Tonight the Summer STAR TREK Simply Spectacular Saturdays at the Royal Theater in West LA gets extended to begin the TNG films, starting with Star Trek: Generations on the big screen. And the guest for tonight is composer Dennis McCarthy.
Kick off the TNG movies with Trek’s most prolific composer
Tonight Laemmle Theaters (in conjunction with Ledjer Film & Theater services and TrekMovie.com) extends the Summer series of Star Trek Saturday midnight movies with the first feature from the Next Generation crew. See Captain Picard and Captain Kirk come face to face on the big screen tonight in Star Trek: Generations at the Royal Theatre in West L.A.
Star Trek Generations trailer
As we do with each film, the screening is proceeded with a Q&A session and tonight I will be talking with the composer, Dennis McCarthy who did the score for Generations, along with dozens of episodes of Star Trek between 1987 and 2005, more than any composer. McCarthy’s music work garnered him nine Emmy nominations and nine ASCAP awards, including one for Generations.
See Star Trek Generations in on the big screen with special guest Dennis McCarthy at the Royal Theater in West LA tonight Saturday July 31st
Star Trek Movie series continues with TNG films and Star Trek 2009
Due to the popular demand, Laemmle Theaters and Ledjer Film & Theater services continued the series of Star Trek films to include the four Next Generation films and the 2009 Star Trek movie. Guests are currently in the process of being arranged.
$10 general admission. $37.50 for a five-film ticket package.
Here is the current schedule.
| Date | Film | Guest |
| July 31 | STAR TREK GENERATIONS | Dennis McCarthy (Composer) |
| August 14 | STAR TREK FIRST CONTACT | Brannon Braga (co-writer) |
| August 21 | STAR TREK INSURRECTION | Guest TBA |
| August 28 | STAR TREK NEMESIS | Will Wheaton (Wesley Crusher on TNG) |
| September 4 | STAR TREK (2009) | Guest TBA |
EVENT DETAILS
What: Star Trek Movie Series
When: Saturdays at midnight in July-September (see above schedule)
Where: Laemmle’s Royal Theatre is located at 11523 Santa Monica Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90025, (310) 478-3836
Tickets: $10 for general admission. You can buy tickets at the box office or online at www.laemmle.com.
I have always enjoyed the works of Dennis McCarthy. He always knew. The right music for the story’s set setting and characters story. My word is genius
Wow, that Generations trailer is awful.
The one thing that I can honestly say that I like about Generations was the music!
I did sit down with the boy and he watched this for the first time just a couple of weeks back. He’s nine and has watched a broad spread of Trek over the years but even he just couldn’t get his head around the death of Kirk. In fact he thought that Picard was the more elderly of the Captains.
Its not a terrible movie, but its such a shame the torch wasn’t passed with more panache than this.
TBA for Insurrection. I can’t imagine anyone wanting to come in and defend that movie during a fan Q& A.
I LIKE Generations. People slam it, but why? It has everything, Kirk, Picard, the Enterprise, even Guinan is in it. Also, Data has a strong story. Something he didn’t get in either Insurrection or Nemesis. I think the movie suffers from switching from Kirk’s time to Picard’s time way to fast, though. The movie should have started in Picard’s time, and then when Kirk met Picard, have flashbacks to the Enterprise B.
4
I would defend Insurrection. I actually loved Insurrection.
I thought that on balance Generations was pretty good, the story was a good arc and the opening scene and stirring EPIC music was a beautiful way to launch the Enterprise B
the only real problem for me was Kirks death, it was meaningless and the plot device that Malcolm McDowell couldn’t just fly a ship into the energy ribbon since that is exactly what happened to the Lakull.
As a side question, why was the Enterprise A decommissioned after only being in Star Trek V & VI?
@7 And we all know what happened to the Lakull: It was destroyed, most likely before anyone could cross into the Nexus.
He couldn’t fly into the nexus with a ship because the chances of being destroyed before crossing over were too great.
