‘Star Trek: First Contact’ (1996)
4K UHD Release Review
Between the Director’s Edition of The Motion Picture, Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country and Star Trek VIII: First Contact I have a very hard time choosing favourites, but First Contact is a superb film by any reckoning.
The Backstory
Over the course of the television programme Star Trek: The Next Generation, few adversaries became as memorable as the Borg. Initially, TNG planned to use the scheming, capitalist Ferengi as their villains — but this bombed, badly. The Ferengi would go on to great things in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine thanks, in no small part, to the wonderful performances of Armin Shimmerman, Max Grodénchick, Wallace Shawn and other talents, but as far as TNG went they were a C-list villain.
The tail end of a very wobbly first series saw the Next Generation crew face-off against a conspiracy of body-possessing parasites taking over the United Federation of Planets (Trek’s interstellar union of Good Guys). Trek doesn’t normally dabble in body-horror, so this was a very unusual episode. The last story beat warns that the parasites, now defeated, were able to send a last transmission to the far reaches of unexplored space…
This was the original set-up for what become the Borg. These body-snatchers, dubbed “bluegills”, were just the advance guard of a much more powerful, insect-like hive-mind species. The very last episode of series 1, The Neutral Zone, further affirms this distant-yet-ominous threat, with both the Federation and its aggressive neighbour The Romulan Star Empire losing outposts in mysterious circumstances — the entire installations just lifted out of the ground and vanished.
Series 2 of TNG finally gave this ominous threat a name and a face. The god-like agent provocateur Q, played with delicious campiness by John DeLancie, decided that the crew of the Enterprise — and Captain Picard (Sir Patrick Stewart) in particular — needed a dose of humility, and so flung the starship thousands of lightyears across the galaxy (Q Who?).
For the first time, they directly encountered the Borg. Off-screen, these adversaries had gone through some narrative changes: there was no longer any connection to the creatures from Conspiracy and they were not insect-like any more. Instead, the Borg were now a race of cybernetic zombies, their bodies extensively integrated with advanced technology that allowed them to act together as one hive-mind. They scoured other civilisations for technology that they could harvest, leaving only the dust of empires in their wake.
When it becomes apparent that the Enterprise and her crew are completely outmatched, Picard admits to Q that they are unprepared for such a foe. Q is impressed with Jean Luc’s humility, and returns the Enterprise to her previous location.
Discussing the event, which incurred eighteen casualties, with Guinan (Whoopie Goldberg), Picard surmises that Q may have been helping by revealing the Borg earlier than they would have otherwise been encountered, giving the Federation time to prepare. Guinan observes that, conversely, since the Borg are now aware of the Federation’s existence… they will be coming!
The finale of TNG series 3, and the first episode of series 4, added a new element to the Borg. The two-parter The Best of Both Worlds opens with a Borg incursion into the Federation: one ship, but this time the Borg have a new goal: Captain Picard himself.
It is heavily implied in Q Who? that the Borg are only interested in technology, but The Best of Both Worlds expands on that threat to include biology. The Borg, in fact, don’t just steal machines, they steal people and transform them into Borg — adding their knowledge, experience, skills and traits to the Borg collective mind.
The Borg capture Picard, and he is assimilated into the Borg collective. With the knowledge of one of Starfleet’s most senior and trusted officers, the Borg begin a seemingly unstoppable onslaught directly towards Earth.
The Enterprise, badly damaged after trying to destroy the Borg ship, is limping after and arrives only in time to see the carnage left behind. The Battle of Wolf 359, an infamous loss for the Federation in Star Trek lore, isn’t shown on screen. Instead, and much more effectively, we follow the Enterprise as she arrives at the erstwhile battlefield, now a graveyard of wreckage and bodies.
With quick thinking and daring-do, Captain Riker (Jonathan Frakes), promoted in Picard’s absence, and the crew kidnap Picard. Access to Locutus, as Picard now calls himself — Latin for “the one who speaks” — allows Lieutenant Data to physically connect himself to the Borg collective consciousness. Whilst all high-level commands are unavailable to him, Data is able to instruct the Borg to enter their regenerative cycle: effectively sending them all to sleep.
This rogue command causes a feedback loop which quickly overloads the Borg ship and triggers a massive explosion. The destruction of the Borg ship frees Picard from the hive-mind, and the ship’s doctor is able to remove the implanted Borg technology.
Picard, bandaged and trying to maintain a stoic dignity, can’t help but look out of a nearby window and see the Earth which he so very nearly helped to destroy. The physical and mental scars of his abuse, mutilation, torture and torment at the hands of the Borg will haunt the captain for the rest of his life.
The crew of the Enterprise would encounter the Borg two more times, but these subsequent encounters were just skirmishes and mainly involved ex-Borg — Borg who had also been separated from their collective mind. Nonetheless still traumatising for Picard, Earth was never in serious danger.
That is, until First Contact.
