Galaxy Quest Revisited

 

Last week I got to talk about The Princess Bride and add it to my list of perfect films. The original post that I wrote several years ago included three films that at the time I would classify as perfect. I haven't changed my assessment of those films, but I continue to evolve in my appreciation of them every time I see them, and I got to see one of them again this week.

It's been said that Galaxy Quest is the best Star Trek film ever made. I think that's probably a correct assessment. Those things that we loved about Star Trek, the characters, the camaraderie, and all of the tropes that make up science fiction television of the 1960s are present in this send-up of a Star Trek type television show. The lead actor played by Tim Allen, is a thinly disguised version of William Shatner's Captain Kirk. The outsized ego of the star, gets put in contrast to the attitudes of the secondary players and co-stars of the series. Sigourney Weaver gets a chance to play comedy, and boy does she nail it. She does let her wig do half the work however. Oh and her push-up bra. I'll get to the work of the other actors in just a minute.

The thing that makes this film resonate so much with its loyal audience, is that it represents them not in a satirical way but in an affectionate one. We all know those fans who take the minor portions of the thing they love and obsess about them. In this film The “Questers” attend a fan convention and do the usual cosplay, and line up for autographs at $15 a pop. That episode of Saturday Night Live where William Shatner went off on the fans of Star Trek and told them to get a life, feels like it is the basis for several of the moments in the early part of the film. The  actors in the cast of the canceled TV series Galaxy Quest, struggle for relevance, while having to make do with personal appearances that cash in on their celebrity from their time on the show. When they are at the fan convention, they recognize for the most part that it is the fans who have sustained any career that they might have. When Tim Allen's character Jason Nesmith goes off on a fan in the autograph line it, frustrates everybody else and surprises them. Even though they are all irritated that this is what their careers have been reduced to, they still recognize that the fans are sincere and care about them. None of them would want a fan to be disappointed. This film takes geek culture seriously while still mildly lampooning it. The fan boys and girls have their fantasies about the characters, read online sources for information about the show, and have a depth of knowledge that befuddles the cast of the show. It's those very things that allow the Thermians to be perceived as fans instead of the aliens that they are. Jason has a private gig booked, and it was with some of the fans that he dissed at the convention, and he mistakes the Thermians for the group that he is supposed to visit.

Harold Ramis was supposed to be the director for the film, but he dropped out when Tim Allen was cast as the lead. He thought that this was the wrong move. In fact it was the perfect move because Allen was at the height of his TV Fame and was just crossing over into movies, and the confluence of those situations with the character that is written in the script is just perfection. Sometimes you just get lucky. Speaking of lucky, the supporting cast is so deep with talented actors that it's a little ridiculous. Tony Shalhoub gets laughs with the mildest kind of expression on his face, looking a wee bit high and befuddled, but also extremely confident in some situations and frantically overmatched in others. I think the implication was that he was chemically treating his emotional issues, and that is reflected in the performance of his character. He is frankly hysterical. Of course hysterical is a relative term and if there is a level that is one step up from that, that is where you'll find Sam Rockwell in this movie. Almost everything he says is a comic gem, and his desperation, fear and ultimate redemption add some real spark to the story as well as making the emotional heart of the movie even more solid. This may have been the first time I recognized Rockwell's genius, and I have been enjoying it ever since. I can't wait until next week when he stars in “Argyle”, the new movie from my favorite contemporary action director Matthew Vaughn.

Fandom is well represented by Justin Long as the leader of the fan group that has big questions for Jason, and is a little too obsessive about the technical readouts of their spaceship The Protector. If you have not seen the film and don't know what I am referring to, I'm not going to try and explain it to you, this site has never been about simply restating the story for the readers. This is a movie that's been out for 25 years now, and if you don't know the premise, you're just going to have to see it and then come back and read these comments to make sense of it all. Long has the earnestness of a young fan, and the whining voice of a frustrated teen when dealing with his mom. Enrico Colantoni, Patrick Breen, and Missy Pyle all score laughs at some point as the Thermians. At one point Raiin Wilson is in the film, but he disappears completely once we are on The Protector. 

The CGI may be a little wonky, after all it is 25 years ago, but none of that matters because the special effects in the original Star Trek were never great, and that never mattered. The value of these shows was in the characters and situations, not in the flash and visual extravaganzas that we get in so many science fiction films these days. I really enjoy the fact that the Thermians built their version of The Protector based on the television show, because some of the technology looks like an adoption of a game console, and some early computer technology. Exactly the kind of thing that might have been done on Star Trek. Even if it is sometimes just Christmas lights, the fans don't really care because they came for the characters. Which is what I've been doing for the last 25 years with this terrific film. Alan Rickman, a comedic performance that is equal to all the dramatic work that he did in the later part of his career. “Galaxy Quest” along with “Robin Hood Prince of Thieves”, contain two of the most iconically hysterical comedic performances of the 1990s. Rickman is sorely missed, but we at least have this iteration of him to cherish in our memories.