#6 I can sympathize. I saw Nemesis in the theatre 4 times. I thought it was great, but I also hadn’t read the plotline or script which was posted online. I went in completely fresh and loved it. I went in fresh for Insurrectiion and left feeling indifferent.
love the music, best soundtrack after TWOK. The movie gets a little weird when the enterprise gets to veridian 3. a klingon bird of prey takes down a galaxy class starship? The captain volunteers for a prisoner exchange? Soren’s probe reaches the sun in 6 seconds? One of the weirdest crashes when the saucer section crash lands on verdian 3. I remember watching a making of generations tv special where the showed a front end loader with the mock up of the saucer section on the front. In the film it looks like that is exacly what is happening. and the captain(s) make bad choices to where and when they will re-enter reality.
I still love the film, Soren was a very strong villan, It would have been cool if soren would have been a regular villian in TNG the series.
and of course Shatner (at the time) was very happy with how his character died.
#8 Olley is correct. Even tho the ship was destroyed they ended up in the nexus, but the Enterprise beamed them out as they were crossing into it, hence the echo left of Guinan.
The Deflector was half destroyed with Kirk behind it, and he ended up in the nexus also.
There’s no evidence that proves that anyone in a destroyed ship doesn’t end up in the nexus. In fact the evidence proved otherwise.
It was a poorly constructed concept. Had Rick Berman been willing to listen to Leonard Nimoy and make changes, it could have been a much better movie and Nimoy may have been open to directing it. But hey, he only made the most successful Trek movie of all time at that point!
7
Did you happen to see how it was going to be originally?
They went with the better ending and Kirk died a hero and not shot in the back.
#10 Not true, Shatner was not happy. I refer to you the book “Movie Memories” which has diaries of his time on the set. Sadly the book ends at the time just before they reshot the ending. Shatner was so dissatisfied he quickly pitched an idea for Kirk’s return, which was rejected by Berman, and became one of the best-selling Trek novels of all time.
I hope the newbies will see the TNG movies and lovve them as much as the other ones.
First Contact is one of the best movies ever. It was a fav of mine when I was 13 and is still up there with Khan as a great Trek movie.
Channel 4HD tonight @ 11pm in UK.
@ 13. I have the generations special from E! television during the movies publicity tour. Shatner was quite pleased with the film. Perhaps after the film’s run through theaters. Shatner then had some regrets. And no, I didn’t make it up. :)
I still think the Saucer crash is stil fantastic
I loved how the Enterprise D bridge looked in Generations.
I guess it has its flaws but the idea of this film was very cool. I loved the setting of Kirk’s house for the meeting between Kirk and Picard, it seemed more whimiscal and unique setting for this historic meeting.
By the way has anyone caught the original ending of Generations?
Oh, the saucer crash was fantastic on the big screen. I remember just being amazed by it. I love the shot where Riker looks up at the ceiling, and sunlight is coming in.
About the trailer, One would assume that Kirk is actually aboard the Enterprise-D(which I was lead to believe), and that cliff eidelman did the music. Of course these aren’t gripes and that is just clever editing and Generations film score hadn’t been completed yet.
19
A great moment.
In regards to Kirk’s death I think some fans would be unhappy no matter what way Kirk was killed.
In the final movie he did die a hero and not shot in the back.
I said it once,,and I’ll say it again,,,
One “quick” way to save Shatners Kirk would be to film a quick 5 min part with Leonard Nimoys Spock leaving the “new Trek” and zipping back to the Kirk, Picard and Dr Tolian Soran, fist fight, and have Leonard Nimoys Spock save the day.
Shatners Kirk is saved,prime Spock is back with prime Kirk,Dr Tolian Soran is arrested,(and may return one day),and Picard rides off in the sunset.
There would be afew ways to save Shatners Kirk, but I see this as the best easy option.
you would only need 4 cast, and the same couple of props set up.
Gees I wonder what Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman think of that,,
:oD
I have a question: Why don’t showing like there ever happen in, say, NY?!?
Gr…sorry mispelled a few things, there, but its at leas understandable, LOL!
#16 Shatner is a professional. No actor would ever bad mouth a movie they were contractually obliged to promote. He was over in the UK calling it a wonderful movie. All part of the marketing game. His Movie Memories are his personal journal, no pressure to hold back honesty. He hated filming Kirk’s death scene. He didn’t want to say goodbye to the character!
