Star Trek: First Contact (PG-13, 1996)

A theatrical spin-off of the fine TV show Star Trek: The Next Generation, STAR TREK: FIRST CONTACT gets right to business with the most compelling of the villains from the program, the Borg, an army of ghoulish cyborgs from deep space, out to conquer all humanoid life. Responding to an attack on Earth by the Borg, the starship Enterprise (a new model since the previous one got trashed in the last film) discovers the invaders have sent a Borg expedition back in time, to a war-devastated 21st-century Earth. By striking at this crucial interval, the Borg will absorb humanity at its weakest point, altering history and preventing the founding of Starfleet. Following in the same time warp, the Enterprise crew split into two teams; one beams to the wilderness of Montana of 2063, to find a genius inventor-pilot named Zephraim Cochrane (James Cromwell), responsible for faster-than-light space travel -- but he turns out to be a gangly wastrel, aghast that he's destined to be regarded as the planet's greatest hero. That's played on a comic level; more serious events unfold on the Enterprise, where Borg have taken root like an infection and are spreading throughout the ship.

Though it comes on like gangbusters (or Borgbusters, as the case may be), as with many Star Trek movies, knowledge of the dense TV mythology is crucial to comprehending this maximum-warp theatrical expansion. Someone who has not seen the cliffhanger episodes in which Capt. Jean-Luc Picard is captured and turned into a Borg, will be a bit lost -- and this movie not only references it but also connects, to varying degrees, with Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and Star Trek: Voyager, among others. In-joke lines and cameos that made audiences cheer in 1996 may seem puzzling and out of context today. But kids (heck, adults too) who have absorbed Treklore on the level of their Pokeman or Buffy the Vampire Slayer scholarship should be delighted by the well-modulated space adventure.

While the relatively tame stuff on Earth with Zephraim Cochrane seems to have drifted in from an entirely different (and more lighthearted) film, it gives you vital breathing space in between the Borg conflict, in which the stakes are literally a fate worse than death. Indeed, the vibe is not unlike Alien as the purposeful zombies take over deck by deck -- only to meet their match in human will and loyalty.

Studio: Paramount Pictures
Director: Jonathan Frakes
Cast: James Cromwell, Jonathan Frakes, Michael Dorn
Genre: Science Fiction
Run time: 111 minutes
Theatrical release: November 22, 1996
DVD release: May 15, 2005
MPAA Rating: PG-13
MPAA explanation: some sci-fi adventure violence.