But, damn if I can’t see what the hell is going on most of the time. Shouldn’t that added motion be used to hide/compensate for cheap effects? But they keep using it for very expensive scenes. It took me a third viewing of the Dark Knight to get a good handle on how awesome that last vehicle chase was (with the semi).

I actually have an even bigger problem with the shaky in scenes that are static. Now, I loved loved loved Star Trek. Already saw it twice.

Quick side bar: I grew up more on Trek than Star Wars, even tho I also adore Star Wars. But back in the 70s/80s … you didn’t just get to see movies whenever. I had some kiddie audio books for the three SW movies … and that was kind of it. Star Trek was in syndication … and I ate that shit up.

So, the shaky … In the bar scene, when Pike talks to Kirk … I though the projectionist was futzing with the camera. But, upon a second viewing, that was all done on purpose. Same with a very blurred Spock toward the end.

Dude. I’m sadly getting old. I’m ok with lens flare. And I’ll suffer through some movement in tense action scene if filmmakers just want to set money on fire.

But …. don’t make me feel like a hafta puke during a scene where people are sitting at a damn table. Seriously.

That said, assuming I was a poor communicator, let me rehash.

a) I do not dislike the active camera in films. In many ways, I prefer it. But I only prefer it when it’s done right, because if it’s done wrong, it can significantly detract from the film.

b) I’m lumping Greengrass in with the first Bourne film and the Shield — “almost right” does not equate to amateurish. I feel that the latter two Bourne films make a few mis-steps in the editing room, with some cuts that are too hasty. But I still love the Bourne films. They’re Bond done right (well, before Casino Royale came along and actually gave us a Bond film worth watching). Let me clarify again: I like the active camera. I like Greengrass and his work. For reals. Relax.

c) Go back and read my Trek “review” again (I put quotes around it, because it’s barely that). The only reason I called out the fight scene is because, after 15 minutes of trying to think of something meaningful to say about the movie, that’s what popped in my head. Not because I’m consumed by it; I’m not. The fight scene isn’t even a great example of the “unsteadicam” problem, but it was a doorway to let me rant about it. Yes, the script sucks in Trek. It does. It’s built on a trembling house of cards, where each card in the structure is the same: the Joker, or the Fool. The whole movie is driven by coincidence, and that makes character choices fail to really matter. All that being said, I didn’t think about it during the movie, and I can barely be summoned to think about it now. That’s ultimately my point about the movie — for good or bad, I don’t have much to really say about it. My brain goes to the movie, it wades around in the waters for a few minutes, and then it gets out and dries off. I liked it. I didn’t hate it. I didn’t love it. If it had a better script, if it had been smarter? I probably would’ve loved it. C’est la vie. Shit happens. Oh wells.

Anyway, I’m not saying your argument is void because you’re disagreeing with me. You know I love the way you think, even when you do disagree with me. I’m saying that Greengrass is pretty well recognized, from Bloody Sunday on, as a guy who knows how to do handheld, so citing him as an “almost” strikes me as coming from a place of bias against the style. I think the cinematography in the Bourne sequels is pretty fucking brilliant.

1. I wasn’t confused during Kirk’s bar brawl, and I got the sense of his fighting style and what was happening even without tracking the choreography. Just as I can write a fight in prose without necessarily tracking specific punches, so can a fight be described in film with a degree of abstraction. One way you can tell whether or not a fight scene is really about the fighting is how the director chooses to show it to you, right?

Anyway, I understood what was happening and I found your call for an end to such photography to be a threat, because I enjoy those Bourne movies.

2. To get the maximum effect out of handheld, you have to catch the action just so, and the audience’s relationship to the screen makes a huge difference. A modern motion picture lives on the big screen for maybe 90 days, and in the home theater for the rest of all eternity. This kind of camerawork may look great on the on-set monitors and at home. However — and acceptably, to me — the theater experience is not always its best home.

You’re not going to be soothed by me telling you that handheld photography is fine, even if you don’t like it. I similarly refuse to be soothed by the idea that it doesn’t matter if the movie is smart or not.

