Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986)

Director:

Leonard Nimoy

Writers:

Gene Roddenberry (television series Star Trek)
Steve Meerson (screenplay) ...

Release Date:

26 November 1986 (USA)

Genre:

Adventure | Comedy | Sci-Fi

Tagline:

Beaming down to Earth December 12 1986

Plot:

To save Earth from an alien probe, Kirk and his crew go back in time to retrieve the only beings who can communicate with it, humpback whales.

Plot Keywords:

Probe | Whale | Space | Time Travel | Punk

Awards:

Nominated for 4 Oscars. Another 3 wins & 13 nominations

Cast

  (Cast overview, first billed only)

William Shatner	...	Admiral / Captain James T. Kirk
Leonard Nimoy	...	Captain Spock
DeForest Kelley	...	Dr. Leonard "Bones" McCoy
James Doohan	...	Commander Montgomery "Scotty" Scott
George Takei	...	Commander Hikaru Sulu
Walter Koenig	...	Commander Pavel Chekov
Nichelle Nichols	...	Cmdr. Uhura
Jane Wyatt	...	Amanda
Catherine Hicks	...	Dr. Gillian Taylor
Mark Lenard	...	Ambassador Sarek
Robin Curtis	...	Lieutenant Saavik
Robert Ellenstein	...	Federation Council President
John Schuck	...	Klingon Ambassador
Brock Peters	...	Admiral Cartwright
Michael Snyder	...	Starfleet communications officer

Runtime:

119 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.20 : 1

Sound Mix:

70 mm 6-Track (70 mm prints) | Dolby SR (35 mm prints)

Certification:

Canada:PG (Ontario) | Italy:T | Canada:G (Canadian Home Video rating) | Iceland:L | South Korea:12 | Brazil:Livre | Sweden:11 | Canada:G (Régie du Cinéma Québec) | Argentina:Atp | Australia:PG | Finland:K-11 (DVD rating) | Finland:K-12/9 (original rating) | France:U | Norway:10 (1988) | Norway:11 | UK:PG | USA:PG | West Germany:12 | Netherlands:AL | Singapore:PG

Filming Locations:

500 Block of Pacific Avenue, Chinatown, San Francisco, California, USA

Company:

Paramount Pictures

Trivia:

Final cinema film of Robert Ellenstein.

Goofs:

Revealing mistakes: When the cloaked ship lands on the grass, a trash can is crushed. As the earth (grass) moves down under the pressure of the heavy ship, the grass blades remain pointing up.

Quotes:

[first lines]
Saratoga captain: What do you make of it?
Saratoga science officer: It appears to be a probe, Captain. From an intelligence unknown to us.
Saratoga captain: Continue transmitting universal peace and hello in all known languages. Get me Starfleet Command.
Saratoga helmsman: Ready, Captain.
Saratoga captain: Starfleet Command, this is U.S.S. Saratoga patrolling sector five, neutral zone. We're tracking a probe of unknown origin on apparent trajectory to the Terran solar system. Attempts to communicate with the probe have been negative on all known frequencies.
Starfleet Command: Continue tracking, Saratoga. We will analyze transmissions and advise.
[...]

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "The IT Crowd: Yesterday's Jam (#1.1)" (2006)

Soundtrack:

Genesis Project

Hugely enjoyable!

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.