Star
Trek: The Motion Picture is a 1979 American science fiction film
released by Paramount Pictures. It is the first film based on Star
Trek, and a sequel to the Star Trek television series. The film is
set in the twenty-third century, when a mysterious and immensely
powerful alien cloud called V'Ger approaches Earth, destroying
everything in its path. Admiral James T. Kirk (William Shatner)
assumes command of his previous starship, the recently refitted USS
Enterprise, to lead it on a mission to save the planet and determine
V'Ger's origins.
When the original
television series was cancelled in 1969, Star Trek creator Gene
Roddenberry lobbied Paramount to continue the franchise through a
film. The success of the series in syndication convinced the studio
to begin work on a feature film in 1975. A series of writers
attempted to craft a suitably epic script.
Roddenberry was allocated
$3 to $5 million to develop a script. By June 30th he had produced
what he considered an acceptable script, but studio executives
disagreed. This first draft, The God Thing, featured a grounded
Admiral Kirk assembling the old crew on the refitted Enterprise to
clash with a godlike entity many miles across, hurtling towards
Earth. The object turns out to be a super-advanced computer, the
remains of a scheming race who were cast out of their dimension. Kirk
wins out, the entity returns to its dimension, and the Enterprise
crew resumes their voyages.
The film was postponed
until spring (March/April) 1975 while Paramount fielded new scripts
from acclaimed writers such as Ray Bradbury, Theodore Sturgeon and
Harlan Ellison. Ellison's story had a snake-like alien race tampering
with Earth's history to create a kindred race; Kirk reunites with his
old crew, but they are faced with the dilemma of killing off the
reptilian race in Earth's prehistory just to maintain humanity's
dominance. When Ellison presented his idea, an executive suggested
Ellison read Chariots of the Gods? and include the Maya civilization
into his story, which enraged the writer because he knew Mayans did
not exist at the dawn of time. By October 1975 Robert Silverberg had
been signed to work on the screenplay along with a second writer,
John D. F. Black, whose treatment featured a black hole that
threatened to consume all of existence. Roddenberry teamed up with
Jon Povill to write a new story that featured the Enterprise crew
setting an altered universe right by time travel; like Black's idea,
Paramount did not consider it epic enough.
The
original Star Trek cast who had agreed to appear in the new movie,
with contracts as-yet unsigned pending script approval, grew anxious
about the constant delays, and pragmatically accepted other acting
offers while Roddenberry worked with Paramount. The studio decided to
turn the project over to the television division, reasoning that
since the roots of the franchise lay in television the writers would
be able to develop the right script. A number of screenwriters
offered up ideas that were summarily rejected. As Paramount
executives' interest in the film began to wane, Roddenberry, backed
by fan letters, applied pressure to the studio. In June 1976,
Paramount assigned Jerry Isenberg, a young and active producer, to be
executive producer of the project, with the budget expanded to $8
million. Povill was tasked with finding more writers to develop a
script. His list included Edward Anhalt, James Goldman, Francis Ford
Coppola, George Lucas, Ernest Lehman and Robert Bloch. The end result
was a compiled list of 34 names, none of whom were ever chosen to pen
the script.
In October, British
screenwriters Chris Bryant and Allan Scott wrote a 20 page treatment
entitled Planet of the Titans, which executives Barry Diller and
Michael Eisner liked. Bryant believed he earned the screenwriting
assignment because his view of Kirk resembled what Roddenberry
modeled him on; "one of Horatio Nelson's captains in the South
Pacific, six months away from home and three months away by
communication". A list of possible directors, including Coppola,
Steven Spielberg, Lucas and Robert Wise, but all were busy at the
time (or were not willing to work on the small script money budget).
Philip Kaufman, having impressive science fiction credits, signed on
to direct and was given a crash course in the series. Roddenberry
screened ten episodes from the original series for Kaufman, including
the most representative of the show and those he considered most
popular: "The City on the Edge of Forever", "The Devil
in the Dark", "Amok Time", "Journey to
Babel", "Shore Leave", "The Trouble With
Tribbles", "The Enemy Within", "The Corbomite
Maneuver", "This Side of Paradise" and "A Piece
of the Action". Early work was promising and by the fall of 1976
the project was building momentum. Fans organized a mail campaign
that flooded the White House with 400,000 letters, influencing Gerald
Ford to rechristen the Space Shuttle Constitution to Enterprise.
Bryant and Scott's proposal became the first accepted by the studio
in October; Roddenberry immediately stopped work on other projects to
refocus on Star Trek, and the screenwriters and Isenberg were swamped
with grateful fan mail. The elation was short-lived; the first draft
of the completed script was not finished until March 1st, 1977, and
pressure was mounting for Paramount to either begin production or cut
its losses and cancel the project. Isenberg began scouting filming
locations and hired designers and illustrators to complement the
script. Dissatisfied with having everyone take a turn at rewriting
the script, Bryant and Scott quit in April 1977. Kaufman reconceived
the story with Spock as the captain of his own ship and featuring
Toshiro Mifune as Spock's Klingon nemesis, but Katzenberg informed
the director in May 1977 that Paramount
was scrapping the project and instead planned on returning the
franchise to its roots with a new television series, Star Trek: Phase II.
Barry Diller planned on a
new Star Trek series forming the cornerstone for a new television
network. Though Paramount was loath to abandon its work on the film,
Roddenberry wanted to bring many of the production staff from the
original series to work on the new show, titled Star Trek: Phase II.
Producer Harold Livingston
was assigned to find writers for new episodes, while Roddenberry
prepared a writers' guide briefing the uninitiated on the franchise
canon. Of the original cast, only Leonard Nimoy stated he would not
return. To replace Spock, Roddenberry created a logical Vulcan
prodigy named Xon. Since Xon was too young to fill the role of first
officer, Roddenberry developed Commander William Decker, and later
added Ilia. The new series' pilot episode "In Thy Image"
was based on a two-page outline by Roddenberry about a NASA probe
returning to Earth, having gained sentience. Alan Dean Foster wrote a
treatment for the pilot, which Livingston turned into a screenplay.
When the script was presented to Michael Eisner, he declared it
worthy of being told as a feature film. At the same time, the success
of Close Encounters of the Third Kind showed Paramount that Star
Wars' success in the science fiction genre at the box office could
repeat. On November 11th, just two and a half weeks before production
on Phase
II was due to start, the studio announced that the television series
had been cancelled in favor of a new feature film. Cast and crew who
had been hired that Monday were laid off by Friday, and construction
came to a halt. Production was moved to April 1978 so that the
necessary scripts, sets, and wardrobe could be upgraded.
On March 28th, 1978,
Paramount assembled the largest press conference held at the studio
since Cecil B. DeMille announced he was making The Ten Commandments.
Eisner announced that Academy-Award winning director Robert Wise
(center right) would direct a film adaptation of the television
series, titled Star Trek - The Motion Picture. Wise had only seen a
few Star Trek episodes, so Paramount gave him about a dozen to watch.
The budget was projected at $15 million. Dennis Clark (Comes a
Horseman) was invited to rewrite the script and to include Spock, but
he disliked Roddenberry, who demanded sole credit. Livingston
returned as writer, and although he also found Roddenberry
unreasonable, Wise and Katzenberg convinced him to continue rewriting
the script throughout production. The original cast of the TV show
would return in their original roles.
William Shatner as James
T. Kirk
The former captain of the
USS Enterprise and is now an Admiral at Starfleet headquarters. When
asked during a March 1978 press conference about what it would be
like to reprise the role, Shatner said, "An actor brings to a
role not only the concept of a character but his own basic
personality, things that he is, and both Leonard Nimoy and myself
have changed over the years, to a degree at any rate, and we will
bring that degree of change inadvertently to the role we recreate."
