Customer Reviews

Star Trek VIII: First Contact (Remastered) [Blu-ray]

5 star:		(234)
4 star:		(74)
3 star:		(23)
2 star:		(14)
1 star:		(12)

 

 

This two Disk DVD Set is extraordinary. The Picture and Sound quality are so very good that you feel as though you are watching it in a theater. Because it's a widescreen picture the closed captioning doesn't interfere with the picture. It's jam packed with all sorts of extra bonus special features. Everything you ever wanted to know about First Contact and weren't afraid to be told. Let's not forget what a wonderful job Jonathan Frakes did directing. He truly proved himself a more than qualified director for feature films. We all know what a great job he did behind the cameras on the T.V. show. My boyfriend and I watched it together and he was really impressed. He asked me how much it cost. When I told him how inexpensive it was he bought two copies. One for a gift to another Treky fan. I highly recommend this two disk set and suggest you buy it right away before they run out. If you're not satisfied with it, I'll pay you for it. That's how much confidence I have that you'll absolutely LOVE it. Believe me when I tell you this is one purchase that you will never regret. ORDER NOW!!! In response to your comment first of all thank you for reading my review and please feel free to check them all out. You are correct I didn't leave enough information on my personal feelings. I thought the film was terrific. It lived up to the quality that we are used to getting when we see anything that starts out with the heading Star Trek. The storyline was very entertaining, it was as usual well acted, written, directed, great effects. I agree I could have done a better job on the body of the review itself. I'm busy writing another review as we speak. Thank you for taking the time to read my comments and I will strive to do better in the future!

I'm not going to review the movie itself as it's clearly been out long enough I'm just going to give a quick review for those curious as to the bluray transfer. I picked up the disc yesterday and watched it last night. The quality of this bluray disc is stunning! The clarity is top quality and the color vibrance is amazing, without looking fake or hyped. I didn't notice any unusual artifacts like edge enhancement nor any noise reduction - I watched it on my 52" Samsung LCD but didn't get right up at the screen to examine for these things. But from where I was sitting it looked flawless. The sound is also fanstic and what I noticed the most is that the movie doesn't suffer from the irritating dramatic volume changes. Yes, during action scenes things get louder as they normally should but it wasn't so much that I had to ride the volume control, which is hugely irritating and becoming more common in today's new releases. If you still don't get what I mean I'm referring to the dialog being much lower in volume to the tremendously loud action scenes. Anyhow, this disc doesn't suffer from that, yet there is still a good amount of bass to put you into the feel of the action scenes.

I highly recommend this disc!

*EDIT - forgot to mention there are several extras listed on the back of the box and all of them are listed as being in HD as well. Being that I don't have the case in front of me though I can't list the extra's titles.

Even though Star Trek: Generations was a good first entry in The Next Generation era of feature films, it wasn't until Rick Berman, Ronald D. Moore and Brannon Braga wrote Star Trek: First Contact's story and screenplay that Captain Picard (Patrick Stewart) and his crew proved that they could carry a Trek film without help from The Original Series' cast.

It also helped that the film was more action-oriented than Star Trek VII. Sure, the last battle of the NCC-1701 D was impressive and the brief meeting of Captains James T. Kirk (William Shatner) and Picard did provide Trek fans with some exciting and moving moments, but what fans really wanted was a muscular...action movie with a mission (and antagonists) worthy of the Next Generation crew and the new, top-of-the line Enterprise E.

Star Trek: First Contact brings back the Borg, a race of half-organic, half cybernetic beings whose goal is to destroy other races by assimilating their technology and transforming the survivors by injecting microscopic nanoprobes that turn humans, Vulcans, El-Aurians -- anyone, really -- into unfeeling, relentless drones. As fans of the 1987-1994 syndicated series know, Capt. Picard was once captured by the Borg and transformed into Locutus, a Borg strategist/spokesdrone whose intimate knowledge of Starfleet technology,its tactics and its officers nearly spelled certain defeat for the Federation at the Battle of Wolf 359.

Now, several years later, the Borg are back and meaner than ever. Having been thwarted more than once in the 24th Century by Picard and his crew, the Borg Queen (Alice Krige) leads a single-cubeship invasion force into Federation space, hoping to defeat the Federation by either conquering Earth in a battle against Starfleet...or tinkering with the timeline and going back to the 21st Century to prevent humanity's first contact with another spacefaring race.

Actor Jonathan Frakes (Cmdr. Will Riker) makes his feature film directing debut in this eighth installment of the Star Trek movie series, and although he would only direct the weaker Star Trek: Insurrection, he does a great job at helming a very high-octane action flick that involves time travel, space battles, a strong Picard/Data storyline and elements from The Original Series, The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine and the then-still new Voyager.

