T'pol : "Do you have any experience riding these animals?"
Trip Tucker : "I've seen every John Ford western."
T'pol : "Who?"
     [Star Trek : The Next Generation, episode 'North Star']

As we all know, Gene Roddenberry is the father of Star Trek – the numerous TV series and its spin-offs, including this latest, excitedly-received, critically-hosanna'd $160 "reboot" of the "franchise". But its unacknowledged grandfather – or perhaps great-grandaddy – was arguably John Ford: his 1950 film Wagon Master (whose story he devised) was, later the same decade, turned into the show television-show cited by Roddenberry when he pitched his science-fiction project to studio bosses as "a Wagon Train … to the stars!"
   On its initial release Variety magazine described Wagon Master - based on the experiences of intrepid Mormon settlers in 1849 (ironic that Roddenberry's vision of the future would be a deliberately atheist one) as boasting "careful character development and movement, spiced with high spots of action, good drama and leavening comedy moments." And that's not such a bad encapsulation of the 2009 Star Trek extravaganza, an all-bets-are-off alternative-reality take on the much-loved characters from the TV original, here shown coming together as greenhorns barely out of Starfleet academy to combat the time-travelling antics of vengeance-crazed Romulan villain Nero (Eric Bana.)
   The much-emphasised youth - and relative inexperience - of Kirk (Chris Pine, confirming the charisma he showed flashes of in Smokin' Aces), Spock (Zachary Quinto) and company does give proceedings a certain Starfleet Troopers vibe. Of course, director Abrams and scriptwriters Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman avoid any really Paul Verhoevenish controversy-baiting, subtext or envelope-pushing - Orci and Kurtzman's last outing was, after all, Transformers.
   They're actually on very similar form to their previous work on Abrams' Mission Impossible III and Michael Bay's The Island (both underrated pictures, the latter criminally so): this is rock-solid, mainstream entertainment, pulling off the tricky feat of satisfying long-time fans without scaring or baffling initiates with excessive in-jokery and/or arcane references to previous Trek lore (the comic relief, largely provided by Simon Pegg's Scotty, is laid on a little thick here and there.)
   The general aim was clearly to provide the venerable franchise – which had dribbled into the sand with 2002's flop Nemesis (now chiefly of interest as a very early showcase for Tom Hardy) – with the solid basis for more adventurous future instalments. And as such it works just fine – fingers crossed that the next episodes make a bit more use of Karl Urban: the New Zealander - showing his range after more action-oriented turns in the likes of The Bourne Supremacy, Pathfinder, Doom and Return of the King - is a drolly scenestealing delight here as the dependably no-nonsense, sarcasm-spouting medical-officer 'Bones' McCoy. Even ornery old John Ford ("How did I get to Hollywood? By train.") would surely have been impressed.

Neil Young
20th May, 2009

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director : J J Abrams
country : USA
year : 2009
run-time : 128m (BBFC)
seen : 8th May, 2009
cinema : The Tyneside Cinema, Newcastle
format : 35mm?
paid :  £6.70
MVP : Karl-Heinz Urban (, spaceman)
respected second opinion : Scott Foundas, LA Weekly