Could Kirk still exist after the events of Generations? Someone, perhaps, should ask Mr. McCarthy, even though he may not have written the movie.
If Guinan was still in the Nexus despite the fact that she was also in the Prime Timeline, then Kirk is still in the Nexus.
Someone wrote in the Wikipedia that the what Picard encountered in the Nexus was only a “ghost.” Others have said that it was only an “echo,” whatever that means. And perhaps one could say that Guinan was in the Nexus only because she was El-Aurian. However, Soran was El-Aurian, too, and no part of him remained in the Nexus, as far as we knew, so it might not be merely because of her species that she was able to stay.
Moreover, we know that Kirk encountered his old pet dog and also interacted with his horse, neither of which existed in the Prime Timeline. (At least the dog had died.)
Presumably, if Picard were to go back to the Nexus, everyone he knew, including Kirk, as well as Guinan, would still be there in some form. (As would his fantasy Victorian family.)
It’s true that Guinan told him, that none of what he enountered was “real.” But then, how do you explain Kirk and his role at Veridian III?
One more thing: There might be a version of Soran in the Nexus, but it might be a version that did not aspire to leave it.
The Nexus might be a realm in which parts of spirits can remain and be sustained in the world they build. Or, the Nexus might be a portal to another universe, and the people there either might or might not leave.
Had Picard not encountered Kirk, Kirk might have stayed in the Nexus forever. In fact, had Guinan not talked to Picard, Picard might have decided to stay, as well. His Victorian family was simply perfect. (Although, he did see in the glint of that ornament that someone was wrong.)
Picard never had a real family, and the closest relative he had to a son was a nephew who had just been killed. For him, paradise was to have a family of his own.
(Although why a Victorian family? Wasn’t his family originally French? But that’s a side issue.)
Generations is a very good movie. I liked it when I saw it in the theaters, and I still like it — in fact, I like it more and more as the years go on… for some reason.
I used to disparage Mr. McCarthy for his bland and uninspiring scores until I read that such lifeless music was insisted upon by Mr. Berman, who evidently didn’t want music to overwhelm his precious dialogue. While I no longer blame Mr. McCarthy, his scores are by far the worst of the Trek franchise.
I don’t see how there could be a Soran in the Nexus, because When Picard and Kirk leave it, they arrive at a point of time where Soran never entered the Nexus. Guinan may still be in there because her Nexus entering was a different time.
That’s a good point, 29. I’d forgotten that. So, the fact that there is no “echo” or “ghost” of Soran makes sense.
Still, while it is true that one logical way that neither Picard nor Kirk remain (in any form) in the Nexus is that it might be that Guinan’s El-Aurian heritage allowed her to leave an “echo” or “ghost” there while neither Picard nor Kirk are El-Aurian, since this is not stated onscreen, it would remain a supposition.
Also, it remains true that if anyone who knew Kirk were to go to the Nexus, he or she might interact with Kirk at least as a figure in his or her fantasy. That, admittedly, is a separate issue.
^^ I mean, “one logical reason.”
#29 and #30 The Nexus exists outside of space/time. No external event would effect what happened inside of it. If Soran entered at any point, he would always be in there. Think of it like the temporal shielding in Year Of Hell. No matter how many times the timeline changed, Voyager was protected because the shielding took her out of space/time. The fact that Picard and Kirk went back in time and stopped him from re-entering only affects that localised point in time and that version of Soran, and not anything inside the nexus. So in effect, Soran both got what he wanted, and didn’t.
If you can get past an ancient Bird-of-Prey destroying the Federation’s flagship, this isn’t too bad…
Dennis’s Nexus theme is amazing, and moving…loved the concept of the Nexus also.! I enjoyed Kirk’s last stand, but Shat was a bit over-the-top with his performance here! It was as if James T. Kirk was portraying William Shatner in this movie!
I like it anyway! Loved it in ’94 more! Saw it 5 times in the theater (twice matinee, thrice dollar theater)! Sad this was James Doohan’s final portrayal of Scotty!!!