Guest stars James Cromwell (The Sum of All Fears, Babe) and Alfre Woodward join the cast of TNG as warp-drive inventor Zefram Cochrane and his friend and assistant Lily, who add a certain mixture of edginess and wit to the film. Cromwell fares particularly well as Cochrane, a character first seen in The Original Series episode Metamorphosis. While Cromwell doesn't remotely look like the then-30 or 40-something Glen Corbett, he portrays the legendary "father of warp drive" as a very human and flawed genius -- he is cranky, cynical and drinks way too much -- who is bemused by the hero-worship he receives from the Enterprise crew. He also gets some of the best lines. (My favorite: "You're astronauts...on some kind of star trek?")

Also contributing to the excitement is Jerry Goldsmith's score, a mixture of a lovely new main theme and such familiar touchstones as Alexander Courage's fanfare for the Original Series theme and Goldsmith's own "Main Theme" for Star Trek's first feature film (and later adapted as The Next Generation's main title).

Although First Contact does require some familiarity with the Star Trek universe and its history, it's clearly among the best of the 10 in the series.

While "Star Trek: First Contact" rewrites too much of the original TV series' history--a debilitating addiction the current production people can't seem to shake--it delivers a rollicking adventure that is more in keeping with Captain Kirk's episodes than any other "TNG" film. That's really good because on TV, talky Captain Picard and crew often seemed better suited for Monday morning board meetings than the intergalactic perils of space opera. In this one, a race of cybernauts called the Borg decide to revise Earth history by stopping the first human excursion with warp drive. Picard and crew follow the aliens back in time, meeting with a cynical, drunken inventor (a laconic James Cromwell) who revises their assessment of his place in history. Unlike the other TNG films, this one's plotted more like a film than a TV show, meaning that the pace is less likely to put you to sleep, even if Star Trek still can't quite escape cornball humor or pure cheese. (How many times does Data have to discover his humanity or Worf be told he's a warrior worthy of respect? Why do characters rely so often on a pregnant pause and one last line before exiting? Just how much technobabble can we really take?) The regular cast is as good as it's always been--which is to say, adequate--but Alice Krige stands out as the creepily sexy Borg queen and though she's frequently bug-eyed with excitement, Alfre Woodard deserves more screen time as Picard's potential love interest. The real stars here, though, are Jonathan Frakes as director, who seems to actually understand and respect the material he's working with, and Jerry Goldsmith, whose score is among the better in the series. When the humans meet up with a surprise alien race at the end, the moment might actually give you goosebumps.

The only reason why I'm giving the DVD 4 stars is because Paramount did not go the extra mile for die-hard fans by putting in some of the interactive content and added bonuses that DVDs were made for... "The Matrix" is a prime example of how a DVD should be presented. The DVD widescreen format is sweet and the DVD does include 2 theatrical trailers, but that's it. :-)

Now that I'm off my soap box, I must say that this is the best Star Trek movie made to date. Sit-on-the-edge-of-your-seat movie watching experience.

The Borg are back and now they're out to destroy Earth. Former assimilated Borg himself, Jean-Luc Picard is off to the rescue in this extremely entertaining sci-fi adventure. What could be more romantic that the captain of the best ship in the fleet off to rescue mother earth from the most evil force in the Galaxy!

Alfre Woodard really adds a lot to this film and to the development of Picard's character. You don't have to be a Star Trek fanatic or even a regular watcher of the film to enjoy it... a lot is explained to the ST neophyte in the opening sequences... but this movie will be most enjoyed by fans of the tv series.

The best ST captain yet vs. the worst enemy the Federation has ever met... an enemy with no soul - like a virus, they just spread and consume and do it without mercy. I had this movie on VHS but I watched it so many times, the tape broke, so I got it on DVD. Just a great flick - emotionally thrilling and lots of eye candy and SFX thrills.

"Star Trek: The Next Generation", the first and most famous sequel series to the classic 1960s TV series "Star Trek", ran on TV from 1987 to 1994, accumulating a large fanbase and tremendous critical acclaim, particularly for years 3 through 6. Following the end of the program, it moved to take the place of the TOS film series, which had wrapped up with "Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country" in 1991. 1994's "Generations", a passing-of-the-torch film, was a middling endeavour. "First Contact", released in 1996, represented the highpoint of the new film series (and, of the run of the original ten films, is at least in the top two, in contention for first). With series co-star Jonathan Frakes, the TV show's best actor-turned-director, at the helm, the production crew delivers a great sci-fi action film, one that simultaneously manages to do quite a bit with the main characters. It has rereleased on DVD and Blu-ray following the success of Star Trek XI (or just plain "Star Trek"), and now in much more convenient packaging (and also, I note, with the numeral "VIII" added in, something that they pointedly avoided using on initial release). Spoilers follow.

