12:00 AM, 14-JULY-08
Abrams Talks Trek, Comic-Con
J.J. Abrams, director of the upcoming Star Trek reboot film, told SCI FI Wire that he's disappointed not to be bringing a preview to Comic-Con International this month, but added that the film will explore the relationships among the familiar characters while dispensing with the original series' kitsch.
"I feel like there's a certain thing that you can't really hold onto, which is, ... there's a kind of kitschy quality that must go if it's going to be something that you believe is real," Abrams said in an interview at the Television Critics Association's summer press tour in Beverly Hills, Calif., on July 14.
"Our Star Trek is not parody," added Abrams, who was promoting his upcoming Fox SF series, Fringe. "And so the idea of maintaining character relationships, the dynamic between the characters, [was key]. I never saw how Kirk and Spock became so connected. And that's what this movie does. And it does it with the entire family of the Enterprise."
As for Comic-Con in San Diego, July 24-27, Abrams expressed disappointment at not bringing the movie to the largest pop-culture confab in the world. (It's the last Comic-Con before Trek's opening next May.)
Star Trek studio Paramount "said they're not going to take anything," Abrams said. "G.I Joe's not going. Transformers 2's not going."
Abrams added that the film is not ready to be shown, though Paramount screened snippets of Iron Man to last year's convention, earning raves. "Our visual effects, unlike something like Iron Man, we have well over 1,000 visual-effects shots," Abrams said. "It's a huge thing. so i'm very disappointed, because the characters are so good, the actors are so good, that I would have been psyched just to show some of the stuff that's about the people. Because it's not really about the visual effects. But with so little done ... . And this was a big kind of strategic decision on [Paramount's] part. so I was disappointed." Star Trek is slated to open May 8, 2009. --Patrick Lee, News Editor
http://www.scifi.com/scifiwire/index...ory=3&id=57630
Abrams Talks Trek, Comic-Con
