This is the ninth of a series of essays on the first ten Star Trek features, the Trekalog.by William Severini Kowinski
Star Trek: Insurrection has become a problematic
movie as the ninth in the original ten (or Trekalog) of Star Trek features.
Even its title has become troublesome. (There’s no insurrection to overthrow
the government in this story. We now
know better what that looks like.) Though I have great affection for this film,
I’ve been bothered by its shortcomings, from the first time I saw it in a
theatre the week it was released in December 1998. I felt then it could have
been a great Star Trek movie, as well as a brave one. In many respects, it
dazzled me. I still believe thematically it remains a major evocation of the
soul of Star Trek.
This film, written by Michael Piller from a story by Piller
and Rick Berman, and directed by Jonathan Frakes, has its fans. At the time it opened, critic Gene Siskel
said it was the only Star Trek movie he truly enjoyed. (His TV partner, Roger Ebert, had a
different view.)
Others have come to value it over the years, or at least
elements of it. Jerry Goldsmith’s score—especially the lovely Ba’ku
theme—remains one of my favorites, and the acting, the characterizations, the
humor gave it an attractive buoyancy.
After many subsequent viewings, I’ve found more that’s annoying but I also
retain that initial affection, and admire it even more for its courage.
The conventional wisdom has become that it is more of a
television episode than a movie.
Insofar as I even know what that means, I take the opposite view: I
think it tries too hard to be an action movie.
Or more generally, it may simply be that the Star Trek features series
started to run out of luck. Many if not most very good feature films have a
pretty long history. They may have been conceived five or eight or ten years
before they get made. Even some sequels
take years to develop. But Star Trek
movies rolled out at a faster pace—every two or three years. They typically emerged from assembling bits
and pieces of screenplay drafts, often at the last minute, with lots of different imput. This fortuitously resulted in some excellent
films. Unfortunately that kind of luck
doesn’t always appear.
But before wallowing in the details, the most important
element of this movie is the core story, the principles that are at stake. In special features interviews for the first
expanded DVD of this movie, writer Michael Piller said that he wanted to move
away from the darker Star Trek (not only the previous feature, Star Trek:
First Contact, but the ongoing television stories, particular of Deep Space
Nine) and the darker path science fiction had been taking in general in the
1990s, to revive the optimistic spirit and idealistic modeling of Gene
Roddenberry’s original vision. “I
wanted to do one for Gene,” he said. So
Insurrection pivoted on a moral issue with a real world history, as well as
portraying a society that emphasized a different aspect of the soul of Star
Trek.
The title sequence—set to that lilting but slightly
unconventional Goldsmith theme—depicts a happy, healthy and busy agrarian
society with some pre-industrial mechanisms.
But we quickly see hidden observers, Starfleet uniforms and unknown
aliens (the Son’a), just before violence disrupts this peaceful day. The
android Data has seemingly gone berserk, and has deliberately unmasked the
hidden observers. He also appears to be
wounded.
Meanwhile the Enterprise-E is far away, on yet another minor
diplomatic mission (“Does anyone remember when we were explorers?” Captain
Picard asks.) After being contacted by an Admiral Dougherty requesting Data’s
schematics, and then a brief conversation with the Admiral about Data
apparently gone amok, Picard (against the Admiral’s wishes) diverts the
Enterprise to the distant planet involved, in an untraveled pocket of the
galaxy called the Briar Patch because its environment disrupts starship
technologies.
Maneuvering a shuttle and a bit of Gilbert and Sullivan,
Picard and Worf disable Data, and Geordi La Forge learns what went wrong: Data
had been attacked and engaged his ethical subprograms. But why was he attacking the Son’a and
Federation personnel—everyone but the Ba’ku on the planet?
Picard and an Enterprise team beam down to free the unmasked
observers Dougherty tells him are hostages. They find instead peaceful, calm
and intelligent villagers, treating the “off-worlders” as guests. Picard soon learns that the Ba’ku are
warp-capable but have chosen a life without advanced technology, on this
welcoming planet.
