It Really Was A Fantastic Voyage

I saw Fantastic Voyage in the theater as a kid. Some years later, a science teacher showed the movie in a junior high science class (this was pre-video days so I'm assuming 20th Century Fox made the movie available as a teaching aid). Here is the premise. A government scientist goes into a coma after an assassination attempt. The only chance to bring him back to life is perform laser surgery to remove a clot to his brain. In 1966, this kind of laser surgery can only be done from inside the body so the government has a miniaturization program to shrink humans to a microscopic size and inject them into the body using a kind of miniature submarine to get from point A to point B, the point where the surgery must be performed. This is science fiction at its best,

But its the medical aspects of the story and actors interracting inside the human body that brings out the best of Fantastic Voyage. This isn't an A class list of actors. The dialog can be kind of hokey at times. But the movie itself is quite compelling and well worth watching. Or maybe Raquel Welch in a wet suit is compelling enough. The movie also has Donald Pleasence as the bad guy and I don't if there was ever a creepier actor in the movies. 

Anyway, the movie was just released on Blu-Ray and I couldn't get it fast enough to watch it and plan to watch it again soon. It is that good of a movie.

The Star Trek 2009 Reboot

Maybe I've been watching too many movies that are over 50 years old lately, movies that were actually filmed on a sound stage with things like scenes and dialog. The original Star Trek television series was like that since computer graphics and advanced special effects didn't exist yet. And while there were special effects in place for the 6 movie Star Trek series that began in 1979, varied drastically when it came to quality.

The 2009 Star Trek reboot with an all new cast (except the return of Leonard Nimoy) is a different kind of Star Trek altogether. It is a special effects geek fest, digitally charged, rapidly cut and edited, and meant to inflect new life into a deteriorating franchise heading to towards being irrelevant for a modern audience. I saw the 2013 Star Trek: Into Darkness when it came out earlier this summer. When that movie came to video, some bright guy thought of bundling Into Darkness with its predecessor in a single package for one low price (about 25 bucks). I actually thought I had seen the 09 Star Trek film but apparently not when I plopped in the blu-ray player today to watch with my father-in-law earlier today. The confusing time bending story that more blasted on the screen rather than play had him bailing out about an hour into the film to take a nap. I stuck it out to the end and generally thought that it was good film that told the origins of Kirk, Spock, and the rest of the major Star Trek characters but could have done a few of the plot points much better than what came out in the finished product.

But director J.J. Abrams gave the franchise what it needed and brought it up to date to what the current movie viewer wants from a space movie - special effects, special effects, and more special effects that tell an interesting story without being laughably silly. If you like that kind of thing, Star Trek 09 fits the bill - wish it was about 20 minutes shorter though.