Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home - PG
Common Sense Note
Parents need to know that this Star Trek movie is the most farcical of the big-screen series. As much comedy as adventure derives from the journey of the Starfleet heroes to 1986 Earth, and the relative rudeness and local color they encounter in San Francisco. There are instances of comical swearing and drug references.
Families can talk about the movie's emphasis on comedy, and the culture-shock of the future space travelers in (more or less) present-day Earth society. What aspects of this world do you think would bewilder visitors from tomorrow? Also, what eco-messages do you find in the movie?
Common Sense Review
Reviewed By: Charles Cassady, Jr.
Fans like to say STAR TREK IV: THE VOYAGE HOME successfully captured the same lighthearted spirit of some of the classic 1960s TV episodes of Star Trek that aimed for whimsical humor instead of ray-gun battles with Klingons and interplanetary intrigue. Think "The Trouble with Tribbles," for instance. The movie is delightfully entertaining, and you don't have to have seen the predecessor Star Trek III: The Search for Spock to enjoy it -- though knowing the backstory helps considerably, as circumstances of the two movies start out tightly interwoven.
The core crew of the now-destroyed starship Enterprise are seen at the beginning in exile on the planet Vulcan, having rescued a returned-from-the-dead Mr. Spock (Leonard Nimoy, who also directed), and committing multiple offenses against Starfleet in the process.
Voting unanimously to return to Earth and face justice, they depart in their captured Klingon ship, only to find their home planet besieged by a bizarre, enigmatic alien space probe (another one? Wasn't that the plot of the original Star Trek: The Motion Picture?) that's battering Earth through storms and energy drains. The heroes figure out that the probe is trying to contact humpback whales, described as an intelligent species which, by the 23rd century, have been long extinct, hunted to their doom by greedy humans. Admiral Kirk (William Shatner), resurrecting an idea from the TV series that Starfleet alumni know how to navigate time as well as space, orders the crew to time-warp back to the 20th century, where humpback whales can be found.
The bulk of the fun -- and it is, much of the time, played for breezy laughs, despite the mortal peril for the Earth -- centers on the super-competent 23rd-century visitors' awkwardness fitting into 1986 Earth society. There, a surprisingly naïve Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Scotty, and other icons have to contend with such otherworldly concepts as money, rude people, profanity, exact change on buses, and impish Mr. Chekhov perceived as a Soviet agent after he's assigned to go to a U.S. Navy yard and seek out the nuclear "wessels" for a fuel component.
This cast has seldom been more charming (and that's saying a lot), and there's a running undercurrent about Spock, still partially amnesiac and disoriented after his more-than-near-death experience, gradually re-learning his ties of friendship with his shipmates, and learning to balance logic with emotion. Sure, the special effects are good too (note the use of early CGI to simulate the time warp), but it's the beloved characterizations of Star Trek that power the "wessel," and that set it apart from the vast majority of screen science-fiction that's all about the gadgets, rockets, aliens, and monster costumes.
There have been other movies -- and Star Trek episodes -- about time-travel (and whales in jeopardy). Some in which characters revisit the world of yesterday to save the future include Millennium, the R-rated 12 Monkeys, and the entire Back to the Future series.
Rate It!
| Content | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| CS | adults | kids | ||
Sexual Content |
 |
|||
ViolenceA brief flashback to a spaceship explosion from Star Trek III, but otherwise this is renowned as the Star Trek movie without a single shot fired in anger. One character does suffer a fall, and disastrous storms batter the Earth. Some stock footage of the killing and butchery of whales. |
|
|||
LanguageMr. Spock tries to fit into 20th-century culture by swearing gratuitously ("colorful metaphors," he calls it), played as comedy. Words used include "Goddamn," "hell," "dumbass," and "dips--t." A punk gives Kirk and Spock the finger. |
 |
|||
Message |
|
|||
Social BehaviorStarfleet is racially and species-integrated, individually quirky but respectful and appreciative of differences. They function as a great team, working together for positive outcomes. Kirk asks Spock to lie -- which Vulcans can't do, but he's able to "exaggerate" deceptively. Female characters, often on the sidelines or simply love interests, are particularly strong in this mission. |
 |
|||
CommercialismApple computers get a plug, as well as the Yellow Pages and other 20th-century billboards. Star Trek itself is quite a commodity. |
 |
|||
Drug/Alcohol/TobaccoSocial drinking. Kirk explains Spock's alien ways to a 20th-century heroine by saying he did heavy drugs in the 1960s. |
|
|||