Picard and the Ba’ku investigate what Data found that got
him shot: a holo-ship, programmed to simulate the Ba’ku village. When several Son’a attack them, Picard
realizes what is happening: a conspiracy to transport the Ba’ku onto the
holo-ship and abduct them. “You go to sleep one night in the village. Wake up
the next morning on this flying holodeck transported en masse. In a few days, you’re relocated on a similar
planet without even realizing it.” But the question remains: why?
By now some of the Enterprise crew are feeling and acting
oddly. Riker and Troi are re-igniting their old romance, Worf is showing signs
of going through Klingon puberty, and Picard himself feels a burst of vitality
and exuberance. Having danced his way
to a mirror to examine his jawline, he realizes what is happening, and returns
to the planet to speak with Anij and the other Ba’ku, who confirm that the “metaphasic
radiation,” a quality of the rings around the planet that continuously
regenerates genetic structure, is keeping them young and even improves their
health. Just being in orbit around the
planet is enough to affect the Enterprise crew. Three centuries earlier, the
Ba’ku left a war-torn planet and searched for an isolated haven to establish a
peaceful culture, ending up here.
Picard now realizes that the planned Ba’ku abduction has
something to do with the “fountain of youth” effects of the planet’s
rings. He vows to prevent it, and in
explaining his reason to Anij, Picard states in plain language the moral core
of this story:
“Some of the darkest chapters in the history of my world
involve the forced relocation of a small group of people to satisfy the demands
of a large one. I’d hoped we had
learned from our mistakes, but…it seems that some of us haven’t.”
Those forced relocations and related behaviors (up to and
including genocide) have happened multiple times on every inhabited continent
on Earth, from ancient days through our own time in the 21st
century. Many would observe that they
are still happening.
But the instance Michael Piller said was foremost in his
mind when he wrote this script was the removal over several centuries of a
series of American Indian peoples, most graphically represented by the Trail of
Tears that resulted from what was literally called the Indian Removal Act in
1830. Cherokee, Seminole and other
tribal groups were driven from their communities in the southeast (near where
gold was discovered) and forced—including force-marched—thousands of miles to
reservations in the West. Thousands
died of starvation and disease along the way, while others perished shortly
after their arrival.
Later, in his confrontation with Admiral Dougherty, Picard
asserted that removal “will destroy the Ba’ku, just as cultures have been
destroyed in every other forced relocation throughout history.” Relocation and related oppressions certainly
destroyed American Indian cultures that had flourished for many centuries.
In this confrontation, Dougherty makes the case for
kidnapping the Ba’ku. The Son’a have
developed a way to extract the youth-preserving qualities of the planet’s rings
but the process would render the planet “uninhabitable for many generations.” They will deploy the huge, eye-catching particles collector, with technology the Federation can't duplicate. But the planet (oddly, it is never named) is in Federation space, so for this mission the Son’a and
the Federation are partners, sanctioned by the Federation Council.
After Dougherty parries his proposals to delay the procedure
for further study of alternatives while the Son’a and Ba’ku share the planet,
Picard lays it on the line: “We are betraying the principles upon which the
Federation was founded. It’s an attack
upon its very soul.”
Though there are technical interpretations of how the Prime
Directive does or doesn’t apply, Picard is consistent in his assertion about history. For him, the nuances of “non-interference”
are based upon a hard-won founding principle, which in a TNG episode he spelled
out to his crew: “We are not invaders.
We are explorers.”
The distinction is basic, and a huge change. Historically,
explorers were the scouts for invaders. Again, we have to look no further than
the Americas. Explorers, financed by governments and commercial interests,
returned with news of lands to inhabit and resources to plunder and bring back
to Europe. Columbus thought the friendly natives might make good slaves.
When the Federation
was founded, it committed to not repeating this history, to respecting the
cultures and the lifeforms on planets it explored. A number of Next Generation stories were about this very subject.
This is what Starfleet’s Prime Directive is really
about. It is what makes the Federation
different, not only in the fictional universe it inhabits, but in our universe
as a vision of justice, diversity, and respect for all life. It is as Picard said, an element of the
Federation’s soul, and a major expression of the soul of Star Trek that has
inspired so many for generations.
