By GustavoLeao / 23:38, 1 October 2009 / Star Trek: Nemesis

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The May June issue of the official Star Trek Magazine features an exclusive interview with Star Trek star Chris Pine (Kirk) and here are excerpts.

You told Star Trek Magazine when we spoke last year that there were two scenes early on in the story that "describe James T. Kirk to a T" - which were they?

They're the scenes that I believe people saw early: the scene in the bar, and the scene with Captain Pike right afterwards. Not that it's ‘Kirk to a T,' but it certainly explains much of who he is and I guess why he has so much anger and such a passionate dislike of Starfleet before he changes his mind.

I also think in those two scenes you get a chance to see J.J. and Kirk's sense of humour. J.J. really wanted to make sure there was humour in the movie and that Kirk is that wisecracking, smart but kind of directionless young man.

What do you think gives him the direction? Is it the Academy - after all, he's still arrogant and cocky at the time he takes the Kobayashi Maru test?

I think there are stages in the progression of his becoming that mature leader. We're not reinventing the wheel here. It's Joseph Campbell's reluctant hero's journey. It's a version of a story that's been told since the beginning of time in every single culture on the planet. I think what Captain Pike presents him with is a challenge. Essentially he says, "I know you. I've figured you out. I get why you don't want to be a part of it. I get why you're actively trying to be a deadbeat loser but if you want to be a real man like your father, if you want to achieve real greatness like your father did, I am giving you that chance." He presents that challenge to Kirk and Kirk takes it head on. That doesn't mean that right at the get-go, right when he accepts that challenge, he becomes a reasoned, mature leader. There's an arc to that journey.

Do you think he's become that by the end of the film?

I certainly think he's getting there. What it shows is all that passion, that drive, that impulsiveness and arrogance can be moulded and shaped into something a little bit more functional in a team setting. But it's exactly those qualities that make James Kirk a great man.

They're attributes that come from within; he doesn't get taught them by Starfleet.

Yes, and I think that's exactly what Pike is saying to him at the bar is that he is exactly what Starfleet needs. Starfleet needs someone who can think on their own; it needs a little bit of edge, and I think Kirk brings his personality to bear on the office. The office doesn't take precedence over the man.

How much could you bring your own take to the character?

I hope I brought everything that I could to the role. J.J.'s mandate to us all in the beginning was to re-imagine these characters, to think of these characters as our own, and by giving us that freedom in the beginning, I never felt an overbearing responsibility.

I certainly felt a responsibility to do justice to what Mr. Shatner did, but I never felt like I had to in some way impersonate the Kirk that he embodied. Really, at the end of the day, I think I would have been doing an injustice to the story, and to my fellow actors, if I was trying to figure out some genius way of impersonating William Shatner, because then it would become an impersonation, not an original incarnation. My version of the character people would have been taking apart to see how I was trying to achieve that perfect mimicry, whereas it shouldn't be like that. It should be about the story, so I had to throw caution to the wind and say, "Screw it, here's my version of it."

I understand that it's a lose-lose situation in many ways, because I know some people are going to want to see a younger version of Mr. Shatner. I am not that, because I am simply not William Shatner. I'm my own person.

What was the most satisfying scene to deliver as Kirk?

Oh I think what was great about Kirk is that I get to really run the gamut of emotions, and I get to run the gamut of every single genre with this character. I get to be a comedian, an action hero, a take-charge leader. I get to be my own version of Jason Bourne - I have all these different qualities that I get to bring to life. I don't think I'd be doing anyone any favours by saying which was the most satisfying...

I loved my scene with Captain Pike in the beginning, I loved the bar scene because I get to be the kind of bad ass hero that I grew up watching - it's like any boy's dream. Playing pretend on that multimillion dollar Bridge was like playing cops and robbers with real horses and real robbers.

The best answer I can give you is that J.J. really created an atmosphere on set where every day was a new kind of fun and a new kind of challenge, and although we felt the responsibility of living up to fans' expectations, we also knew we would do our best if we could bring something new to it. J.J. always reminded us, and brought it back down to this fundamental mandate of "have fun." What makes these kind of movies great is fun, and I think it's that kind of camaraderie and friendship that we felt on set that comes out on screen.