Leonard Nimoy as Spock
The Enterprise's
half-Vulcan, half-human science officer. Nimoy had been dissatisfied
with unpaid royalties from Star Trek and did not intend to reprise
the role, so Spock was left out of the screenplay. Director Robert
Wise, having been informed by his daughter and son-in-law that the
film "would not be Star Trek" without Nimoy, sent Jeffrey
Katzenberg to New York City to meet with Nimoy. Katzenberg gave Nimoy
a check to make up for his lost royalties, and the actor attended the
March 1978 press conference with the rest of the returning cast.
Nimoy was dissatisfied with the script, and his meeting with
Katzenberg led to an agreement that the final script would need
Nimoy's approval. Despite the financial issues, Nimoy said he was
comfortable with being identified as Spock because it had a positive
impact on his fame.
DeForest Kelley as
Leonard McCoy
The chief medical officer
aboard the Enterprise. Kelley had reservations with the script,
feeling that the characters and relationships from the series were
not in place. Along with Shatner and Nimoy, Kelley lobbied for
greater characterization, but their opinions were largely ignored.
James Doohan as
Montgomery Scott
The Enterprise's chief
engineer. Doohan created the distinctive Klingon vocabulary heard in
the film. Linguist Marc Okrand later developed a fully realized
Klingon language based on the actor's made-up words.
Walter Koenig as Pavel Chekov
The Enterprise's weapons
officer. Koenig noted that the expected sense of camaraderie and
euphoria at being assembled for screen tests at the start of the
picture was nonexistent. "This may be Star Trek," he wrote,
"but it isn't the old Star Trek." The actor was hopeful for
the film, but admitted he was disappointed by his character's bit part.
Nichelle Nichols as Uhura
The communications officer
aboard the Enterprise. Nichols noted in her autobiography that she
was one of the actors most opposed to the new uniforms added for the
film because the drab, unisex look "wasn't Uhura".
George Takei as Hikaru Sulu
The Enterprise's helmsman.
In his autobiography, Takei described the film's shooting schedule as
"astonishingly luxurious", but noted that frequent script
rewrites during production "usually favored Bill" [Shatner].
Other actors from the
television series who returned included Majel Barrett as Christine
Chapel, a nurse on the original series Chapel was now doctor aboard
the Enterprise, and Grace Lee Whitney as Janice Rand, formerly one of
Kirk's yeomen. David Gautreaux, who had been cast as Xon in the
aborted second television series, cameos as Branch, the commander of
the Epsilon 9 communications station. Mark Lenard portrays the
Klingon commander in the film's opening sequence; the actor also
played Spock's father, Sarek, in the television series and in later
feature films.
New cast members included:
Persis Khambatta as Ilia
The Deltan navigator of the
Enterprise. Khambatta (right) was originally cast in the role when
The Motion Picture was a television pilot. She took the role even
after Roddenberry warned her that she would have to shave her head
completely for filming.
Stephen Collins as
Willard Decker
The new captain of the
Enterprise. He is temporarily demoted to Commander and First Officer
when Kirk takes command of the Enterprise. Collins (right) was
completely unfamiliar with the franchise, having never seen an
episode of the series. Kelley's dressing room was next to Collins',
and the older actor became his mentor for the production. Given the
preexisting television cast Collins' casting was the only one that
director Wise participated in; he called Collins' performance
"excellent, in a difficult role." Collins is best known for
playing Eric Camden on the long-running television series 7th Heaven.
His TV wife, Annie Camden, on the series was played by Catherine
Hicks who played Dr. Gillian Taylor in Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home.
The writers began to adapt
"In Thy Image" into a film script, but the script was not
completed until four months after production commenced. Wise felt
that the story was sound, but the action and visuals could be made
more exciting. As the intended start of filming in late spring 1978
approached, it was clear a new start date was needed. Time was of the
essence; Paramount was worried that their science fiction film would
appear at the tail end of a cycle, now that every major studio had
such a film in the works. Livingston described the writers' issue
with the story, calling it unworkable:
"We
had a marvelous antagonist, so omnipotent that for us to defeat it
or even communicate with it, or have any kind of relationship with
it, made the initial concept of the story false. Here's this gigantic
machine that's a million years further advanced than we are. Now, how
the hell can we possibly deal with this? On what level? As the story
developed, everything worked until the very end. How do you resolve
this thing? If humans can defeat this marvelous machine, than it's
really not so great, is it? Or if it really is great, will we like
those humans who do defeat it? Should they defeat it? Who is the
story's hero anyway? That was the problem. We experimented with all
kinds of approaches. We didn't know what to do with the ending. We
always ended up against a blank wall."
The script received
constant input from the producers and from Shatner and Nimoy. The
discussions led to repeated rewrites, right up to the day the pages
were to be shot. At one point, scenes were being rewritten so often
it became necessary to note on script pages the hour of the revision.
Though changes were constant, the biggest push for alteration
revolved around the ending. Much of the rewriting had to do with the
relationships of Kirk and Spock, Decker and Ilia, and the Enterprise
and V'ger. A final draft of the third act was approved in late
September 1978, but had it not been for a Penthouse interview where
NASA director Robert Jastrow said that mechanical forms of life were
likely, the ending may not have been approved at all.
The first new sets
(intended for Phase II) were constructed beginning July 25th, 1977.
The fabrication was supervised by Joseph Jennings, an art director
involved in the original television series, special-effects expert
Jim Rugg, and former Trek designer Matt Jefferies, on loan as
consultant from Little House on the Prairie. When the television
series was cancelled and plans for a film put into place, new sets
were needed for the large 70 mm film format.
Wise asked Harold Michelson
to be the film's production designer, and Michelson was put to work
on finishing the incomplete Phase II sets. The designer began with
the bridge, which had nearly been completed. Michelson first removed
Chekov's new weapons station, a semicircular plastic bubble grafted
onto one side of the bridge wall. The idea for Phase II was that
Chekov would have looked out toward space while crosshairs in the
bubble tracked targets. Wise instead wanted Chekov's station to face
the Enterprise's main viewer, a difficult request as the set was
primarily circular. Production illustrator Michael Minor created a
new look for the station using a flat edge in the corner of the set.
The
bridge ceiling was redesigned, with Michelson taking structural
inspiration from a jet engine fan. Minor built a central bubble for
the ceiling to give the bridge a human touch. Most of the bridge
consoles, designed by Lee Cole, remained from the scrapped television
series. Cole remained on the motion picture production and was
responsible for much of the visual artwork created. To inform actors
and series writers, Lee prepared a USS Enterprise Flight Manual as a
continuity guide to control functions. It was necessary for all the
main cast to be familiar with control sequences at their stations as
each panel was activated by touch via heat-sensitive plates. The
wattage of the light bulbs beneath the plastic console buttons was
reduced from 25 watts to 6 watts after the generated heat began
melting the controls. The seats were covered in girdle material, used
because of its stretching capacity and ability to be easily dyed. For
the science station, two consoles were rigged for hydraulic operation
so that they could be rolled into the walls when not in use, but the
system was disconnected when the crew discovered it would be easier
to move them by hand.
Aside from control
interfaces, the bridge set was populated with monitors looping
animations. Each oval monitor was a rear-projection screen on which
super 8 mm and 16 mm film sequences looped for each special effect.
The production acquired 42 films for this purpose from an Arlington,
Virginia-based company, Stowmar Enterprises. Stowmar's footage was
exhausted only a few weeks into filming, and it became clear that new
monitor films would be needed faster than an outside supplier could
deliver them. Cole, Minor, and another production designer, Rick
Sternbach, worked together with Povill to devise faster ways of
shooting new footage. Cole and Povill rented an oscilloscope for a
day and filmed its distortions. Other loops came from Long Beach
Hospital, the University of California at San Diego, and experimental
computer labs in New Mexico. In all, over two hundred pieces of
monitor footage were created and catalogued into a seven-page listing.