Some of the FX could use a 21st century CGI upgrade! Like the Enterprise’s crash sequence!
I break this one out about once a year! Not great, but not Nemesis bad!
@29: Both Guinan and Soran (from the Enterprise-B) were inside the Nexus, before being “pulled” away from it, by the Enterprise-B’s transporters. If the act of “pulling” them out of the Nexus in this fashion left an “echo” of Guinan in the Nexus, should the same not ring true for Soran as well? First words uttered by Soran in the Enterprise-B sickbay was “No, I have to go back, please let me go back…”
That suggests that as I stated above, he too was in the Nexus, or “partially” there since they were still able to lock onto him (and 46 of his shipmates), while the other 113 (47 survivors out of 150), either were killed when the ship was destroyed, or had crossed over into the Nexus and stayed there.
Kirk on the other hand, was pulled into the Nexus, much like the “Veridian III” version of Soran, and the Veridian III version of Picard. The fact that Kirk and Picard both left the Nexus, would likely be that there would be NO echo of them behind. Although, since the Nexus version of Guinan said that “nothing Picard had seen was real”, who exactly did Picard talk to on the mountaintop near Kirks cabin? And what/who was it that followed Picard when he/they left the Nexus?
34 After Kirk and Picard come out of the Nexus to face Soran, there’s a point in the novel where Soran realizes he is out of the Nexus, and is angry at Picard. So, Soran was in the Nexus twice during the movie, but due to Picard and Kirk’s time travel, he got pulled out again.
I wonder why Soran never tried beaming himself into the Nexus instead of destroying a star?
Good points. Soran’s echo should be in the Nexus. I cannot recall exactly happened to Soran at Veridian III.
I think Generations took a lot of undue knocks. No, it wasn’t perfect; but it was one helluva thankless-but-necessary undertaking to try to bridge the franchise over the the TNG cast to begin with. It paralleled ST:TMP in a lot of ways.
The whole Nexus thing is a mess in terms of storytelling, and the movie has some highs and lows. Overall, though, it’s a watchable mess and better than some. The horseback scenes are worth the price of admission, as are the gorgeous shots of the D bridge the way it should always have been. Big demerits to the extra who does the arm gesture one second before Brent. (Was Data supposed to be imitating that guy?) Kudos to Michael Dorn for working with a bloody knee. But big demerits to whoever chose to have Gates get wet and then NOT have her do a sexy pull-up onto the ship a la Sophia Loren. Love Malcolm McDowell, but Soren is yet another cookie-cutter villain with a nutso plan that must be stopped. Yawn. BIG demerits for killing off so many of the minor characters, especially Picard’s nephew… all for what? To punch up a sluggish script? Meh!
Anyway — notice I didn’t blast the film for killing Kirk. That discussion has been had and had to a rocky grave. It was about money. They got some bucks, and pissed off a lot of fans. Done. And… Meh!
I thought Generations was an okay movie. Soren was one of the better villains from the film series, and the “death” of the Enterprise-D was handled well. Not so much in the way of Kirk’s death. I mean, he should’ve died on the bridge of a starship, not a… bridge.
To those who think it’s a horrible movie I suggest listening to the DVD commentary with Ron Moore and Brannon Braga. They pretty much rip their own script to pieces, and it comes dangerously close to being a Mystery Science Theather free-for-all! Anyway, it’s very informative in how the creative process works (or doesn’t work) in filmmaking.
Generations is very good movie in my book, despite the mind-bending nature of the whole Nexus thing, whose explanation, if I ever understood it, I’ve obviously forgotten. Whose echo or substance is where, and why, is an account I need to think through.
I will classify my listing of Trek movies in two ways: Sheer enjoyability, and artistic merit. For now, my lists stand as follows:
Enjoyability:
STII:TWOK and ST2009 (tie)
ST:FC and STVI:TUC (tie)
ST:TMP
ST:G
STIV:TVH
STIII:TSFS
ST:INS
STV:TFF
ST:NEM
Artistic Merit (Top 4 Only):
ST:TMP
ST2009
STVI:TUC
ST:FC
From Star Trek III
spock: “Why did you come back for me”
Kirk: “You would have done the same for me!”