My argument is that nothing would be lost if Star Trek were smarter. What would be gained? It would be smarter. The trouble with the franchise wasn’t that the movies were smart and needed dumbing down, it was that they were not so good. I enjoy plenty of dumb movies, but I don’t believe we have to use up opportunities for smart movies to get our dumb, fun movies.

Honestly, I’m surprised to see that you’re bothered more by fight photography outside of your pleasure zone than you are by flaccid, fluky screenwriting. You’re more bothered that you couldn’t tell where Kirk punched Nameless Cadet #3 in the Rote Bar Fight than you are by the fact that Nero could just use the MacGuffin Tech to save his planet 130 years early, in keeping with his declared motivation?

– c.

They should bring back the whole team. Get the band back together.

Er. Except for the screenwriters. Get some new screenwriters, I think. Put Drew Goddard on this. Put BKV on it.

– c.

While I see Will’s point about the bar scene NOT being a fight scene insomuch as it sets up Kirk as fuck-up and Pike as motivating force but I disagree. One of my first compliments about the movie was Kirk’s fighting style as highlighted in the bar and brought back on the Space Elevator in time that his surviving the end of the movie made any sense. It was definitely a fight scene, specifically a “How to Fight the James T. Kirk Way” scene. Because when done right, fight scenes tell you something about the participants.

To be fair I got all that even with the Sens-o-round epilepsy-cam, so I guess I can’t complain that it didn’t work, only that I’m tired of it in general.

Anyway, I loved it on toast. I thought it was great in every way that matters. I’ll agree it’s not exactly brain food but I came out thinking about stuff. Most of it was dominated by how much it was or wasn’t Trek-proper at first. But I was left thinking about Nero’s motivations and how they treated [MAJOR PLOT POINT PEOPLE KEEP CASUALLY SPOILING], b/c you can totally do that wrong.

I’m not pondering the heavy-handed message of tolerance as delivered by a superintellegent space cloud or whether robots feel love, but I liked that about it. A lot of sci-fi really reaches to be prescient when they’re better served at shutting up and telling a story. The lesson (if any) will sort itself out. Example: BSG, which took far too much umbrage in their last leg on being “totally Sci-fi” all of the sudden.

Meh. My two cents. Put them in a high yield savings account or toss them into a fountain to poison the Koi.

–M

So, expect this reply to be all the more acerbic. You were warned.

Okay, I seem to have stepped on the hem of your cranky pants. Better get them laundered.

First: I didn’t say Greengrass was an amateur. I said he got it almost right. I really like the Bourne films — I just think the action sequences in the first are sharper and better defined than in the latter two.

Second: Because I don’t agree with you, my argument is null and void? Or is it because Greengrass is a vaunted director? Spielberg is awesome. Big fan over here. I’d watch a PSA on syphilis if he filmed it. But don’t pretend he hasn’t done some less-than-laudable films, or made unfortunate choices in some of his work. If we can’t criticize the efforts of professionals, then film criticism becomes impossible. C’mon. Give me a break. Just because I may not like the same things you don’t like doesn’t mean my argument is dashed against the rocks like a deformed baby. Criticism is opinion. I have one. You have one. Fine. You think the active camera works more often than I do? Good for you. High-five. I disagree. So, my argument is shot?

Third: Every fight scene isn’t about every punch, no. But every scene in a film is telling a story — not necessarily the larger story, no, but it is contributing to a narrative, abstractly or not. If the visuals are muddy, then that narrative is muddy.

Fourth: The bar scene in Trek is, objectively, a fight scene. Subjectively, maybe not. But on the set, I promise you that the actors and filmmakers referred to it as a “fight scene.”

EDIT: I see another comment. The film relies wholly on ludicrous coincidences, which is a sticking point. But “dumb fun” remains legitimate for some people. It remains so for me. I love Evil Dead II and Army of Darkness, but both are pretty goddamn dumb. That doesn’t make them bad. Dumb fun is a viable choice — it’s just a weird choice for a Star Trek film.