what with all of the preposterous green screen material that fueled the proceedings in the last go around. Maybe it’s a product of the first film’s marginal success, but there appears to be more of a budget here. At any rate, the production value is infinitely higher. All credit should be given to Jonathan Frakes’ influence, a clearly gifted director who should definitely be allowed to keep making features, even if two of his efforts twenty years ago failed to make a dime. It wasn’t his fault! The man made Star Trek: First Contact (1996). Show some respect!

Now, before we go thinking that my praise for this second Librarian film knows no bounds, let’s keep in mind that it’s not like the film has any surprises in it, even if all of the elements presented work a little bit better here. The twist in the plot is so obvious, I knew from where every new character was coming the moment they appeared on screen. And while the special effects are certainly better, this is still at its core a film designed for the sole purpose of filling time between cable broadcasts of NBA games.

Star Trek: Nemesis (2002)

Director: Stuart Baird

Cast: Patrick Stewart, Jonathan Frakes, Brent Spiner, Tom Hardy

Have I Seen It Before?: Oh, yes. Funny story: In early December 2002, I had my wisdom teeth removed. I tried to get clear-headed enough from all of the pain medication so I could make it to a screening of this film during its opening weekend. As the film, sort of happened in front of me it felt all wrong, so much so that as the end credits limped into existence, I shouted in the middle of the theater, “What the hell was that?” Apparently I still had some cotton in my mouth, and more than a little painkillers in my system, and a little cotton in my motuh, so it sounded more like, “Wha tha hee iyat?” But the point remains.

Did I like it?: See the previous statement.

I love Star Trek, and 2000s/1990s when it seemed like there would never be a shortage of Trek material, it felt like there was plenty of room to thoroughly dislike the entries that didn’t hold up.

The film is not a celebration of a beloved TV franchise, but more the final strained compromise of years’ worth of studio politics. Stuart Baird only got the director seat because he did Paramount a solid by doing a last-minute editing jobs on Mission: Impossible II (2000) and Lara Croft: Tomb Raider (2001). One might say that the great film editors shouldn’t direct Star Trek films after the muddled affair that was Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979), but Robert Wise edited films like Citizen Kane (1941) and had previously directed The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951) and West Side Story (1961). Stuart Baird got the movie Supernova (2000) into some form that could be released in theaters, after directing the distinctly unmemorable Executive Decision (1996) and U.S. Marshals (1998) and hasn’t been allowed to direct a film since.

There’s a temptation to make the review a list of complaints. They artificially lowered the dialogue for Worf (Michael Dorn) to where he is inexplicably the actor with the most screen time in all of Trek, and somehow unrecognizable. The films based on The Next Generation never successfully utilized Beverly Crusher (Gates McFadden) and things are certainly no better here. The film desperately wants to be The Next Generation’s answer to Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982), and the desperation shows.

And yet, since it ushered in an era of a Trek desert, I don’t want to think of the film as a total loss. It’s the last film to feature a score by Jerry Goldsmith, so one wants to revel in what we have left. The ending originally felt like a sour note to end the time with The Next Generation crew with a whimper, but thankfully Star Trek: Picard is here to continue the adventures of the man from La Barre, and it solidifies the sacrifice of Data as genuine far more than the deaths of other characters in the Trek series over the years.

Star Trek: First Contact (1996)

Director: Jonathan Frakes

Cast*: Patrick Stewart, Brent Spiner, James Cromwell**, Alfre Woodard

Have I Seen it Before: Oh, yes… I have the most vivd memory of coming out of the theater in November 1996 getting picked up by my parents. When they asked me how it was, I said, “The greatest two hours*** of my life.” They said, “You’re young yet.” Nearly twenty-five years later, I’m still not entirely sure what they were talking about.

Did I Like It: See the above comment.

At their core, the four films based on The Next Generation are a mixed bag. The producers behind the various television series of the era maybe never quite got out of their television mindset, so one could argue that we just got four feature-length new episodes featuring an A-plot for Picard (Stewart) and a B-plot for Data (Spiner). The rest of the cast—the main draw for that section of the audience that was likely to buy multiple tickets—got a few pieces of business here and there.

