Oh my, my, my. Where to begin with this intriguing but not exceptionally well executed movie? I wanted to love this movie but in the end I couldn’t help but focus on all the areas that it just didn’t quite measure up. Paramount and the "powers that be" at the helm of the Star Trek empire insist on taking the movie franchise further towards the "action" genre. Nemesis was marketed as an action flick in almost every way possible, as each new Trek movie is created, the name "Star Trek" become smaller and smaller to try and change its image. As an action flick, Nemesis is a pretty decent shoot ‘em up. But it’s the areas of Star Trek where it falls short, despite the very commendable effort at moving along the storylines of some of the secondary characters.
General Story
Commander William Riker (Jonathan Frakes) and Councelor Deanna Troi (Marina Sirtis) are finally getting married. After a party on Earth and a nostalgic bringing together of many cast from The Next Generation, best man Captain Picard (Patrick Stewart) and the crew of the Enterprise embark to the planet Betazed for the actual ceremony. Along the way, they get distracted by finding what looks like a prototype to the android crewman Data (Brent Spiner) on a backwater planet near the Romulan Neutral Zone.
Speaking of Romulans, a new government has come into power on Romulus - long time cold-war-ish enemy of the Federation. And it appears that the new praetor, Shinzon (Tom Hardy), wishes a dialogue between the Romulan Empire and the Federation. The Enterprise is sent as the Federation’s envoy.
Little does Picard and the Enterprise know that they are flying into a trap, for what awaits them is a determined and cunning villain, with a menacing new weapon of mass destruction, and the will to use it to devastate the Federation. The villain - Praetor Shinzon, is none other than a clone of Captain Picard created by a prior Romulan government as an attempt to infiltrate Starfleet and the Federation - who has emerged with ulterior plans for his destiny. What follows is some of the best action to come out of Star Trek - but there’s little else other than action. There isn’t much character progression for any of the characters, other than the fact that Riker and Troi get married - but one crewmember won’t be back for Star Trek eleven.
Romulans and Remans
One of the main disappointments of Nemesis in my opinion was that the trailers and pre-release propaganda showed a lot of Romulan promise. It was a tease. Instead of focusing on the devious, wonderful, underutilized, predictably treacherous Romulans they decided to delve into the Remans, a little known and never before explored aspect of Romulan society. Remus is the twin world of the planet Romulus. Its orbit and rotation are such that the same side faces the Romulan sun, creating a light and dark halve to the planet. The Remans live on the dark half. They are a slave caste in Romulan society. Shinzon emerged as a champion for the Remans - instigating a coup de tat of the Romulan government and installing himself as Praetor.
The Remans look absolutely devilish. Designed to be a race accustomed to darkness, they look like a cross between Nosferatu and big fish things. Really scary creatures. Given the fact that one of them demonstrates some limited telepathic abilities in the movie (The Viceroy, portrayed by Ron Pearlman), it’s fair to say that it’s a common trait among all Remans. But, the point is... they are not as complex and interesting as the Romulans! What we’re denied is treachery and scheming and plotting that is done by Romulans and given just another violent, warrior race (which the Klingons already do enough of).
However, what we are given of Romulans is well appreciated and excellent. The first scene of the movie is a swoop in on the gorgeous capital city on Romulus, as well as tantalizing scene inside the Romulan Senate (All ala Gladiator since one of the scriptwriters also worked on Gladiator). A sexy and patriotic Romulan Commander, Donatra (Dina Meyer), is one of my favorite characters who I wanted to see more of. We also get to see some sleeker Romulan warbirds in action.
Tom Hardy as Shinzon
I’m pretty sure I have a non-sexual crush on Tom Hardy in this role, he’s very good at playing an evil, mirror image of Captain Picard, or maybe it’s just his costume. He does the very best given the material. His scenes with Captain Picard are some of the best in the movie as each is giving the other double wonderful double talk and about how they reminisce about their youth and debate their future. He’s a good tragic character - his purpose for his whole creation was to replace the real Captain Picard in Starfleet but the Romulan government abandoned the plan. Now he struggles to find a meaning to his existence. The film’s story and the character of Shinzon open up the whole "nature vs. nurture" debate. Are we born to do good or evil, or is our destiny a product of our environment?
Anything else good about Nemesis?
The action is the best yet in a Star Trek movie. I think the producers have been itching to let the new Enterprise E cut loose - we’ve only seen glimpses of what this bad girl ship can do in First Contact and Insurrection. The battle between Picard and Shinzon with the Enterprise and the Scimitar rivals the battle in Wrath of Khan. It’s an almost perfect Star Trek naval battle - slow enough and detailed enough for you to almost suggest what should happen next and then you see it happen and you think, "Wow this is awesome, that’s what I would have done!"
I also enjoyed the cameo appearance of Voyager’s (recently promoted) Admiral Janeway (Kate Mulgrew).
The music by Star Trek movie composer Jerry Goldsmith is I think his most energetic, dark, and ambitious for a Star Trek film yet, even going as far as composing full thematic material to use, should we ever see Romulans on the big screen again!
Best exchange of the movie:
Worf: (Not quite believing it) The Romulans fought with honor.
Riker: Yes they did, Mr. Worf.
What’s wrong with Nemesis?
The script is pretty much formulaic: take the skeleton of the script for Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan - a nefarious villain with a personal vendetta against the captain of the Enterprise, a weapon of mass destruction, witty dialogue between the two enemies, a great ship to ship battle inside a nebula, and kill off a beloved crew member, presto-chango, change the names and you have Nemesis!
In the movie, the big battle scene was really between the Enterprise and Shinzon's ship, the Scimitar. In the movie however, Picard and crew planned on joining an assembled fleet - another teaser.
The crewmember who dies does so ala Spock in Wrath of Khan, saving the rest of the crew and ship. But we didn’t have enough time to say goodbye this time, the way Kirk did with Spock! It was so sudden. You saw it coming, yes, but it was just sudden at the end.
There’s only one part of the movie that I think could have been cut out or replaced with something more important. There’s a pointless action scene early in the movie just to show off this ridiculous land vehicle type thing that Picard gets to drive around at what Data calls "unsafe velocities".
Some things never change though. Riker still can’t fight. Troi pilots and crashes yet another ship named Enterprise! And unless your character’s name is Picard or Data - your character doesn’t do much in terms of developing.
But after seeing the movie a few times, it grew on me and I liked it more than after seeing it the first time at the theater. It’s also a very self contained Star Trek movie - you don’t need to know much about the rest of Star Trek to get into it.
"If you had lived my life, you’d be doing exactly as I am now."
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