"Generations" ended with the Enterprise-D being destroyed in battle, allowing the filmmakers to introduce a new and more film-friendly ship and sets, the Enterprise-E, which is indeed a lovely looking piece of work. There are a number of other updates here, significantly a new wardrobe for the cast that is probably the highpoint of 24th century fashion (later adopted by "DS9" for the rest of that series). Similar to "The Wrath of Khan", "First Contact" is a sequel of sorts to an episode of the TV series, in this case "The Best of Both Worlds", the season three/four two-parter that really pushed the show to superstar status. Captain Jean-Luc Picard (Sir Patrick Stewart) has recovered from being assimilated by the cybernetic Borg, but he is still on some level traumatized by the experience, and when a new Borg invasion begins, he defies orders to take the Enterprise to the front lines - said front line being Earth, as the new Borg cube has cut through Starfleet with ease. Picking up Worf (Michael Dorn) from the wrecked USS Defiant, they soon find themselves in the 21st century, where the Borg plan to abort first contact between Humans and alien life. While Commander Riker (Frakes) leads a team planetside to get the spaceship ready for its rendezvous with destiny, Picard and his allies on the ship confront the Borg, who have taken root within.

The Borg are arguably Star Trek's greatest villain race (at least, they were at this point; "Voyager" would, as with many other things, drive them into the ground through overuse and villain decay), and they were probably never more effectively used than here. Much like Starfleet, they've been redesigned to look more more sinister, with a tremendously scary new method of assimilating enemies. The Borg Queen (Alice Krige) was a controversial element to introduce, but I think she makes sense as the synthesis of the Collective's consciousness ("Voyager", of course, would overuse her too), and the dynamics between her, Picard, and Data (Brent Spiner) are great. Data, whose quest for emotions was played for laughs in "Generations", is treated properly here, and his scenes here really progress his character (unfortunately, the later films would abandon this without explanation, one of their bigger problems). The epicentre of the drama is Picard, of course, and Stewart does perhaps his best work here, with Picard's quest for revenge gradually overtaking Picard's normally level-headed disposition. Krige makes a great villain, and the two major civilian characters, Zefram Cochrane (James Cromwell) and Lily Sloane (Alfre Woodard) are well-handled; Cochrane is an especially interesting and funny take on the reality behind supposedly great men.

Highly recommended.

But this--this movie turned me from being a casual Trek fan into a huge Trek fan. I saw this movie in the local theater at a formative age, and I remeber being amazed not only by the remarkable visual effects and perfect dramatic pace, but also by the intelligent story and rich character study. It has been noted that Star Trek movies can often turn into long episodes you have to pay to watch, but this movie certainly can't be accused of that--it's bold, daring, and exciting, not to mention nearly perfect. Nearly--there are a few minor logical flaws in the plot, but this movie truly is space opera, and as with most opera, you have to suspend your disbelief a little.

The movie revolves around Captain Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) battling the Borg physically and psychologically. After foiling a Borg plot to assimilate Earth, the Borg go back in time to stop a pivotal moment in Earth's history from occurring, thus making Humanity an easy target. So, it's up to the Enterprise crew to a) get history back on track and b) defeat the Borg. It could easily have been standard-issue thriller material, but it is intelligently handled, emphasizing the characters rather than the action. We see Picard go from the stoic renaissance man to revenge-obsessed Ahab, and Data from loyal officer to Sampson (with the terrific Alice Krige supplying the Delilah as the sensual Borg Queen). The planet-side sequences have their moments, too, but like all the Next Generation movies, this is the Picard and Data show, and for good reason--the actors' obvious talent at making characters they had played for near a decade come up with new facets to explore. It's certainly a trip.

Of all the Next Generation movies (heck, all the Trek movies, excepting Wrath of Khan), this movie is the most evenly paced and best plotted. Considering that this movie underwent half a dozen different shifts in what it was meant to be about--at one point it was going to take place in the middle ages and be called Star Trek: Renaissance--it's a testament to the actors and writers that the material never gets away from them--a temptation that proved all too powerful in the next installment (Insurrection). On the technical side, the direction from Jonathan Frakes (a.k.a. Commander Riker) is superlative--he manages to draw out Patrick Stewart's most complex performance as Picard, and the lighting, camerawork, and sound are all impeccable. The special effects, of course, are still impressive a decade later, thanks to George Lucas' Industrial Light and Magic studios (this was the last Star Trek film they did). The Enterprise-E looks fabulous, and thankfully, there are no trips to Bronson Canyon in this movie (why do all the deserts in the Star Trek series look similar? Well...). Although it doesn't quite beat out the slightly more literate and philosophically dense Wrath of Khan for the title of Best Star Trek Movie, it finishes a solid second in my book. If you only buy one Star Trek movie, buy Wrath of Khan. But if you buy two, buy this one in addition to Wrath of Khan. You'll be really glad you did.

