Star Wreck Review

Author: rta-man

These are the subtitled voyages of the Starship Kickstart.

A small band of Finnish Star Trek fans created this 105-minute Star Trek/Babylon 5 parody, and they did an exceptionally good job doing so. The starship crew consists of Captain James B. Pirk (Samuli Torssonen), Commander Info (Antti Satama), Plingon Commander Dwarf (Timo Vuorensola), and the beautiful Lieutenant Whip (Tiina Routamaa). The film starts out with an armada of P-Fleet starships dropping out of warp and approaching a "maggot hole" (worm hole).

Eight years previously, Pirk and his crew were stranded on 21st Century Earth (Finland). Initially, I couldn't help noticing how closely Captain Pirk resembled David Byrne, of the Talking Heads, in the 1986 movie True Stories. On Earth, Pirk tries to convince a female that he's from the future by showing her his hand twinkler (hand phaser). Her boyfriend tosses him out into the street where he's roughed over by a few suburban-looking gang-bangers. Pirk then threatens to open a "bag of whoopass" on them with his hand twinkler, but the batteries are dead. Later, he phones Dwarf. The frustrated Plingon works at Bobby's Grill where he serves hot dogs to factory drones.

In ST: First Contact, the Vulcans land on Earth to meet Zephram Cochrane. In this film, the Vulgars land and party with rock star Jeff Cochbrane. The timeline had changed. Instead of the "antimaterial power breakthrough" being announced, the country's entire space program had been cancelled. But Pirk had a backup plan to restore the timeline. He must retrieve the Vulgar's ship and become the Emperor of Earth. Unfortunately, Cochbrane sold the ship to the Russians. Pirk, Info, and Dwarf quickly found the Tachanya nuclear facility where the starship was housed. They surprised the guard. The guard shoots about fifteen rounds out of his AK-47, but four hand twinkler shots take him out. In the words of Pirk, "Piece of pie." Once Pirk, Info, and Dwarf storm the facility, the workers believe it to be a revolution. They welcomed Pirk and his crew to bring an end to capilalism. At this point, Pirk announces that he's the Emperor of Earth. An alliance with Russia is soon formed, and guarantees him an army of engineers and red shirts to build his ship (the CPP Kickstart). At last, the starhip is completed. Pirk gives the command to leave, "Let's move." The ship leaves Earth's gravity and Pirk gives the command to go to "twist factor two". They fire "twinklers and light balls" and destroy the International Space Station.

Now, a black and white propaganda film featured Emperor Pirk and Russian President Ulyanov bringing a new peace to the world. Scenes showed the Kickstart flying in formation over Russian tanks, and fighters (looking like ST: Voyager Delta Flyers) fighting along side with turn-of-the-century gatling guns. Russian soldiers are wearing P-Fleet (TNG-era Starfleet) uniforms. Russia had conquered the world; but as the saying goes, absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Meanwhile in the Epsilon Quadrant, a small craft appears from the "maggot hole". Captain Sergey Fukov (a former Chernobyl coolant engineer and Ozzie Osborne look-alike), captain of the CPP Kalinka (which resembles the USS Enterprise from ST: XI), was the welcoming committee. Promptly, Fukov destroys the craft. On the other side of the maggot hole, resides a parallel universe and Babel 13 (looks like Babylon 5). This is where Pirk's objective lies to restore the timeline. But first, he must get past Babel 13's Captain Jonni Sherrypie.

The film displayed Hollywood-grade special effects. Their transporters dematerialize people from the top down, and rematerialize them from the bottom up. This effect was done quite nicely. Personally, I have a preference for ship images. Head on, Pirk's starship resembled the USS Enterprise-E. The sequence of the ship lifting off from dry dock and leaving Earth's atmosphere was stunning. This was very professionally done and left no marks of an amateur movie. The movie also featured some spectacular ship-to-ship battle sequences. The quality was on the same level as ST: First Contact when Starfleet engaged the Borg. Another scene matched the CGI effects of ST: Nemesis when the Enterprise plunged into the Scimitar. I was totally impressed by the FX.

Star Wreck was initially released online October 1, 2005. On October 12, 2006, it was first officially released on DVD in Finland, Sweden, Norway, and Denmark. Revolver Entertainment will be releasing the film on DVD, in the US, on November 10, 2009. The audio is in Finnish 5.1 Stereo Surround Sound and Finnish 2.0 Dolby Stereo. Subtitles are available in English. In addition to the movie, the single DVD also contains Bloopers, Definitive Inside Out (the making of the movie), Director's Commentary, and Towards the Iron Sky (talk about their next movie). More information about this movie can be found on their website at starwreckmovie.com.

Once I got over the subtitles, I thoroughly enjoyed the movie. On a scale of one to five, I give it a four.