Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986) Reviews

• A perfect, light hearted Sci-Fi Comedy which keeps you entertained for the whole two hours

  jmanchak62010-03-01

  WARNING!!! POSSIBLE SPOILERS!!!!!!!! "Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home" is arguably the greatest Trek. It is the most popular Star Trek film (not including the 2009 reboot). Before the reboot, it was the only Trek to gross over $100 million domestically, plus it was extremely well received by critics and fans alike. It surpassed every expectation that it had set up for itself, simply because it is the funniest and most light hearted Trek. The best part is the interactions between the characters. Yes, the film was nominated for 4 Oscars (once again, the most of any Trek) including best effects, but the effects aren't the best part. It was the success of this film that convinced Paramount Television to give a spin-off series a shot. As you probably know, TNG, DS9, ST:V, and ST:E were all very successful, and they were the result of a chain reaction which started with the success of "The Voyage Home". The film also noted Leonard Nimoy as a top-notch comic director. This won him the job of directing "Three Men and a Baby". If you like Star Trek, this is definitely the film for you. Everyone else? Just research the characters a bit and I'm sure that you'll have a good time. This film earned its money and its acclaim. It features many classic moments (Spock mind-melding with the whale, Scotty talking to the computer, Kirk using "colourful metaphors" to handle an angry cabbie, Spock using the nerve pinch on a punk on the bus, Kirk and Spock arguing over their preferred foods, and that's just scratching the surface!). 10/10 A Sci-Fi Comedy along the quality of "Ghostbusters", "MIB", and "Back to the Future"! That might be an overstatement, but I think it's true!

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• Hugely enjoyable!

  NiceGuyTommy2005-02-21

  First off, I'm not a big BIG 'Star Trek' fan. I've seen the first six films, and catch an episode of the TV series every now and then (I saw the whole first season recently, which made me re-visit the Shatner/Nimoy films). I did however, find this film extremely entertaining! In fact, it was about as much fun as I think you can have at home with a (tasteful) video! I found 'Star Trek: The Motion Picture' a tad dull, although I still enjoyed it. And II and III work well together, and are both enjoyable sci-fi action flicks ('Wrath of Khan' is another classic, but I feel IV pips it to the post). However, when 'The Voyage Home' was over, I had no idea that a film with a plot which involved two humpback whales and mid-1980s San Fransico could be so damn fun. Shatner is on great form as the rogue Capt. Kirk, and Nimoy is brilliant in conveying Spocks absolute confusion at being stuck on a planet he partly understands, in a time he cannot comprehend. When Kirk explains Spocks oddness to the brilliant and frankly underused actress Catherine Hicks, Kirk says that Spock did a lot of "LDS" back in college. Kelley, Takei and company are all on fine form, and the score, direction and script all work brilliantly. The fact that the 1980s now seems so long ago (it after all, did not age as well as some decades) only adds to the films premise. I would thoroughly recommend this film to anyone - 'Star Trek' fan or not - as it is a wonderfully entertaining film for all ages. I'm sure wherever Gene Roddenberry is, he looks back on this film venture with a wry smile and a bag of popcorn.

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• There be whales here.

  bigwig_thalyi2005-07-25

  An alien probe is heading towards earth causing tidal waves and hurricane winds. The probe is trying to get in touch with humpback whales which no longer exist.In time honoured tradition it is up to James kirk and crew to go back to the 20th century, find some humpback whales,take them home with him and save the day again. This is by far the funniest of all the star trek films due to the fact that it is played totally tongue in cheek and the cast aren't afraid to poke fun at themselves.To the crew it is like visiting an "undiscovered country" and the customs of modern man confuse them totally. Catherine Hicks plays their 20th century contact,joins in the fun and adds to the confusion they are feeling by playing her role totally straight. Some classic scenes include Scotty trying to instruct a computer by talking into the mouse,Dr Mcoys horror when surgeons are about to drill into Chekovs skull and Spocks solution to dealing with an arrogant yob on a bus. However it also has a serious ecological message.If we don't stop destroying our planet then the day could well come when every kind of whale will cease to exit.Some video clips, shown in the scene in the museum,displaying images of men killing whales are disturbing because they are real. Watch this film ,enjoy it, but remember that sometimes fact is more disturbing than fiction. In memory of James Doohan 1920- 2005 RIP.

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• The most popular Star Trek movie

  perfectbond2003-02-04

  The Voyage Home is the Star Trek film that had the highest box office gross. It captured the imagination of the public who were eager to see Kirk and the crew in present day (1986) San Francisco. Luckily, the film was solid in all aspects and was enjoyed by long-time fans of the series as well. Although the outcome of the film is never in doubt, it never loses the attention of the viewer and entertains throughout. It actually felt fresh and original despite the fact that time travel had been done before (in the TV series) and it was the fourth film in the franchise. Recommended, 8/10.

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• A Vivid, Upbeat, Frequently Intelligent and Delightful Sci-Fi Adventure

  silverscreen8882005-06-15

  The fourth entry in the "Star Trek" movie series is the most popular and unarguably the best-liked of these entertaining movies. It has a fine variety of scenes, intelligent comedy to leaven the more serious adventures. it is fast paced, beautifully directed by Leonard Nimoy who also plays "Spock". What prevented it from being even better perhaps appreciated is a deliberate attempt by the writers to write short, choppy-sentence dialogue that in some scenes does not work as well as more formally-structured words might have worked. The film is bright, the art direction is very good, the music by Leonard Rosenmann is outstanding. And the story line is one of the best that sci-fi filmmakers have yet devised, in my judgment, because it has everything. As Captain James T. Kirk of the 23rd century starship Enterprise, William Shatner acts with unusual intelligence and even strength to get by. As his half-alien First Officer Spock, just recovering from a traumatic experience that caused him to have to be reeducated from ground zero, Leonard Nimoy is even better. Everyone of Jim Kirk's crewmen, including James Doohan as Engineer Montgomer Scott, De Forest Kelley as CMO Leonard McCoy, Nichelle Nichols as Lt. Uhura of Communications, talented George Takei as Helmsman Sulu, and Walter Koenig as Navigator Pavel Chekhov, have good scenes to perform and do them seamlessly and with professional style. Others in the cast including Brock Peters, Jane Wyatt, Mark Lenard, Grace Lee Whitney, Alen Henteloff, Robert Ellenstein and a relative unknown as the earthwoman who becomes enmeshed in the Enterprise officers' mission,are given telling moments. There are many memorable visual moments, including the departure of a stolen Klingon warbird from the planet Vulcan, the near-wreckage of Starfleet Headquarters, the landing of an invisible vessel in Golden Gate Park, a slingshot run around the sun, a descent from the invisible craft to the ground, scenes around the Alameda Navy Yards, a chase in a hospital and scenes at the cetacean Institute all make themselves hard-to-forget. It is the sheer fun and adventure of the storyline--sending a starship back in time to rescue two hump-backed whales and save the earth from alien destruction--that sets this film apart. Ignored by critics who have nearly always ignored sci-fi achievements, this cinematic attainment set a standard for future sci-fi to which hardly any film's maker has yet approached. The revelation of character could have been deeper, but the relevance of every moment to the plot line could hardly have been bettered. Harve Bennett deserves some of the credit for this script's excellences; so do the special-effects creators, since for once in Hollywood, every such effects serve to further the progress the central character and his helpers are making. This is probably a film to be watched over and over; I wish there were more such adult sci-fi efforts that eschew pretension and present so much intelligent dialogue, acting and intriguing "differences".

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