The Enterprise engine room
was redesigned while keeping consistent with the theory that the
interior appearance had to match the corresponding area visible in
exterior views of the starship. Michelson wanted the engine room to
seem vast, a difficult effect to achieve on a small sound stage. To
create the illusion of depth and long visible distances, the art
department staff worked on designs that would utilize forced
perspective; set designer Lewis Splittgerber considered the engine
room the most difficult set to realize. On film the engine room
appeared hundreds of feet long, but the set was actually only 40 feet
(12 m) in length. To achieve the proper look, the floor slanted
upward and narrowed, while very small actors of three, four, and five
feet in height were used as extras to give the appearance of being
far from the camera. For "down shots" of the engineering
complex, floor paintings extended the length of the warp core several
stories. J.C. Backings Company created these paintings; similar
backings were used to extend the length of ship hallways and the rec
room set.
Redesigning the Enterprise
corridors was also Michelson's responsibility. Originally the
corridors were of straight plywood construction reminiscent of the
original series, which Roddenberry referred to as "Des Moines
Holiday Inn Style". To move away from this hotel look, Michelson
created a new bent and angular design. Roddenberry and Wise agreed
with Michelson that in three hundred years, lighting did not need to
be overhead, so they had the lighting radiate upward from the floor.
Different lighting schemes were used to simulate different decks of
the ship with the same length of corridor. Aluminum panels on the
walls outside Kirk's and Ilia's quarters were covered with an orange
ultrasuede to represent the living area of the ship.
The
transporter had originally been developed for the television series
as a matter of convenience; it would have been prohibitively
expensive to show the Enterprise land on every new planet. For the
redesign Michelson felt that the transporter should look and feel
more powerful. He added a sealed control room that would protect
operators from the powerful forces at work. The space between the
transporter platform and the operators was filled with complex
machinery, and cinematographer Richard Kline added eerie lighting to
the set to create atmosphere.
After the redesign of the
Enterprise sets was complete, Michelson turned his attention to
creating the original sets needed for the film. The recreation deck
occupied an entire soundstage, dwarfing the small room built for the
planned television series; this was the largest interior in the film.
The set was 24 feet (7.3 m) high, decorated with 107 pieces of custom-designed
furniture, and packed with 300 people for filming. Below a large
viewing screen on one end of the set was a series of art panels
containing illustrations of previous ships bearing the name
Enterprise. One of the ships was NASA's own Enterprise, added per
Roddenberry's request:
"Some fans have
suggested that our new Enterprise should carry a plaque somewhere
which commemorates the fact it was named after the first space
shuttle launched from Earth in 1970s. This is an intriguing idea. It
also has publicity advantages if properly released at the right time.
It won't hurt NASA's feelings either. I'll leave it to you where you
want it on the vessel."
Pictured above,
Roddenberry and the cast of Star Trek visiting the Space Shuttle
Enterprise at the Rockwell International plant at Palmdale,
California, USA.
Another large construction
task was the V'ger set, referred to by the production staff as
"the Coliseum" or "the microwave wok". The set
was designed and fabricated in four and a half weeks, and was
filmable from all angles; parts of the set were designed to pull away
for better camera access at the center. Throughout production Star
Trek used eleven of Paramount's thirty-two sound stages, more than
any other film done there at the time. To save money, construction
coordinator Gene Kelley struck sets with his own crew immediately
after filming, lest Paramount charge the production to have the sets
dismantled. The final cost for constructing the sets ran at
approximately $1.99 million, not counting additional costs for Phase
II fabrication.
Ralph
McQuarrie and Ken Adam worked on the ship designs for Planet of the
Titans. McQuarrie had to redesign the sets and models that were meant
for the television series; the Enterprise, space dock, and orbital
office were remade with greater details to look more impressive on
the bigger movie screens. McQuarrie also redesigned the Enterprise
with a flat hull, and though his models never appeared in the film
they were later used for the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode
"The Best of Both Worlds".
Art director Richard Taylor
wanted to completely redesign the ship, abandoning Jeffries'
television design, but Roddenberry insisted on the same shape.
Instead, Taylor focused on the details, giving it a stylization he
considered "almost Art Deco". Concept artist Andrew Probert
helped with the redesign. Probert elaborated on Jenning's television
movie model, making the Enterprise's secondary hull wider, with
angled struts supporting the nacelles (engine pylons) and an
elaborate wiring system for the model's lights. In the television
series, it had not been clear where the photon torpedoes were
intended to have originated from, so Probert rectified this by
designing multiple launcher designs at the base of the secondary hull
for Taylor to choose from. Probert even added elements such as a
separating saucer and landing pads that never made it to The Motion
Picture or any other film featuring the model. While the hull surface
was kept smooth, it was treated with a special paint finish that made
its surface appear iridescent in certain lights. More windows were
added than the previous design, and transparent images of the sets
were inserted behind the windows so that when the camera approached
the model it appeared that viewers could see something inside. As a
joke, these images featured Probert, other production staff members,
and Mickey Mouse.
Most of the models in The
Motion Picture were created by Magicam, a Paramount subsidiary. The
main Enterprise model was eight feet long, to a scale of 1/120th
scale size, or 1 inch to 10 feet . It took 14 months and $150,000 to
build. Instead of standard fiberglass used for older models, the new
Enterprise was constructed with lightweight plastics, weighing 85
pounds. The biggest design issue was making sure that the connective
dorsal neck and twin warp nacelle struts were strong enough so that
no part of the ship model would sag, bend, or quiver when the model
was being moved. The completed model could be supported at one of
five possible points as each photographic angle required. A second,
20-inch model of the ship was used for long shots. Magicam also
produced the orbital dry dock seen during the Enterprise's first
appearance in the film. Measuring 4 ft x 10 ft x 6 ft, its 56 neon
panels required 168,000 volts of electricity to operate, with a
separate table to support the transformers; the final price for the
dock setup was $200,000.
The creation of V'Ger
caused problems for the entire production. The crew was dissatisfied
with the original four-foot clay model, which looked like a
modernized Nemo's Nautilus submarine. Industrial designer Syd Mead
was hired to visualize a new version of the mammoth craft. Mead
created a machine that contained organic elements based on input from
Wise, Roddenberry, and the effects leads. The final model was 68 feet
long, built from the rear forward so that the camera crews could
shoot footage while the next sections were still being fabricated.
The model was built out of a plethora of materials, wood, foam,
macramé, styrofoam cups, incandescent, neon and strobe lights.
Dick
Rubin handled the film's props, and set up a makeshift office in the
corner of stage 9 throughout production. Many of the props were
updated designs of items previously seen in the television series,
such as phasers and handheld communicators. The only prop that
remained from the original television series was Uhura's wireless
earpiece, which Nichols specifically requested on the first day of
shooting (and all the production crew save those who had worked on
the television show had forgotten about).
The new phaser was entirely
self-contained, with its own circuitry, batteries, and four blinking
lights. The prop came with a hefty $4000 price tag; to save money,
the lights were dropped, reducing the size of the phaser by a third.
A total of 15 of the devices were made for the film. The
communicators were radically altered, as by the 1970s the
microminiaturization of electronics convinced Roddenberry that the
bulky handheld devices of the television series were no longer
believable. A wrist-based design was decided upon, with the provision
that it look far different than the watch Dick Tracy had been using
for decades previous. Two hundred communicators were fashioned, but
only a few were the $3500 top models, used for close-ups of the
device in action. Most of the props were made from plastic, as Rubin
thought that in the future man-made materials would be used almost exclusively.
William Ware Theiss, the
designer who created the original television series costumes, was too
busy to work on the film. Instead Robert Fletcher, considered one of
American theater's most successful costume and scenic designers, was
selected to design the new uniforms. As times had changed, the
Starfleet uniforms, with their bright reds, blues, greens, and golds,
had to be revised: the miniskirts worn by females on the show seemed
exciting in the 1960s but would now be considered sexist. Wise deemed
the original multicolored uniforms too garish, and Fletcher believed
that the brightness of these old designs would work against
believability when seen on the wide screen, the designer's first task
was to create new, less conspicuous uniforms.
