by Lichfield1979

Created on: September 03, 2008

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.

The Wrath of Khan is the only Star Trek film that stands in its own right as a great piece of work outside the context of the series - I'll allow an honourable mention for The Voyage Home - and it appears to take its cues from King Lear and Moby Dick rather than science fiction. For once the infamous techno-babble reaches for a biblical resonance in the shape of the Genesis project, and the heart-aching ending - in which Spock famously makes the ultimate sacrifice, because the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one - has genuine philosophical and psychological depth. That moment is the most iconic in the whole of the franchise, and has deservingly transcended it by passing into the wider culture, in a way that has eluded the rest of the cult.

The film makes a virtue of its limited budget - it was the cheapest to make of all the movies, and was actually produced by Paramount's TV division. The look of the film has aged well, thanks to the costume design and the art direction, and intelligent use of the limited special effects budget. There is even a wonderful new theme tune that tends to get forgotten. At the beginning, the film deals very effectively with the main character's sense of growing old, and the introductory scenes are full of warm personal touches and engaging naturalistic storytelling, of a kind not always evident in Star Trek's TV incarnations or the later special effects driven spin-offs. By the end, the characters are again dealing with a very different kind of loss.

William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy and DeForest Kelley are all outstanding, whilst Ricardo Montalban delights in a scene chewing performance as the villainous Khan, who stares obsessively into the abyss, like Captain Ahab - surely it's no coincidence that Kirk would would soon be chasing a whale of his own. The story has the virtue of returning to an original series episode for its source material, and the tightrope of suddenly introducing a son for Admiral James T. Kirk is just about navigated safely. More convincingly, Kirstie Allie provides a welcome addition to the crew of the Starship Enterprise, and presses Kirk to reveal something more about his character and his past.

Written and directed by Nicholas Meyer, this is the film that JJ Abrams has the unenviable task of matching when he relaunches the franchise in 2009.

"KHAAAAAAAAAAAAN!"

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