Dougherty counters: “Jean-Luc, we are only moving six
hundred people.”
“How many people does it take, Admiral, before it becomes
wrong?” Picard replies. “A thousand?
Fifty thousand? A million? How many
people does it take, Admiral?”
With its swelling music tag, this speech is a popular moment
with many Trek fans. Personally I feel
this choice of tone makes Picard sound too pompous and self-righteous—he’s not
really asking the question, he’s being indignant. It’s no wonder that Dougherty dismisses his objections and orders
him to another part of the galaxy. But
his point is solid—and controversial.
Many people, evidently including some members of the cast,
see sense and maybe a more persuasive case based on the numbers: Dougherty said
that the regenerative properties of the rings’ radiation could benefit
billions. Doesn’t helping billions justify moving six hundred people (and
probably sacrificing their current perpetual youthfulness, perhaps condemning
them to imminent death)? Don’t the
needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few?
By positing billions against 600, this script forces a hard
look at the core principles. Doubtless
the European invaders thought timber from American forests for sailing ships
and other purposes, as well as crops like tobacco, would benefit millions in
Europe, and therefore justified getting rid of the cultures of hundreds or thousands living in those
forests and on those lands that were in the way. Just as they justified the Trail of Tears because gold would help
their country’s economy, and therefore more people.
Invasion and exploitation always justifies itself on
supposed principles, as long as they don’t get in the way of the invader’s
gain. What may look like a sensible
calculus is usually a convenient rationalization for greed, based on greater
military power and (almost always) assumptions of racial and cultural
superiority. Even the implication that the Federation can do what it wants with this planet because it is in "Federation space," (and apparently the Ba'ku who live there don't have to be consulted) is a species of imperialism.
Picard had allowed himself to be swayed by this calculus before, in the seventh season episode “Journey’s End,” as described in an
earlier post. In that story it was
young Wesley Crusher who rebelled against the forced relocation of a group of
American Indians. Perhaps it was this
incident, augmented by the youthful idealism and rebelliousness revived by the
rings, that reminded Picard so forcefully of the costs of violating this
principle—as well as the price of upholding it.
The rest of the story involves Picard and his core crew—the
Magnificent Seven—and their championing of the Ba’ku. There is a final twist—the discovery that the Son’a and Ba’ku are
the same race, the grotesquely aging children against their perpetually
youthful parents. The Son’a’s motives
are revealed to include revenge.
There are also a few scenes involving the Ba’ku culture,
particularly two conversations between Picard and Anij, as they grow
closer. In essence, Anij talks about
fully inhabiting the present moment, without reviewing the past or planning for
the future. “You explore the
universe,” Anij says to Picard. “We
have discovered that a single moment in time can be a universe in itself, full
of powerful forces. Most people aren’t
aware enough of the now to even notice.”
Here on Earth,
mindfully exploring the present moment is a both meditation technique and its
intention, developed in Zen and other Buddhist practice, only recently adapted
in American and European contexts. A different approach to valuing the present
moment was a theme in Star Trek: Generations, where it was a consequence
of mortality, rather than a lesson of immorality.
Later Anij
demonstrates the ability to slow time down, or at least the perception of time.
(Making the water drops visible as they fall, or the hummingbird’s visible
wings may remind some viewers of effects of a certain herb, and of spending
seeming hours watching smoke curl under a lamp.) The Ba’ku insights may suggest the value that can be derived from
different “alien” cultures, even small and isolated ones, like Tibet (though
forms of Buddhism are prominent in many Asian countries.) Perhaps what the Ba’ku have to teach would
be more valuable than what the rings of their planet can offer.
Though our own (often small) Native cultures were crushed
before many of their profound insights were known or understood, some of those
cultures made deep impressions on the dominant culture, and that continues to
happen. For instance, the Haudenosaunee (or Iroquois) Confederation of tribes
existed democratically, probably for longer than the United States has so far.