In
the original series, divisions in ship assignments were denoted by
shirt color; for the movie, these color codes were moved to small
patches on each person's uniform. The Starfleet delta symbol, which
previously indicated duty branches, command, science, medical,
engineering, and so forth, was replaced with the command symbol for
all branches, superimposed over a circle of color indicating area of
service. The blue color of previous uniforms was discarded, for fear
they might interfere with the blue screens used for optical effects.
Three types of uniforms were fabricated: dress uniforms used for
special occasions, Class A uniforms for regular duty, and Class B
uniforms as an alternative. The Class A designs were double-stitched
in gabardine and featured gold braid designating rank. It was felt
that the traditional four gold sleeve stripes for the captain's rank
was too blatantly militaristic. Povill had to send out a memo to
Fletcher with the modified stripe rank system, as the designer
continued to get the 20th and 23rd centuries confused. Fletcher
designed the Class B uniform as similar to evolved t-shirts, with
shoulder boards used to indicate rank and service divisions. Each
costume had the shoes built into the pant leg to further the
futuristic look. An Italian shoemaker decorated by the Italian
government for making Gucci shoes was tasked with creating the
futuristic footwear. Combining the shoes and trousers was difficult,
time-consuming, and expensive, as each shoe had to be sewn by hand
after being fitted to each principal actor. There were difficulties
in communication, as the shoemaker spoke limited English and
occasionally confused shoe orders due to similar-sounding names.
Jumpsuits, serving a more utilitarian function, were the only
costumes to have pockets, and were made with a heavyweight spandex
that required a special needle to puncture the thick material. A
variety of field jackets, leisure wear, and spacesuits were also
created; as these parts had to be designed and completed before most
of the actors' parts had been cast, many roles were filled by
considering how well the actors would fit into existing costumes.
For
the civilians of San Francisco, Fletcher decided on a greater
freedom in dress. Much of the materials for these casual clothes were
found in the old storerooms at Paramount, where a large amount of
unused or forgotten silks, crepes, and leathers lay in storage. One
bolt of material had been handpicked by Cecil DeMille in 1939, and
was in perfect condition. The red, black, and gold brocade was woven
with real gold and silver wrapped around silk thread; the resulting
costume was used for a Betelgeusean ambassador (pictured above) and,
at a price of $10,000 for the fabric alone, was the most expensive
costume ever worn by a Hollywood extra. Fletcher also recycled suedes
from The Ten Commandments for the Zaranite costumes. With the
approval of Roddenberry, Fletcher fashioned complete backgrounds for
the alien races seen in the Earth and recreation deck sequences,
describing their appearances and the composition of their costumes.
Fred Phillips, the original
designer of Spock's Vulcan ears, served as The Motion Picture's
makeup artist. He and his staff were responsible for fifty masks and
makeup for the aliens seen in the film. The designs were developed by
Phillips himself or else off Fletcher's sketches. In his long
association with Star Trek Phillips produced his 2000th Spock ear
during production of The Motion Picture. Each ear was made of latex
and other ingredients blended together in a kitchen mixer, then baked
for six hours. Though Phillips had saved the original television
series casts used for making the appliances, Nimoy's ears had grown
in the decade since and new molds had to be fabricated. While on the
small screen the ears could be used up to four times, since nicks and
tears did not show up on television, Phillips had to create around
three pairs a day for Nimoy during filming. The upswept Vulcan
eyebrows needed to be applied hair by hair for proper detail, and it
took Nimoy more than two hours to prepare for filming, twice as long
as it had for television.
Besides
developing Vulcan ears and alien masks, Phillips and his assistant
Charles Schram applied more routine makeup to the principal actors.
Khambatta's head had to be freshly shaved each day, then given an
application of makeup to reduce glare from the hot set lights.
Khambatta had no qualms about shaving her head at first, but began
worrying if her hair would grow back properly. Roddenberry proposed
insuring Khambatta's hair after the actress voiced her concerns,
believing the price of such insurance to be negligible. The idea was
ultimately scrapped, as it turned out such a guarantee would be
highly expensive; the insurance company believed that there would be
difficulty in proving that the hair grew back exactly the same as
before. Instead, Khambatta visited the Georgette Klinger Skin Care
Salon in Beverly Hills, where experts recommended that she receive
six facials and scalp treatments during the course of production. The
salon also prescribed a daily scalp treatment routine of cleansing
bars, brilliantine lotion, conditioner, makeup remover, and cleansing
lotion. The studio agreed these measures were necessary and footed
the bill while Khambatta spent six months following the tedious
instructions (her hair eventually regrew without issue, though she
kept her shaven locks after production had ended.)
In the decade between the
end of the Star Trek television series and the film, many of the
futuristic technologies that appeared on the show, electronic doors
that open automatically, hypodermic injections, talking computers,
weapons that stun rather than kill, and personal communication
devices, had become a reality. Roddenberry had insisted that the
technology aboard the Enterprise be grounded in established science
and scientific theories. The Motion Picture likewise received
technical consultation from NASA, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory at
California Institute of Technology, and the Massachusetts Institute
of Technology, as well as individuals such as a former astronaut and
the science fiction writer Isaac Asimov.
During the rewrite of the
final scenes, the studio executives clashed with Roddenberry about
the script's ending, believing that the concept of a living machine
was too far-fetched. The executives consulted Asimov: if the writer
decided a sentient machine was plausible, the ending could stay.
Asimov loved the ending, but made one small suggestion; he felt that
the use of the word "wormhole" was incorrect, and that the
anomaly that the Enterprise found itself in would be more accurately
called a "temporal tunnel".
Untitled
AV
CLUB FEATURETTE DEPARTMENT
Untitled
Back when the first Star Trek feature was released in December 1979, the Trek franchise was still relatively modest, consisting of the original TV series, an animated cartoon series from 1973-74, and a burgeoning fan network around the world. Series creator Gene Roddenberry had conceived a second TV series, but after the success of Star Wars the project was upgraded into this lavish feature film, which reunited the original series cast aboard a beautifully redesigned starship U.S.S. Enterprise. Add
Star Trek The Motion Picture to your DVD collection.
Filming of The Motion
Picture's first scene began on August 7th, 1978. A few ad-libbed
ceremonies were performed before the cameras rolled; Roddenberry gave
Wise his baseball cap, emblazoned with "Enterprise" in gold
lettering (the cap was a gift from the captain of the nuclear carrier
Enterprise.) Wise and Roddenberry then cracked a special breakaway
bottle of champagne on the bridge set (there was no liquid inside, as
flying champagne would have damaged the readied set.) The scene
planned was the chaotic mess aboard the Enterprise bridge as the crew
readies the ship for space travel; Wise directed 15 takes into the
late afternoon before he was content with the scene. The first day's
shots used 1,650 feet of film; 420 feet were considered
"good", 1,070 feet were judged "no good", and 160
feet were wasted; only one and one-eighth pages had been shot.
Alex Weldon was hired to be
supervisor of special effects for the film. Weldon was planning on
retiring after 42 years of effects work, but his wife urged him to
take on Star Trek because she thought he did not have enough to do.
When Weldon was hired, many of the effects had already been started
or completed by Rugg; it was up to Weldon to complete more complex
and higher-budgeted effects for the motion picture. The first step of
preparation involved analyzing the script in terms of the number,
duration, and type of effects. Before costs could be determined and
Weldon could shop for necessary items, he and the other members of
the special effects team worked out all possibilities for pulling off
the effects in a convincing manner.
Richard
H. Kline served as the film's cinematographer. Working from sketch
artist Maurice Zuberano's concepts, Wise would judge if they were on
the right track. Kline and Michelson would then discuss the look they
wanted (along with Weldon, if effects were involved.) Each sequence
was then storyboarded and left to Kline to execute. Kline would
recall that there was not a single "easy" shot to produce
for the picture, as each scene required special consideration. The
bridge, for example, was lit with a low density of light to make the
console monitors display better. It was hard to frame shots so that
reflections of the crew in monitors or light spilling through floor
grilles were not seen in the final print.