Well Spock couldn’t bacause it was not written, this is a major flaw in the movie for me….
Its no wonder Nimoy refused.
6# I wouldn’t………..
Best trailer of ST7 in HD:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_AioR_vGKI
I still think the movie should have opened with Picard on the Bridge of the Enterprise in the 24th Centruy. All they had to do was mimic TWOK, and put up a card that said “In the 24th Century”.
Well, in my mind, Kirk is still alive, somehow.
I know that Shatner wrote a novel or two in which Kirk’s death in GEN was not permanent. I can’t remember the details, and it may have had something to do with the Nexus echo thing, but frankly we could still Bring Back Kirk even in the Prime Timeline, now that the TNG crew has said its last goodbyes (at least for a long while).
For any future production, Prime Kirk should not be played by Shatner in any medium (TV or movie), since Shatner is too old for the part (unless it’s a “future-Kirk” part). A different actor could still credibly play Prime Kirk. Hey, they switched Darrins on Bewitched, didn’t they?
Maybe it’s just because I grew up listening to it, but I didn’t think the music of TNG was all THAT horrible. Following from that, I really love the Generations score, partly because (being from the same composer) it feels like a grown-up, silver-screen version of that music. In fact, you can even hear certain motifs carried over from the show.
I always thought the saucer crash was absolutely badass — if the D is gonna be killed off, what a way for her to go! (Actually, I remembered reading some prescient speculation about that scene from Mike Okuda and Rick Sternbach in 1991’s TNG Technical Manual, in which they described possible saucer planetfall procedures. Man, that book brings back memories…) To this day, McCarthy’s “Out of Control / The Crash” cue still ties my stomach in a knot because of its strong association with the scene. I’ve heard complaints about it being too obviously a model shoot, but…well, maybe I have to watch it again, but I remember it being really good, and an example of great model-work trumping well-intentioned CGI.
The movie, overall, I have mixed feelings about, of course. Stylistically, it did a lot of things to TNG that I liked (the more creative lighting being one of them), and it hit some really good emotional chords at times, but, of course, they gave Kirk such a lame death, and there are plot holes the size of Veridian III. Not to mention the recycled Bird of Prey explosion shot.
By the way, what’s the problem with the Bird of Prey taking out the Enterprise? You guys do remember that they had the shield frequency, right? As unevenly matched as the two ships might’ve been otherwise, the E was essentially subjected to direct, unshielded torpedo hits to the engineering section; that’s bound to break something. (Plot hole case-in-point: in any given TV episode, they would’ve rotated their shield frequency the second they realized they’d been hit, and the Klingon torpedoes woulda done squat.)
#46
My only guess about why they didn’t rotate the shields would be that maybe the first shots disabled that function? Beats me. But I didn’t have a problem with a BoP destroying the Enterprise either. Of course, it would’ve been more fitting for a Romulan warbird or a Borg cube to deliver the fatal shots, as they seemed to be the primary baddies in the series, but a BoP worked just fine for me. At least we got to see the Duras sisters finally get what they’d been asking for… for a long time.
ah, what a soft spot I have for Dennis McCarthy’s Trek music. It certainly helped define the mood and atmosphere of TNG for me. I was thrilled that he was able to do the score for Generations…I remember buying the soundtrack and just about wearing it out ( I was still buying cassettes at that point). I still put the nexus there (christmas w/ the picards) on my christmas songs playlist, hehehe.
Generations, while flawed, still holds alot of very fond memories for me. No matter how the film holds up, I still enjoy watching it because it really takes me back to that time, and the feelings I have surrounding the release of that movie. I’ll defend it to the end (sigh…”lifeforms” included….)
While the scenes featuring the fights with Kirk, Picard and Soran and Kirk’s death were subpar in a lot of ways, Dennis McCarthy’s music was really good. His piece during Kirk’s “Oh, my…” was especially haunting and poignant.
Generations is one of those movies that, the more you watch it, the more you like it. :-)
I thought that the music was wonderful. It’s just beautiful. It’s got that spacey feeling. Kind of Pink-Floyd-meets-Enya. Just what the doctor ordered.