Contacts with Founding Fathers and others, some scholars say, meaningfully
influenced the idea and structure of the United States. In turn, it influences the United Federation
of Planets, though the Haudenosaunee had a different Prime Directive than
Starfleet: In every decision, consider the impact on the seventh generation
to come. (For us, seven generations takes us into the 23rd
century.)
J.M. Dillard’s
novelization, published to coincide with the movie’s initial release, was based
on a slightly earlier version of the script, but differs in plot details mostly
in a different ending, in which Ru’afo escapes the collector but plunges into
the rings, speedily becoming younger and younger until he disappears. Apparently this was changed during shooting
when that ending didn’t seem to be working.
The actual ending is disappointing: Picard and the villain climbing and
fighting against a ticking clock to get to a control panel replicates the
Generations
climax and there are similar scenes in
First Contact, while the blue
background (meant to be the rings outside?) screams unfinished visual effect.
The Son’a’s appearance is different in the novelization—not
the wrinkled wraiths we see on the screen but with surgically thin baby smooth
skin, and ostentatiously adorned in robes and jewels. Perhaps this was too
close to a Hollywood reality. Apart
from their skin stretching salon, just about the only remnant of the Son’a’s
conspicuous love of luxury is the incongruous sofa that is Ru’afo’s command
chair on the bridge of his ship. (In the film, the Son’a have two alien slave
races: the Ellora, who look like Vegas showgirls in body paint, and the Tarlac,
who resemble the aliens in Buckaroo Banzai.)
Apart from some Harlequin romance level descriptions,
Dillard does elaborate on motives and intentions. The duck-blind observation of the Ba’ku, in her interpretation,
was itself always a ruse, to mask the secret of what the Son’a and Admiral
Dougherty were up to. It takes an extra step to realize this from the actual
movie, for the only hint I got was the implication of Dougherty saying the
Ba’ku originally came from elsewhere in space (and hence weren’t covered by the
Prime Directive), suggesting he mus have known they weren’t a pre-warp society
that required secrecy to study.
Towards the end,
when Admiral Dougherty learns the true relationship of the Son’a and Ba’ku,
Dillard has him realizing that Ru’afo was primarily seeking revenge, and that
he never intended to share the youth-giving technology or its fruits with the
Federation. Similarly, Picard has a
flash of recognition as he confronts Ru’afo on the collector: just as he had
been driven by vengeance against the Borg in the events depicted in
Star
Trek: First Contact, so Ru’afo was obsessed with revenge against the Ba’ku
who had rejected and exiled him. Even though revenge seems the default
motivation for Star Trek movie villains, this movie might have benefited from
such clarifying moments.
Dillard also elaborates earlier on Picard’s thoughts from
his initial confrontation with Dougherty.
He reasons that the Federation would probably need no more than a few
years to figure out a better way to benefit from the cellular regeneration
effects of the rings, and that the Son’a were rushing things for reasons of
their own. He doubts that the full and
true plan had ever been presented to the Federation Council. Clearer indications of Dougherty’s and
Picard’s suspicions and realizations in the movie (perhaps as Dillard developed
them) might have added texture and interest to the movie’s story, making it
more of the unraveling of a mystery.
I don’t want to belabor what I experienced as flaws in the
film. Every film has flaws, but some
are serious enough—or there is an accumulation of them—to weaken the
credibility and flow of the movie, or to engender confusion and raise questions, all of which are harmful when they take the viewer out of the story. My disappointments are no doubt heightened by my conclusion that this could have been the best of the TNG features.
My first impression
that this was a movie that just missed being really good was based on what
seemed to be a confusing rhythm, a sense that, despite some slow scenes and
comic moments, it just rushed on, with no rhythm but momentum. I felt it needed more pace; it needs to
breathe. It’s not as if running time
was a problem—this was the shortest of all Star Trek features.
I felt this most acutely on first view in the cut from
Geordi’s viewing of a sunrise—the first time in his life he’d seen one with
normal vision, due to the planet’s regeneration effect. In his original commentary to
First
Contact, director Jonathan Frakes noted the temptation to cut off a scene
too quickly just to keep the movie moving.