The production was for most
of the filming a closed set, with great measures taken to maintain
the secrecy of the plot. Scripts were numbered and lists kept of who
received each copy. The press was told nothing about the story and
only a few production stills were allowed to be published. During
construction one young visitor to a soundstage stole a copy of
blueprints for the bridge set and sold duplicates of them to any fans
who would pay him $75; Paramount reported the matter to the FBI, who
turned the case over to the Los Angeles Police Department. The police
arrested, convicted, and fined the culprit $750; it was later
discovered that the stolen plans were in fact not the final copies.
Visitor's badges were created to keep track of guests, and due to the
limited number were constantly checked out; among the visitors
included friends of the cast and crew, the press, fan leaders, and
actors such as Clint Eastwood (pictured with hus children above
visiting the set), Tony Curtis, Robin Williams and Mel Brooks.
Security swept cars leaving the lots for stolen items; even the
principal actors were not spared from this inconvenience.
Every hour on stage cost
the production $4000 and by August 9th, the production was already a
full day behind schedule. Despite the delays, Wise refused to shoot
more than 12 hours on set, feeling he lost his edge afterwards. The
director was very patient on set; bets were placed on when he would
finally lose his temper, but pool organizers returned the money when
Wise never lost his cool. Given his unfamiliarity with the source
material Wise relied on the actors, especially Shatner, to help
ensure that dialog and characterizations were consistent with the
show. While the bridge scenes were shot early, trouble with filming
the transporter room scene delayed further work. Crew working on the
transporter platform found their footwear melting on the lighted grid
while shooting tests. Issues with the wormhole sequences caused
further delays. The footage for the scene was filmed two ways; first,
at the standard 24 frames per second, and then at the faster 48
frames; the normal footage was a back-up if the slow-motion effect
produced by the faster frame speed did not turned out as planned. The
shoot dragged on so long that it became a running joke for cast
members to try and top each other with wormhole-related puns. The
scene was finally completed on August 24th, while the transporter
scenes were being filmed at the same time on the same soundstage.
The planet Vulcan setting
was created using a mixture of on-location photography at Minerva Hot
Springs in Yellowstone National Park and set recreation. Miniatures
were used in the foreground to create the Vulcan temples, combined
with the real hot springs in the background. In the film, the bottom
third of the frames were composed of miniature stairs, rocks, bits of
red glass and a Vulcan statue. The center of the frame contained
Nimoy's shots and the park setting, while the final third of the
frame was filled with a matte painting.
As
August ended, production continued to slip farther behind schedule.
Walter Koenig learned that rather than being released in 14 days
after his scenes were completed, his last day would be on October
26th eight weeks later than expected. Chekov's burns sustained in
V'Ger's attack were difficult to film; though the incident took only
minutes on film, Weldon spent hours preparing the effect. A piece of
aluminum foil was placed around Koenig's arm, covered by a protective
pad and then hidden by the uniform sleeve. Weldon prepared an ammonia
and acetic acid solution that was touched to Koenig's sleeve, causing
it to smoke. Difficulties resulted in the scene being shot ten times;
it was especially uncomfortable for the actor, whose arm was slightly
burned when some of the solution leaked through to his arm.
Khambatta also faced
difficulties during filming. The actress' conservative Indian
upbringing meant she would not appear nude as called for in the
script during the Ilia probe's appearance. The producers got her to
agree to wear a thin skin-colored body stocking, but she caught a
cold as a result of the shower mist, created by dropping dry ice into
warm water and funneling the vapors into the shower by a hidden tube.
Khambatta had to leave the location repeatedly to avoid hypercapnia.
One scene required the Ilia probe to slice through a steel door in
the sickbay; doors made out of paper, corrugated cardboard covered in
aluminum foil, and cork were tested before the proper effect was
reached. The illuminated button in the hollow of the probe's throat
was a 12–volt light bulb that Khambatta could turn on and off
via hidden wires; the bulb's heat eventually caused a slight burn.
The last week of production
was fraught with issues. Red gel lights appeared orange upon
reviewing the daily footage; the lights were faulty, and three people
were nearly electrocuted. On January 26th, 1979, the film finally
wrapped after 125 days. The three leads (Shatner, Nimoy, and Kelley)
delivered their final lines at 4:50 pm. Before the crew could go
home, a final shot had to be filmed, the climactic fusing of Decker
and V'Ger. The script prescribed a heavy emphasis on lighting, with
spiraling and blinding white lights. Collins was covered in tiny dabs
of cotton glued to his jacket; these highlights were designed to
create a body halo. Helicopter lights, 4000–watt lamps and wind
machines were used to create the effect of Decker's fusion with the
living machine. The first attempts at filming the scene became a
nightmare for the crew. The extreme lighting caused normally
invisible dust particles in the air to be illuminated, creating the
appearance that the actors were caught in a blizzard. During the
retakes throughout the week the crew mopped and dusted the set
constantly, and it required later technical work to completely
eliminate the dust in the final print.
Two weeks later, the entire
cast and crew joined with studio executives for a traditional wrap
party. Four hundred people attended the gathering, which spilled over
into two restaurants in Beverly Hills. While the cast departed to
work on other projects, the post-production team was tasked with
finalizing the film in time for a Christmas release; the resulting
work would take twice as long as the filming process had taken.
Roddenberry provided a large amount of input, sending memos to Ramsay
via Wise with ideas for editing.
After the groundbreaking
opticals of Star Wars, The Motion Picture's producers realized the
film required similarly high-quality visuals. Douglas Trumbull, a
film director with an excellent reputation in Hollywood who had
worked on 2001: A Space Odyssey, was the first choice for director of
special effects, but declined the offer. When approached, Trumbull
was busy on Close Encounters, and was tired of being ignored as a
director and having to churn out special effects for someone else's
production. The next choice, John Dykstra, was similarly wrapped up
in other projects. Post-production supervisor Paul Rabwin suggested
Robert Abel's production company Robert Abel and Associates might be
up to the task. The scope and size of the effects grew after the
television movie became The Motion Picture. Abel and Associates bid
$4 million for doing the film's effects and Paramount accepted. As
new effects were added, Abel increased their bid by $750,000, and
Roddenberry suggested that the effects costs and schedules be reexamined.
Rumors surfaced about
difficulties regarding the special effects. By a year into the
production, millions of dollars had been spent, yet almost no usable
footage had been created; Abel and Associates was not experienced in
motion picture production and the steep learning curve worried the
producers. Due to contract obligations, Trumbull served as a
consultant to Abel and Associates, while effects artist Richard
Yuricich acted as a liaison between Abel and Paramount. To speed up
the work, Abel passed off miniature and matte painting tasks to
Yuricich. Despite being relieved of nearly half the effects work, it
became clear by early 1979 that Abel and Associates would not be able
to complete the remainder on time. Creative differences grew between
Abel and Associates and the Paramount production team, and by mid-February
1979 the two companies parted ways.
The
studio had wasted $5 million and a year's worth of time with Abel
and Associates, although Abel reportedly gained a new production
studio filled with equipment using Paramount's money. Trumbull,
meanwhile, had completed Close Encounters but his plan for his own
feature had been cancelled by Paramount, a move some considered
punishment for passing on Star Trek. With Trumbull (right) now
available, primary responsibility for The Motion Picture's optical
effects passed on to him. In March the studio offered Trumbull
virtual carte blanche if he could get the opticals work completed by
December, the release date to which Paramount was financially
committed (having accepted advances from exhibitors planning on a
Christmas delivery). Trumbull was confident that he could get the
work done without a loss of quality despite a reputation for missing
deadlines because of his perfectionism. Paramount assigned a studio
executive to Trumbull to make sure he would meet the release date,
and together with Yuricich the effects team rushed to finish. The
effects budget climbed to $10 million.