But in 1996—the thirtieth anniversary of the franchise—all of the cylinders were firing, and thus, we were treated to Picard and company’s undisputedly greatest film. Like The Wrath of Khan (1982) before it, First Contact wisely mines one of the better television entries and makes a more epic sequel, while at the same time not vapidly mimicking the structure of that earlier, GOAT movie, like they did in the near-unwatchable Nemesis (2002). There are also plenty of references to Moby Dick.

And still, my opinion of the film has morphed considerably over the years. As I have with most Trek films, I walked out of the theater thinking it was perfect. I’ve been wrong every time. For years afterward, I came to think Picard’s plot on the starship exacting his revenge on the Borg was the real story, while the prepping of the flight of the Phoenix down on Earth was filler. I now think of Picard’s Ahab-ing as mostly fine, if a little redundant of action star schtick which feels ill-fitting for Stewart. The real genius of the film is with Cochrane (Cromwell).

He’s a lout. A drinker. A low-level sex maniac. He has a passing interest in his work and legacy, but only in how much it will keep him in the company of his vices.

By most honest accounts, Gene Roddenberry—the creator of Star Trek—was the same way. Producer Rick Berman stated that the idea behind the film was to do something about the creation of Star Trek (i.e., the first meeting of Vulcan and Human, and the introduction of FTL flight).

He wasn’t kidding. This movie is about the genesis of the notion of Star Trek, and at the helm of this great idea is a creator history would lionize, but who was just as imperfect as the rest of us.

*It’s one of the near-fatal flaws of the Next Generation films that they never quite found enough for the rest of the cast—especially the funnier-than-she-gets-credit-for Gates McFadden—to do in their four entries into the canon.

**So I’m sitting at my computer, and for the life of me my mind is blanking on the actor who played the father of warp drive. It eventually came to me, but it has to be a testament to the actor that I don’t think of his name or any of the other numerous roles he’s played. He simply is Zefram Cochrane. Which is all the more impressive as legend has it the first choice for the role was none other than admitted Star Trek mega fan Tom Hanks, but he sadly had to back out as he was focused on directing That Thing You Do (1996). He would have been great, too, but here we are.

***The runtime is 111 minutes, but I’m sure the trailers were top-notch.

Star Trek: Insurrection (1998)

Director: Jonathan Frakes

Cast: Patrick Stewart, Brent Spiner, Jonathan Frakes, F. Murray Abraham

Have I Seen it Before: Over twenty years ago, I opted out a date with my first girlfriend to ensure I saw this one opening weekend. So yeah.

Did I Like It: How many new episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation are we likely to get? Don’t answer that question just yet… Picard is coming back…

The text of this review appeared previously in a blog post entitled “How Could No One Else Like These Movies? Part Two, But With No Electric Boogaloo.” published 04/30/2017.

I’m not sure why the ninth film in the series—the fourth to feature The Next Generation crew—gets shit on so much. This is especially true when the series also includes the two-plus hour sleeping pill that is The Motion Picture (1979), the sloppy ode to mountain climbing that is The Final Frontier (1989)*, and that testament to uninspired mediocrity that was Nemesis (2002).

The most frequent complaint I hear about this movie is that, after the epic battle across time and space in First Contact (1996)**, this follow-up is less an actual movie, and more a very basic, episode of the television series upon which it is based. To that, I ask: Why is that a problem? If anyone reading this has ever taken in any random episode of The Next Generation*** and not enjoyed it, then, maybe your problem with Insurrection is that you just don’t like Star Trek that much.

The ancillary material for the film is even better. The late Michael Piller wrote a no-holds-barred account of his experiences writing the screenplay. It’s one of the truly great screenwriting books, ranking right up there with William Goldman’s Adventures in the Screen Trade. It’s only recently available, and I can’t recommend it highly enough.

*Which I actually kind of like, and almost made its way onto this list, except that I get that the movie doesn’t work for the most part. 

**I realize now that movies may have began and ended for me in 1996.

***First season being the only exception, naturally.