"First Contact" is the eighth Star Trek film, and hit the movie screens in 1996. Directed by Jonathon Riker (Will Riker), it was the first in the series of movies to focus solely on the crew of the Next Generation. Following the events of "Generations", it was also the first to feature the Sovereign-class Enterprise-E.

The film opens in 2373, as the Borg launch their second invasion of Federation space. The Borg are a ruthless and highly adaptable enemy. Part organic, part machine, each drone is connected to a single hive mind - allowing for no individual reasoning, thought or action. Their quest for perfection has led them to assimilate thousands of other civilisations into their collective. Their first invasion - 6 years previously - had been covered in the TNG episodes "The Best of Both Worlds" Parts 1 and 2. During that invasion, Captain Picard himself had been assimilated and renamed Locutus of Borg. He was eventually freed from the Collective, though there are certain scars he still carries.

As a result of Picard's previous ordeal, Starfleet's top brass order the Enterprise to stay away from the battlefield. Picard, however, disobeys the order, and takes command of the fleet engaging the Borg Cube. The knowledge he gained as Locutus allows the Starfleet vessels to destroy the invading ship, though not before the launch of a smaller sphere-shaped vessel. This vessel creates a temporal vortex and disappears into the past, with the Enterprise following in its wake. The two ships emerge in 2063, close to Earth - the day before the legendary Zephram Cochrane's first warp flight. This flight led to the first meeting of Humans and Vulcans, which eventually led to the formation of the Federation. The Borg mean to prevent this flight - in doing so, the Federation will never have existed and will allow the easy assimilation of Earth. Picard divides his command crew - some, led by Riker and Troi, work on the surface to ensure the success of Cochrane's flight. Picard, however, leads the fight against a group of Borg who have invaded the Enterprise.

"First Contact" is my favorite of the Trek movies. There's plenty of action and humor - not only do the Enterprise officers have to battle the best 'bad guys' in the Star Trek universe, they also have to deal with Tequila, Rock 'n' Roll and a very different Zephram Cochrane to the one they learnt about in school. It also shows a very different side to the usually diplomatic Picard and a very clear route for Data to become more human.

If you're a "Star Trek: The Next Generation" fan, this is the film for you. The Federation's most deadly enemy, the Borg, are en route for earth --- and in "Terminator" style, they're headed to earth's past to assimilate earth while they've still got technology worth assimilating, but are too vulnerable to fight off the Borg's superior firepower.

Excellent performances by the entire cast including the awesome Alfre Woodard and Oscar nominee James Cromwell.

Relationships among the crew (especially between Worf and Picard) are explored and developed further. The friendship between Picard and Data is also put to the test when the Borg Queen seeks to seduce them both with her promises of power and perfection.

The DVD is lacking in that it just has a couple of theatrical trailers and that's it. It would have been nice to see some behind-the-scenes footage, special effects, out takes, etc... it's almost a waste of the medium. I first bought this on VHS, which included an interesting motion photo of Picard, the Queen and Data (who morphs into an assimilated Data when you tilt the image)... the DVD doesn't have this cool motion photo on the box/case. I definitely prefer DVD to VHS because (unless you set it on fire or let your dogs play frisbee with them) DVDs essentially last forever and tapes are not a permanent medium and are subject to skipping, tracking errors and eventually, decay. It's nice that you can quickly jump from scene to scene w/ a DVD and there is never a need to rewind before you eject... but other than the inherent advantages of the DVD medium over tape, the DVD offers nothing else you can't view on the tape. The tape version is also in letterbox format.

Other than the lack of extras, this film is awesome. I sat on the edge of my seat when I saw this in the theater and I see it at least once a month now that I have it on DVD. It is exciting and entertaining and definitely the best Star Trek film yet.

Naw, it doesn't really have the same ring as 'Damn it, Jim...' does it? However, this is still the only Next Gen movie that comes even close to the genius of The Wrath Of Khan, The Voyage Home and Undiscovered Country.

First Contact is the Next Gen crew at their very best, and this intelligently scripted movie excels at all levels. There are also so many excellent performances in here, including a stunning Alice Krige as The Borg Queen, that this movie will keep the average fan on the edge of her/his seat.

Yet it is not all intensity, and Marina Sirtis turns in a hilarious and quite frankly, very sexy performance as a tipsy Deanna Troi. It is the increased warmth between the crew members that stirs echoes of the Classic Trek crew, and had the Next Gen movies been able to duplicate the high standard set by First Contact, they would have won over a lot more fans. Sadly, Insurrection and Nemesis never delivered on the promise of this genuine classic.

Will they make another movie to repair the lost credibility over Nemesis? I don't know. After all, I'm just a reviewer Jim, not a miracle worker.

Definitely an important purchase. Damn it.