Yuricich's previous work
had been as Director of Photography for Photographic Effects on Close
Encounters, and he and Trumbull reassembled the crew and equipment
from the feature, adding more personnel and space. Time, not money,
was the main issue; Trumbull had to deliver in nine months twice the
effects as found in Star Wars or Close Encounters, which had taken
years to complete. Dykstra and his 60-person production house Apogee
Company were subcontracted to Trumbull.
Trumbull and Dykstra found
the Magicam models problematic. The Klingon cruiser's lighting was so
dim that there was no way to make them bright enough on film. As
Trumbull also felt the Enterprise's lights were ill-suited for his
needs, he rewired both models. He questioned that the Enterprise
could be traveling years from any source of light and yet still be
fully illuminated. Instead of having the ship completely dark save
for viewports, Trumbull came up with a system of self-illumination;
he pictured the ship as something like an oceanliner, "a grand
lady of the seas at night". A similar method was used on the
Klingon cruiser model, but he made it less well-lit to convey a
different look than the clean visuals of the Federation, the cruiser
was meant to evoke "an enemy submarine in World War II that's
been out at sea for too long". The models were filmed in
multiple passes and composited together in post-production; multiple
passes with only the model's lighting running were added to the
original pass for the final look. The Klingon cruiser sequence was
developed to avoid an opening similar to Star Wars, with one model
used for all three seen in the film.
While Dykstra's team
handled the ships, the V'Ger cloud was developed by Trumbull.
Trumbull wanted the cloud to have a specific shape to it, "it
couldn't just be a blob of cotton," he said, "it had to
have some shape that you could get camera angles on." A special
camera support track was built that could pan and focus over a 40 by
80 feet piece of art, with the light strobed to provide depth. While
the team planned on compositing multiple passes to provide physical
movement to the cloud shots, Trumbull felt that it detracted from the
sense of scale, and so small animations were subtly introduced in the
final product.
The scenes of Kirk and
Scott approaching the Enterprise in drydock spanned two pages of
script but took forty-five different shots, averaging one shot a day,
for the travel pod containing Kirk to make its flight from the space
office complex to the docking ring. Double shifts around the clock
were required to finish the effect on time. For close shots of the
pod traveling to the Enterprise, close-ups of Shatner and Doohan were
composited into the model, while in long shots lookalike puppets were used.
Dykstra and Apogee created
three models to stand in for the Epsilon 9 station. A 6-by-3.5-foot
model was used for distance shots, while an isolated 5-by-6-foot
panel was used for closer shots. The station control tower was
replicated with rear-projection screens to add the people inside. A 2
ft model spaceman created for the shot was used in the drydock
sequence and Spock's spacewalk. V'Ger itself was filmed in a hazy,
smoky room, in part to convey depth and also to hide the parts of the
ship still under construction.
Even after the change in
effects companies, Yuricich continued to provide many of the matte
paintings used in the film, having previously worked on The Day the
Earth Stood Still, Ben Hur, North by Northwest and Logan's Run. The
paintings were combined with live action after a selected area of the
frame was matted out; the blue Earth sky over Yellowstone, for
example was replaced with a red-hued Vulcan landscape. More than 100
such paintings were used.
Despite
being hired after the completion of nearly all the principal
photography, Trumbull had an enormous amount of creative input on the
film. The Spock spacewalk sequence, for example, was radically
changed from the Abel version. The original plan was for Kirk to
follow Spock in a spacesuit and come under attack from a mass of
sensor-type organisms. Spock would save his friend, and the two would
proceed through V'ger. Wise, Kline and Abel had been unable to agree
on how to photograph the sequence, and the result was a poorly
designed and ungainly effect that Trumbull was convinced was
disruptive to the plot and would have cost millions to fix. Instead,
he recommended a stripped-down sequence that omitted Kirk entirely
and would be simple and easy to shoot; Robert McCall, known for
designing the original posters to 2001: A Space Odyssey, provided
Trumbull with concept art to inform the new event.
The
score for Star Trek: The Motion Picture was written by Jerry
Goldsmith, who later composed the scores for Star Trek V: The Final
Frontier, Star Trek: First Contact, Star Trek: Insurrection and Star
Trek: Nemesis, as well as the themes to the television series Star
Trek: The Next Generation and Star Trek: Voyager. Gene Roddenberry
had originally wanted Goldsmith to score Star Trek's pilot episode,
"The Cage", but the composer was unavailable. When Wise
signed on to direct, Paramount asked the director if he had any
objection to using Goldsmith. Wise, who had worked with the composer
for The Sand Pebbles, replied "Hell, no. He's great!" Wise
later considered his work with Goldsmith one of the best
relationships he ever had with a composer. Goldsmith was influenced
by the style of the romantic, sweeping music of Star Wars. "When
you stop and think about it, space is a very romantic thought. It is,
to me, like the Old West, we’re up in the universe. It’s
about discovery and new life, it’s really the basic premise of
Star Trek," he said.
The score to Star Trek: The
Motion Picture went on to garner Goldsmith nominations for the
Oscars, Golden Globe and Saturn awards. It is often regarded as one
of the composer's greatest scores and was also one of the American
Film Institute's 250 nominated scores for their top 25 American film scores.
To
coincide with the film's release, Pocket Books published a
novelization written by Roddenberry. The only Star Trek novel
Roddenberry wrote, the book adds back story and elements that did not
appear in the movie; for example, the novelization mentions that
Willard Decker is the son of Commodore Matt Decker from the original
series episode "The Doomsday Machine", a plot element
intended for the Phase II television series. The novel also has a
different opening scene to introduce V'ger and Kirk, concentrates in
sections on Kirk's struggle with confidence in taking command of the
Enterprise again and expands on Ilia and Decker's relationship. In
addition to the novel, Star Trek printed media included a coloring
book, ship blueprints, and a comic book adaptation published by
Marvel Comics as Marvel Super Special #15 (Dec. 1979). Toys included
action figures, ship models, and a variety of watches, phaser mockups
and communicators. McDonald's sold specially designed Star Trek Happy
Meals. The marketing was part of a coordinated approach by Paramount
and its parent conglomerate Gulf+Western to create a sustained Star
Trek product line. The Motion Picture novel started Pocket Books'
Star Trek book franchise, which produced 18 consecutive bestsellers
within a decade.
Owing to the rush to
complete the film, The Motion Picture was never screened before test
audiences, something Wise later regretted. The director carried the
fresh print of the film to the world premiere, held at the K-B
MacArthur Theater in Washington, D.C. Roddenberry, Wise, and the
principal cast attended the function, which also served as an
invitational benefit for the scholarship and youth education fund of
the National Space Club. While thousands of fans were expected to
attend, rain reduced fan turnout to around 300. The premiere was
followed by a black-tie reception at the National Air and Space
Museum. More than 500 people, consisting of the cast and crew,
working members of the space community, and the few "hardcore
Trekkies" who could afford the $100 admission price, filled the
museum. The film was the first major Hollywood adaptation of a
television series that had been off the air for nearly a decade to
retain its original principal cast.
The
Motion Picture opened in North America on December 7th, 1979, in 859
theaters and set a box office record for highest weekend gross,
making $11,815,203 in its first weekend (generally considered to be a
slow time for the movie business). The film beat the record set by
Superman in 1978, which had opened in a similar number of theaters
but had been released in late December, a busier time. The Motion
Picture earned $17 million within a week and overall grossed $139
million worldwide. The Motion Picture was nominated for three Academy
Awards: Best Art Direction (Harold Michelson, Joseph R. Jennings,
Leon Harris, John Vallone and Linda DeScenna), Best Visual Effects,
and Best Original Score.
In the United States, The
Motion Picture sold the most tickets of any film in the franchise
until 2009's J.J. Abrams Star Trek reboot, and it remains the
highest-grossing film of the franchise worldwide adjusted for
inflation, but Paramount considered its gross disappointing compared
to expectations and marketing. The Motion Picture's budget of $46
million, including costs incurred during Phase II production, was the
largest for any film made within the United States up to that time.
David Gerrold estimated before its release that the film would have
to gross two to three times its budget to be profitable for
Paramount. The studio faulted Roddenberry's script rewrites and
creative direction for the plodding pace and disappointing gross.