It's the diametric opposite of something like The Dark Knight - you come out from seeing it on a high...

That's exactly right, man. We have our own sort of special niche in the genre world. I think there's a great desire in the world nowadays to look at the darker side of humanity and comment on the abysmal state of affairs of the world, which is important in its own right. We just happen to have a different, more positive, more optimistic, more utopian, more straight-up popcorn summer movie feeling that these others. That's not to discredit or deny the fact that there are some great ideas explored in the context of this great popcorn movie, but at the end of the day, it's a really fun movie. I don't see how anyone could not look forward to that. It's great entertainment.

Are you ready for all the attention that comes with Star Trek?

I'm getting ready for the madness - I'm training, I'm running, I'm doing anything and everything I can to be prepared for the month long press adventure. The big explosion is April 5 through May 17. I'm going to try to hit as many places as possible - it's a pretty intricate affair trying to work out where people go but I'm geared up and excited.

What was the fight training like?

It was intense: two months, three or four hours a day. We had an incredible stunt team behind us led by Robert Alonzo, who's got his imprint over multiple versions of these films. It was great: you'd go in one day and you learn a couple of moves from the Krav Maga school, or a kung fu move.

Not only does it look great, but it was intelligently done in that each character had the kind of martial arts and physicality that was specific to them. The one Spock has is very unique to that kind of Vulcan mind. The kind of baser, more brutal instincts of Kirk are seen in that bar fight at the beginning... and the fights with Ayel, and the fight with Nero! Each was crafted to match the psychology of the character and it was a lot of fun.

Did you expect to go to such heights to shoot the skydiving sequence?

I guess I was new to making an action film that I had no clue as to what it would take. J.J. Would very excitedly bring us over and say, "check this out" and show us pre-visualizations of what it would look like. But watching it on a computer screen where it's animated, I couldn't get any idea of the size or the scope of it. It looked like a cartoon - my imagination didn't go that far. But being suspended above a cement block in Hollywood, or pretending to spin while standing on the ground and looking upwards, they're things you'd never expect to be doing - so you try to do your job in the moment and hope it plays out, and hope the people who are working up at ILM know what the hell they're doing. And clearly they know exactly what they're doing! I remember when I first saw it in November, my jaw hit the floor.

What also makes it really powerful is the sound. Thank God they brought in Ben Burtt, the sound editor from Star Wars, because it gives the movie a great sense of space - by that, I mean they know exactly when to bombard you with sound and when to take it out. You get a sense of the vastness of space, and being a lonely pebble within that giant world. It brings a reality to it that I don't think I've ever seen before - it reminded me of 2001: A Space Odyssey.

All the effects work to bring out the reality of the moment, rather that the effects standing alone and we're trying to wow you with them. They're utilized to bring out the best parts of the story.

Would it be fair to describe this as a human story that uses science fiction, rather than a "sci-fi" film?

Yes, and I think that was one of the essential pillars of the original series. It used space to explore ideas that, especially in the 1960s, you would not be able to explore if it took place in Hill Street Blues - land, or any place in 1968 in America. You had a chance to have a Russian on the Bridge, have an African American in an interracial love story. You got a chance to explore what it meant to go to war, or be in a long-standing war like the Cold War. All these big ideas you got to explore because you set it in outer space. It is about the human condition; these are very human characters. They are not superheroes - there are no masks, there are no capes. It's about normal people in extraordinary circumstances and it's whether or not they rise to the challenge, which they do every time. That's the great thing about this crew of people.

I'm really grateful that I got a chance to work with such great people and begin a journey with the people behind the scenes and the people I call my crew-mates on the ship - which will last for hopefully a great while. Just to get a chance to work is a privilege, and to work with people that you really enjoy and respect as artists and respect as people, is just icing on the cake. I'm very aware of how blessed an experience that was.

The full interview can be found on issue 18 of the official Star Trek Magazine.

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