The quick cut from the sunrise and Geordi’s eyes to an overview of
orbiting ships was jarring, and to me trivialized what could have been a more
powerful moment.
I was also taken out of the flow by elements of the story that didn't seem credible, like the simpleminded plan to relocate the Ba’ku (they
weren’t going to notice they were no longer on their planet, with its hills and
sky?) or Data and the others in their invisibility suits tromping around
supposedly undetected, as if the Ba’ku had no other sense but sight.
I was always uneasy with the portrayal of the Ba’ku, though
the actors rescued it for me.
Subsequent viewings suggest why they seem less credible than symbolic:
their gracefully styled but rigidly earth-tone clothing, their uniformly
pristine village buildings-- more elegant versions of a Phoenix suburb (as
Marina Sirtis suggests in a recent commentary) and (as Jonathan Frakes notes)
their unbroken whiteness.
Then there are the missed opportunities, including a clearer
sense (perhaps from a single point of view, like Picard’s) of the contrast
between the trivial hurry of the Enterprise greeting a new Federation member,
and the slower, fuller life on the planet, absent
phaser fire. Another is the
assertion that deploying the collector would destroy life on the planet for
generations, implying for more than its people. So even if the Ba’ku were removed, all other planetary life would
be destroyed, an act of geocide that would have been a major concern in a TNG
episode. (And if Ru’aflo didn’t misspeak when he said “everything in this
sector
will be dead or dying," on more than one planet.)
I get the impression now that not everybody making this
movie was on the same page, contributing to a lack
of clarity and pace that can prevent viewers from just riding along on a voyage, with its ups and downs, sidetracks and problems solved together. Confusion and disagreement about the core issues probably
also contributed. Even in the third
season of Picard, Captain Shaw’s erroneous if funny description of this
movie’s events, particularly that it was Picard who violated the Prime
Directive, suggests this confusion, as well as how the story might be whispered
about at the time so that the Federation saves face.)
Yet a lot of the pieces are there: the exodus from the
village, the Enterprise space battle, the transporter and holoship
trickery on the Son'a, the hummingbirds. Some fans reacted against the
humor, and the change in characterizations.
I enjoyed all of that. (Sure, Data in the haystack was sappy and forced,
but so goofy that isolated it remains an awkward highlight.) The Enterprise crew didn’t
need an alien virus to get a little silly, as in The Naked Now/Time—just an
infusion of youth. It’s fun watching
these actors do humor, and do it well. In this (as well as other respects) it reminded me of
Star
Trek IV: The Voyage Home, when the Kirk Enterprise crew loosened up. It also turns out to be a kind of preview to
aspects of the TNG characters as they appear in
Picard season 3.
If the viewer gets
swept past the incongruities, then the buoyancy and the scenery in this movie
combine for a bright ride. There are plenty of incidents, a fine romance for
Captain Picard and Anij (though their kiss got cut entirely) and along with the
main cast there are solid performances by F. Murray Abraham (Ru’afo), Anthony
Zerbe (Admiral Dougherty) and Donna Murphy (Anij) as well as Gregg Henry (Son’a
Gallatin),Daniel Hugh Kelly (Ba’ku Sojef) and a very young Michael Welch (Ba’ku
child Artim.)
Director Frakes had approached
First Contact’s Enterprise
scenes as a horror story, using some traditional horror movie moves. Those scenes were dark—often literally.
Everyone—from Paramount to Rick Berman to Patrick Stewart, credited for the
first time as a producer, wanted something lighter for this film. So this time Frakes directed an action
adventure out in the bright daylight, like a western. That final shot of the
seven Enterprise officers all lined up, capped the reference to
The
Magnificent Seven heroes defending a helpless village.
The
CGI is now a little outdated (this was the first Trek film to use it
exclusively) but the Briar Patch is visually stunning, and the action scenes
are fun. Despite its reputation, this
movie didn’t do so badly at the box office, either. It’s too bad that it couldn’t more seamlessly bring together its
moral center, the story and the mood, as did its model predecessor, The
Voyage Home.
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