While the performance of The Motion Picture convinced the studio to
back a (cheaper) sequel, Roddenberry was forced out of its creative
control. Harve Bennett and Nicholas Meyer would produce and direct
Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, which received better reviews and
continued the franchise. With the successful revival of the Star Trek
brand on the big screen setting an example, Hollywood increasingly
turned to 1960s television series for material.
The Motion Picture met with
disappointing reviews from critics; a 2001 retrospective for the BBC
described the film as a critical failure. Gary Arnold and Judith
Martin of The Washington Post felt that the plot was too thin to
support the length of the film, although Martin felt that compared to
such science-fiction films as 2001: A Space Odyssey, Star Wars and
Alien, The Motion Picture's pretense was "slightly
cleverer". Time's Harold Livingston wrote that the film
consisted of spaceships that "take an unconscionable amount of
time to get anywhere, and nothing of dramatic or human interest
happens along the way". Variety disagreed, calling the film
"a search-and-destroy thriller that includes all of the
ingredients the TV show's fans thrive on: the philosophical dilemma
wrapped in a scenario of mind control, troubles with the space ship,
the dependable and understanding Kirk, the ever-logical Spock, and
suspenseful take with twist ending".
Many critics felt that the
special effects overshadowed other elements of the film. Canby stated
that the film "owes more to [Trumbull, Dykstra and Michelson]
than it does to the director, the writers or even the producer".
Livingston felt that Trumbull and Dykstra's work on the film was not
as impressive as on Star Wars and Close Encounters due to the limited
amount of production time. Godfrey called the effects
"stunning", but conceded that they threatened to overpower
the story two-thirds of the way into the film.
Later assessments of the
film have echoed these criticisms. James Berardinelli, reviewing the
film in 1996, felt that the pace dragged and the plot bore too close
a resemblance to the original series episode "The
Changeling", but considered the start and end of the film to be
strong. Terry Lee Rioux, Kelley's biographer, noted that the film
proved "that it was the character-driven play that made all the
difference in Star Trek". The slow pacing, extended reaction
shots, and the film's lack of action scenes led fans and critics to
give the film a variety of nicknames, including The Motionless
Picture, The Slow Motion Picture, The Motion Sickness, and Where
Nomad [the probe in "The Changeling"] Has Gone Before.
Keeping in mind that
critics and fans felt the film was too long, in 1983, an extended cut
of the film was released on videotape and premiered on the ABC
television network. It added roughly 12 minutes to the film. The
added footage was largely unfinished and cobbled together for the
network premiere; Wise had never wanted the footage to be included in
the final cut of the film.
Two members of Wise's
production company, David C. Fein and Michael Matessino, approached
Wise and Paramount and persuaded them to release a revised version of
the film on video; Paramount released the updated Director's Edition
of the film on VHS and DVD in 2001. Wise, who had considered the
theatrical presentation of the film a "rough cut", was
given the opportunity to re-edit the film to be more consistent with
his original vision. The production team used the original script,
surviving sequence storyboards, memos, and the director's
recollections. In addition to cuts in some sequences, 90 new and
redesigned computer-generated images were created. Care was taken
that the effects meshed seamlessly with the old footage. The edition
runs 136 minutes, about four minutes longer than the original
release. Included among the special features are the deleted scenes
which had been part of the television cut.
Aside from the effects, the
soundtrack was remixed. Ambient noise such as the buzz of bridge
controls were added to enhance certain scenes. Goldsmith had always
suspected that some overly long cues could be shortened, so he made
the cues repetitive. Although no new scenes were added, the MPAA
rated the revised edition "PG" in contrast to the
"G" rating of the original release. Fein attributed the
rating change to the more "intense" sound mix that made
scenes such as the central part of V'Ger "more menacing".
The Director's Edition was
better received by critics than the original theatrical release. The
DVD Journal's Mark Bourne said that the Director's Edition showcased
"a brisker, more attractive version of the movie" that was
"as good as it might have been in 1979. Even better maybe."
Jeremy Conrad of IGN felt that despite the changes, the pacing might
still be too slow for some viewers.
The
original Star Trek cast who had agreed to appear in the new movie,
with contracts as-yet unsigned pending script approval, grew anxious
about the constant delays, and pragmatically accepted other acting
offers while Roddenberry worked with Paramount. The studio decided to
turn the project over to the television division, reasoning that
since the roots of the franchise lay in television the writers would
be able to develop the right script. A number of screenwriters
offered up ideas that were summarily rejected. As Paramount
executives' interest in the film began to wane, Roddenberry, backed
by fan letters, applied pressure to the studio. In June 1976,
Paramount assigned Jerry Isenberg, a young and active producer, to be
executive producer of the project, with the budget expanded to $8
million. Povill was tasked with finding more writers to develop a
script. His list included Edward Anhalt, James Goldman, Francis Ford
Coppola, George Lucas, Ernest Lehman and Robert Bloch. The end result
was a compiled list of 34 names, none of whom were ever chosen to pen
the script.
Phase
II was due to start, the studio announced that the television series
had been cancelled in favor of a new feature film. Cast and crew who
had been hired that Monday were laid off by Friday, and construction
came to a halt. Production was moved to April 1978 so that the
necessary scripts, sets, and wardrobe could be upgraded.
"We
had a marvelous antagonist, so omnipotent that for us to defeat it
or even communicate with it, or have any kind of relationship with
it, made the initial concept of the story false. Here's this gigantic
machine that's a million years further advanced than we are. Now, how
the hell can we possibly deal with this? On what level? As the story
developed, everything worked until the very end. How do you resolve
this thing? If humans can defeat this marvelous machine, than it's
really not so great, is it? Or if it really is great, will we like
those humans who do defeat it? Should they defeat it? Who is the
story's hero anyway? That was the problem. We experimented with all
kinds of approaches. We didn't know what to do with the ending. We
always ended up against a blank wall."
The
bridge ceiling was redesigned, with Michelson taking structural
inspiration from a jet engine fan. Minor built a central bubble for
the ceiling to give the bridge a human touch. Most of the bridge
consoles, designed by Lee Cole, remained from the scrapped television
series. Cole remained on the motion picture production and was
responsible for much of the visual artwork created. To inform actors
and series writers, Lee prepared a USS Enterprise Flight Manual as a
continuity guide to control functions. It was necessary for all the
main cast to be familiar with control sequences at their stations as
each panel was activated by touch via heat-sensitive plates. The
wattage of the light bulbs beneath the plastic console buttons was
reduced from 25 watts to 6 watts after the generated heat began
melting the controls. The seats were covered in girdle material, used
because of its stretching capacity and ability to be easily dyed. For
the science station, two consoles were rigged for hydraulic operation
so that they could be rolled into the walls when not in use, but the
system was disconnected when the crew discovered it would be easier
to move them by hand.
The
transporter had originally been developed for the television series
as a matter of convenience; it would have been prohibitively
expensive to show the Enterprise land on every new planet. For the
redesign Michelson felt that the transporter should look and feel
more powerful. He added a sealed control room that would protect
operators from the powerful forces at work. The space between the
transporter platform and the operators was filled with complex
machinery, and cinematographer Richard Kline added eerie lighting to
the set to create atmosphere.
Ralph
McQuarrie and Ken Adam worked on the ship designs for Planet of the
Titans. McQuarrie had to redesign the sets and models that were meant
for the television series; the Enterprise, space dock, and orbital
office were remade with greater details to look more impressive on
the bigger movie screens. McQuarrie also redesigned the Enterprise
with a flat hull, and though his models never appeared in the film
they were later used for the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode
"The Best of Both Worlds".
Dick
Rubin handled the film's props, and set up a makeshift office in the
corner of stage 9 throughout production. Many of the props were
updated designs of items previously seen in the television series,
such as phasers and handheld communicators. The only prop that
remained from the original television series was Uhura's wireless
earpiece, which Nichols specifically requested on the first day of
shooting (and all the production crew save those who had worked on
the television show had forgotten about).