The Plot
In the late 24th Century, the crew of the USS Enterprise are out in space on a one-year shakedown cruise of their new ship. The Galaxy-class starship they called home throughout TNG was destroyed in Star Trek VII: Generations, and now they are getting used to her replacement: an enormous, elegant, Sovereign-class ship.
Captain Picard receives a transmission from Starfleet Command: the Borg are back, and they are making another strike at Earth. Starfleet joins the Borg in battle at the Typhon Sector, but the conflict turns into a running firefight; with the Borg ship continuing its advance into our solar system.
Ordered to stay away, lest his experiences with the Borg compromise his judgement, Picard breaks orders and sets course for Earth. Their arrival sees Starfleet in a desperate state, with the remnants of ships forming a trail behind the Borg who are now moments away from Earth.
Jean Luc’s knowledge, coupled with the extensive firepower of the new Enterprise, allows the remaining fleet to destroy the Borg ship… but not before a secondary, smaller ship ejects from it and streaks away towards Earth. A strange energy field engulfs it, which Mr. Data identifies as a “chronoton field”, before the Borg ship disappears and Earth is instantly transformed before their eyes.
In a moment, Earth has been assimilated. The population, all nine-billion people, are now Borg. The oceans have become rust-coloured chemical pools and the lands are now shimmering, silver, continent-wide cities.
Realising that the Borg must have somehow jumped back in time and assimilated Earth in the past, the Enterprise (momentarily protected from the timeline changes as it is caught in the “temporal wake” of the Borg ship) flies into the chronoton field, following the Borg back into history.
The crew emerge in orbit around Earth on April 5th, 2063, and find the Borg ship pounding a location in North America with energy weapons from their orbital position. The craft is quickly destroyed, and the crew survey the situation.
The Borg have calculated the best way to destroy the Federation is to prevent human discovery of faster-than-light travel. April 5th is the day before the inventor of warp drive, Zefram Cochrane (James Cromwell), runs his first test-flight, an event that happens to catch the attention of a passing alien science team and trigger humanity’s first meeting with extraterrestrials.
Warp drive and first contact with aliens ushers in a new era for humans, uniting us in common cause and for the common good, closing out the Third World War and bringing us into a future of peace.
“Famine, disease, war — they’ll all be gone in the next fifty years.”
“But unless you make that test-flight tomorrow, none of it will happen.”
The crew of the Enterprise must now find Cochrane, if he survived the Borg attack, and ensure that first contact still happens. A tough assignment, made worse still when the environmental readings on deck 16 of the Enterprise indicate that some of the Borg survived… and they’re on board!
The film
First Contact brings a lot of action to the table — the first-act Battle of Sector 001, with dozens of starships in a running firefight with the Borg ship, is sci-fi action at its finest. The film also doesn’t forget that it’s a Trek movie, and brings in some of the usual staples: time travel, destiny, and heroes trying to make tomorrow a better day for humanity.
What I love about the movie is that it blends all of these elements well. The surly Zefram Cochrane protests he’s developing warp drive to make money not to save humanity, and one half of the Enterprise crew have to try to convince him to see the bigger picture. Meanwhile, in orbit, Picard and the other half of the crew frantically fight for their lives against a terrible adversary — and Jean Luc, increasingly reckless, is out for revenge.
Which brings us to the Borg, themselves. One of Star Trek’s most iconic villains, the Borg are perfect adversaries. Firstly, they are the polar opposite of humanity: they believe in conformity, order and obedience. All Borg are mindless drones, without individuality, under the control of their collective hive mind. Secondly the Borg are cold, wicked looking creatures with clammy, mottled skin; bizarre artificial body parts and dead eyes. Thirdly they spread like a plague, infecting Enterprise crew members by violently jabbing them with needle-like tendrils and injecting microscopic machines that transform them, from within, into more Borg. Lastly, and most chillingly of all, the Borg cannot be reasoned with.
Both Kirk and Picard have strong track records for talking their way out of conflicts, using thoughtful negotiation or sharp-witted out-smarting of their opposition, as needed. The problem is that none of that works here. The Borg, to quote Q, are the ultimate consumer: they are not interested in conquest, or political power. All they care about is dismantling, cherry-picking and incorporating other races to better their own. To them, other living things are material to be assimilated, leaving no trace of who they were. They cannot be bargained with and, even when vanquished, they are never truly stopped.
The Characters
It is true to say that Trek often deals more with archetypes than it does with characters, and while that’s true; the seven series of The Next Generation TV programme couldn’t help but flesh out these people and their stories.
First Contact not only builds on that, but we also get plenty of character development, especially for the usually terribly written Deanna Troi (Marina Sirtis). Sirtis is a capable actor but her character most times only has one of three roles: victim of violation (The Child, Violations, Star Trek: Nemesis), long-suffering daughter (Ménage à Troi, Half a Life) or sensor of psychological malice (Encounter at Far Point, The Loss). The latter usually accompanied by a look that can only be described as “ice cream headache”.
In this film, though, she gets to actually do something. She has some fun interplay with Zefram Cochrane and is a key member of the “away team” from the Enterprise who are down on Earth, trying to get the past to play out like it should.
First Officer Commander Riker and Chief Engineer Geordie LaForge (LeVar Burton), along with a nice cameo from Dwight Schultz as engineer Barclay, round out the action in North America. They wrangle Zefram to become the unlikely hero he is destined to be, repair the primitive warp craft The Phoenix and try to keep everyone’s date with history on-course.
Meanwhile, in orbit, a battle for survival on the Enterprise has turned into a personal vendetta for Picard.
The chemistry between Patrick Stewart and Commander Worf (Michael Dorn) is exquisitely played. Picard and Worf have a long track record, with the captain supporting Worf several times in matters of his Klingon heritage. Here they are at odds as to how to proceed against the Borg and the tension is palpable. Worf wants to be practical and win the battle, Picard wants the Borg, for once, to pay for all the horror they inflect.
The strongest bond, however, is between Picard and the android Commander Data (Brent Spiner). Much as with Worf, Picard has supported Data and even defended his life in a JAG hearing when Starfleet wanted to hand the android over to scientists for study. Similarly, Data was instrumental in rescuing Picard from the Borg in The Best of Both Worlds. Data has been kidnapped and is being thoroughly examined by the Borg, and Picard must save his friend. There are stakes and there is real chemistry.
The audience-surrogate is Alfre Woodard, as a delightful fish-out-of-water 21st Century woman, accidentally trapped on the Enterprise. Initially thinking she’s been abducted by one of the Third World War factions, she comes to understand where she is and to trust Jean Luc. As an external voice, it’s her clear-thinking and straight-talking that turn Picard’s bloodlust back in to rational thought.
Then, lastly, there is Alice Krige completing the cast as the Borg Queen.
The Queen is a new addition to Borg lore in this movie: a mysterious figure who functions as a locus point for activity in the Borg hive mind. She describes herself as the one who “brings order to chaos”. Seemingly existing outside of regular time, and possibly across dimensions, the Queen is a distinct person and not just another Borg drone. Krige plays her with sultry, femme-fatale sexual energy; generously ladled-out over a cruel, ice-cold heart. She has a deep-seated hatred, bordering on disgust, for non-Borg life and, as the manifestation of the Borg consciousness, believes she is saving everyone who is assimilated — bringing them closer to perfection by uniting and sharing all the best gifts of every species.
The Reception
Directed by Jonathan Frakes, and with Jerry Goldsmith turning in another wonderful score, First Contact did well at the box office and played very well with audiences. It sits at 93% “Certified Fresh” on Rotten Tomatoes with 7.6/10 on IMDb.
I still remember bringing my grandfather to the cinema to see it — as we had nothing else to do that evening — and he was impressed. He’d never watched Trek before in his life, and he thought it was a great use of two hours. As ship’s joiner (carpenter) on HMS Superb back in the 1950s, it tickled him to see the naval influences on Starfleet and the battleship-like grace of their starships as they sail across the void of space.
Referring to the Borg Queen, he was legitimately blown-away by the spectacle of her being assembled: her upper body descending from the roof, and her lower body ascending from the floor. He spoke about it for weeks afterwards.
The legacy of First Contact is somewhat tainted, as it cemented the Borg as the go-to villain for a period in Trek production history. Star Trek: Voyager went on to use them so many times that they lost all threat — the good guys, ultimately, have to win and how many times can an enemy be bested before they no longer appear threatening? Voyager’s weak characterisation and poor writing did nothing to help either, with her captain, Kathryn Janeway (Kate Mulgrew), regularly striking deals and negotiations with the supposedly untouchable Borg.
They rode high again in a one-off appearance in Star Trek: Enterprise entitled Regeneration, in which a small number of Borg survived the events of First Contact and are thawed out in the 22nd Century. The cybernetic menaces then weren’t used until Star Trek: Picard brought them back for its second and third series, with the latter serving as a tour de force ending for the creatures.
The Features
It’s great to see the film mastered nicely in to 4K, but I confess that on a TV with good upscaling it doesn’t look all that different to the 1080p BluRay release. Due to the film being from the mid-90s, rather than from earlier, there isn’t any need to recalibrate the colours or re-master any of the footage. Even the effects, all done through models from Industrial Light & Magic, don’t need changing.
Similarly there’s no extra footage or a Director’s Cut. What was put together and released is already perfect.
Taken together, this all means that if you’ve already seen First Contact on BluRay then there’s nothing much new to see here. But if you love this film, then of course you want it in 4K HDR.
Scores
🌌 Visuals: 9/10
How it looks, generally, as a movie.
📀 Visual Technology: 10/10
The home cinema release qualities, such as HDR or 4K.
🎼 Sound: 10/10
The score, mixing, dialogue and effects.
🔈 Sound Technology: 8/10 (7.1 True HD, not Dolby Atmos)
The home cinema sound qualities.
📖 Story: 10/10
🎭 Acting: 10/10
∑ Overall: 9.5/10