In
the original series, divisions in ship assignments were denoted by
shirt color; for the movie, these color codes were moved to small
patches on each person's uniform. The Starfleet delta symbol, which
previously indicated duty branches, command, science, medical,
engineering, and so forth, was replaced with the command symbol for
all branches, superimposed over a circle of color indicating area of
service. The blue color of previous uniforms was discarded, for fear
they might interfere with the blue screens used for optical effects.
Three types of uniforms were fabricated: dress uniforms used for
special occasions, Class A uniforms for regular duty, and Class B
uniforms as an alternative. The Class A designs were double-stitched
in gabardine and featured gold braid designating rank. It was felt
that the traditional four gold sleeve stripes for the captain's rank
was too blatantly militaristic. Povill had to send out a memo to
Fletcher with the modified stripe rank system, as the designer
continued to get the 20th and 23rd centuries confused. Fletcher
designed the Class B uniform as similar to evolved t-shirts, with
shoulder boards used to indicate rank and service divisions. Each
costume had the shoes built into the pant leg to further the
futuristic look. An Italian shoemaker decorated by the Italian
government for making Gucci shoes was tasked with creating the
futuristic footwear. Combining the shoes and trousers was difficult,
time-consuming, and expensive, as each shoe had to be sewn by hand
after being fitted to each principal actor. There were difficulties
in communication, as the shoemaker spoke limited English and
occasionally confused shoe orders due to similar-sounding names.
Jumpsuits, serving a more utilitarian function, were the only
costumes to have pockets, and were made with a heavyweight spandex
that required a special needle to puncture the thick material. A
variety of field jackets, leisure wear, and spacesuits were also
created; as these parts had to be designed and completed before most
of the actors' parts had been cast, many roles were filled by
considering how well the actors would fit into existing costumes.
For
the civilians of San Francisco, Fletcher decided on a greater
freedom in dress. Much of the materials for these casual clothes were
found in the old storerooms at Paramount, where a large amount of
unused or forgotten silks, crepes, and leathers lay in storage. One
bolt of material had been handpicked by Cecil DeMille in 1939, and
was in perfect condition. The red, black, and gold brocade was woven
with real gold and silver wrapped around silk thread; the resulting
costume was used for a Betelgeusean ambassador (pictured above) and,
at a price of $10,000 for the fabric alone, was the most expensive
costume ever worn by a Hollywood extra. Fletcher also recycled suedes
from The Ten Commandments for the Zaranite costumes. With the
approval of Roddenberry, Fletcher fashioned complete backgrounds for
the alien races seen in the Earth and recreation deck sequences,
describing their appearances and the composition of their costumes.
Besides
developing Vulcan ears and alien masks, Phillips and his assistant
Charles Schram applied more routine makeup to the principal actors.
Khambatta's head had to be freshly shaved each day, then given an
application of makeup to reduce glare from the hot set lights.
Khambatta had no qualms about shaving her head at first, but began
worrying if her hair would grow back properly. Roddenberry proposed
insuring Khambatta's hair after the actress voiced her concerns,
believing the price of such insurance to be negligible. The idea was
ultimately scrapped, as it turned out such a guarantee would be
highly expensive; the insurance company believed that there would be
difficulty in proving that the hair grew back exactly the same as
before. Instead, Khambatta visited the Georgette Klinger Skin Care
Salon in Beverly Hills, where experts recommended that she receive
six facials and scalp treatments during the course of production. The
salon also prescribed a daily scalp treatment routine of cleansing
bars, brilliantine lotion, conditioner, makeup remover, and cleansing
lotion. The studio agreed these measures were necessary and footed
the bill while Khambatta spent six months following the tedious
instructions (her hair eventually regrew without issue, though she
kept her shaven locks after production had ended.)
Richard
H. Kline served as the film's cinematographer. Working from sketch
artist Maurice Zuberano's concepts, Wise would judge if they were on
the right track. Kline and Michelson would then discuss the look they
wanted (along with Weldon, if effects were involved.) Each sequence
was then storyboarded and left to Kline to execute. Kline would
recall that there was not a single "easy" shot to produce
for the picture, as each scene required special consideration. The
bridge, for example, was lit with a low density of light to make the
console monitors display better. It was hard to frame shots so that
reflections of the crew in monitors or light spilling through floor
grilles were not seen in the final print.
As
August ended, production continued to slip farther behind schedule.
Walter Koenig learned that rather than being released in 14 days
after his scenes were completed, his last day would be on October
26th eight weeks later than expected. Chekov's burns sustained in
V'Ger's attack were difficult to film; though the incident took only
minutes on film, Weldon spent hours preparing the effect. A piece of
aluminum foil was placed around Koenig's arm, covered by a protective
pad and then hidden by the uniform sleeve. Weldon prepared an ammonia
and acetic acid solution that was touched to Koenig's sleeve, causing
it to smoke. Difficulties resulted in the scene being shot ten times;
it was especially uncomfortable for the actor, whose arm was slightly
burned when some of the solution leaked through to his arm.
Decker
and V'Ger. The script prescribed a heavy emphasis on lighting, with
spiraling and blinding white lights. Collins was covered in tiny dabs
of cotton glued to his jacket; these highlights were designed to
create a body halo. Helicopter lights, 4000–watt lamps and wind
machines were used to create the effect of Decker's fusion with the
living machine. The first attempts at filming the scene became a
nightmare for the crew. The extreme lighting caused normally
invisible dust particles in the air to be illuminated, creating the
appearance that the actors were caught in a blizzard. During the
retakes throughout the week the crew mopped and dusted the set
constantly, and it required later technical work to completely
eliminate the dust in the final print.
The
studio had wasted $5 million and a year's worth of time with Abel
and Associates, although Abel reportedly gained a new production
studio filled with equipment using Paramount's money. Trumbull,
meanwhile, had completed Close Encounters but his plan for his own
feature had been cancelled by Paramount, a move some considered
punishment for passing on Star Trek. With Trumbull (right) now
available, primary responsibility for The Motion Picture's optical
effects passed on to him. In March the studio offered Trumbull
virtual carte blanche if he could get the opticals work completed by
December, the release date to which Paramount was financially
committed (having accepted advances from exhibitors planning on a
Christmas delivery). Trumbull was confident that he could get the
work done without a loss of quality despite a reputation for missing
deadlines because of his perfectionism. Paramount assigned a studio
executive to Trumbull to make sure he would meet the release date,
and together with Yuricich the effects team rushed to finish. The
effects budget climbed to $10 million.
Despite
being hired after the completion of nearly all the principal
photography, Trumbull had an enormous amount of creative input on the
film. The Spock spacewalk sequence, for example, was radically
changed from the Abel version. The original plan was for Kirk to
follow Spock in a spacesuit and come under attack from a mass of
sensor-type organisms. Spock would save his friend, and the two would
proceed through V'ger. Wise, Kline and Abel had been unable to agree
on how to photograph the sequence, and the result was a poorly
designed and ungainly effect that Trumbull was convinced was
disruptive to the plot and would have cost millions to fix. Instead,
he recommended a stripped-down sequence that omitted Kirk entirely
and would be simple and easy to shoot; Robert McCall, known for
designing the original posters to 2001: A Space Odyssey, provided
Trumbull with concept art to inform the new event.
The
Motion Picture opened in North America on December 7th, 1979, in 859
theaters and set a box office record for highest weekend gross,
making $11,815,203 in its first weekend (generally considered to be a
slow time for the movie business). The film beat the record set by
Superman in 1978, which had opened in a similar number of theaters
but had been released in late December, a busier time. The Motion
Picture earned $17 million within a week and overall grossed $139
million worldwide. The Motion Picture was nominated for three Academy
Awards: Best Art Direction (Harold Michelson, Joseph R. Jennings,
Leon Harris, John Vallone and Linda DeScenna), Best Visual Effects,
and Best Original Score.
