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Best movie of this year hands down!

Fanciful, disturbing, and wildly original, it announces the arrival of a fresh, bold voice in American cinema.

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

Since the 1960's Star Trek has became one of the most beloved film and television franchises of all times. Each generation has it's own spin off series, with each series having a captain to command the ship to areas where no man has ever gone before. The original series captain, Captain James T. Kirk (William Shatner) goes off to find these actors that play the captains in this darting documentary. The documentary introducts these character actors from their beginnings, how they got to become captain, and how their series has impact the world and it's fans. The first of these captain after the original series, was Jean Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) who captain, the 'Next Generation' Series. The documentary shows how much a serious actor he was, and how he change for the better out of it, with great cost of his personal life. The next captain, William Shatner meets is Avery Brooks who played Benjamin Sisko on 'Deep Space Nine'. Avery, the actor seems a very deep and free thinker, who's mind is out there. Drama came ahead to ahead, with personal philosophy and morals between William Shatner and Kate Mulgrew of 'Star Trek Voyager' captain Katryn Janeaway fame. She nearly bump heads with Shatner over morality, and gender roles issues. It was a bit easier for Shatner to hang out with Scott Bakula, the captain of 'Enterprise' Jonathan Archer. There were a few laughs, and was less taken serious questions. The same goes with his short interview with Chris Pike who plays Captain Kirk in the modern day film 'Star Trek". The interview with both Bakula and Pike were a bit too short. Christoper Plummer guest stars in the documentary talking his part as Chang in the film 'Star Trek VI' was surprising. While his part was interesting, the time he spent on screen would better be serve to explaining more about Bakula and Pike, since the titled is called 'The Captains'. There are a bit weird interjects in the documentary where fans interrupt the filming. It doesn't serve anything to the story, it's better used as a DVD extra then leaving it in the film. There is a bit of a feeling of James Lipton's In the Actor Studio in the interview style. It can be direly, when some of the questions verve off that doesn't have anything to related to 'Star Trek' or their own careers. Last, William Shatner come into the reality about his past as Captain Kirk and overall opinion on himself and 'Star Trek' all together. It's a movie for the die hard Star Trek fans, it's not that interesting for the common fan due to seriousness of the philosophic questions the actors are forced to answer. In the end-- Scotty, have to beam me up to watch it again. It's just felt a one time viewing.

Upfront folks: I am not a trekkie and will never become one. But this movie is so much more than just for fans of the Star Trek world: William Shatner takes the viewer through the real-actor's world of Captains of each of the Star Trek series. Shatner discovers an important piece of himself in this movie, namely that he was actually embarrassed to be remembered as "Captain Kirk". As Shatner has played many stage roles in theaters, he always wished to be remembered for that. But as he finds out, not only did all other Star Trek Captains also come from a background of playing on stage, they all put as much hard work and personal sacrifices into acting and recording the series for Star Trek as he did. The viewer finds out that both Shatner's and Sir Patrick Steward's marriages failed due to the time they needed to spend on the set. Sir Patrick Steward, known as a true Shakespearean actor intimates, how serious he took the acting of Star Trek - so serious that he caught himself in the thought of not being allowed have fun while being on the set. This thinking changed over time and the viewer learns that role itself transformed Stewart's personality into being able to enjoy himself on the set while still acting to his very best abilities. Bakula and Shatner discover many, many parallels in their personal life while acting as The Captain, it amazes both so much that the viewer sees literally the actual start of a friendship unfolding. Mulgrew is interviewed by Shatner in a style that cannot be described - it must be seen and heard. It is incredibly scary to see how skillful Shatner peels off the seemingly thick actor's skin of Mulgrew literally in minutes to make her open up for a really personal interview that produces intimate information beyond the expected. Shatner himself is transformed through the production of this movie, as interviewing The Other Captains allows Shatner to not only make peace with himself and his legacy for being remembered mainly as being Captain Kirk, but being able to enjoy the thought without feeling embarrassed as he used to be once in his past. Shatner's movie demonstrates also for the non-trekkie how much joy he has brought into the life of people who meet at Star Trek conventions, which exist historically over 40 years already. Listen to Shatner's conversations with The Other Captains like Avery Brooks, who is now a University Professor, about life and also death as well as personal and philosophical thoughts about a possible afterlife.Anyone will view this movie with astonishment, joy and gratitude for the intimate insight not only into their personal lives but for their views on life as such. My vote as non-trekkie: 10 of 10

I love Star Trek and have seen every episode ever made, most of them more than once. I found the pacing of this documentary to be very slow. The music just didn't do it for me either. Most of the questions that were asked seemed irrelevant. There were some questions that were asked which I really wanted to hear more about, but both Shatner and the rest seemed to dance around the answers. For example, about life-after- death. The absolute worst scenes were those with Avery Brooks. Has he lost his mind? I've never heard somebody speak so many different words without actually saying anything. I did not enjoy listening to him or Shatner sing next to the piano.I was also disappointed that there were not more guest stars. They did show Robert Picardo and Johnathan Frakes but just for a few lines. They deserved more screen time. I'd rather have listened more to them than to Avery Brooks babbling.I did gather some insight into the grueling labor that was involved in shooting the series. I do give the documentary credit for explaining that.

There are several small issues with this production and there is the big one – Will Shatner himself. The documentary is driven in the end by the writer/director obsession with his own mortality – a legendary fact that goes beyond any Star Trek cultural movement boundaries. What this movie is about is Shatner's quest to find meaning and reassurance about the legacy of his work. A desperate cry for an epiphany that in the end comes across as fake and sad at the same time.The production seems amateurish and uninspired. The music is obtrusive and there is neither pacing nor great method. There is minimal structure, the interviews being chopped up and arranged depending on the subject in question. There is also a major flaw in the concept. Being a documentary about Star Trek captains it HAD to feature Chris Pine, the youngest of the bunch, with only a feature film in the Trek series under his belt, and not much of a career to boast on either. Subsequently his small segment is absolutely out of place and feels like a complete waste of time.Except for the Christopher Plummer bit – an absolute gem of a few minutes in this production - the rest of the "interviews" all seem a little bit strange. I don't think that Shatner resonates on the same wavelength with any of the coleagues he interviews. I may even go so far as to say that there isn't much show of mutual respect either. Except for a lot of mandatory and empty exchange of praises, of course. In contrast when you have these two old friends, Shatner and Plummer on the same room it just clicks, naturally and beautifully, but the moment comes and goes very fast.I'm also terribly disappointed with the amount of time this film wastes on the interview with Avery Brooks, that seemed smoked out of his mind. And by interview I mean Shatner and Brooks exchanging a lot of metaphysical mumbo-jumbo and singing along around the piano like schoolgirls. I just don't have the stomach for this amount of naiveté.This was even more disturbing considering that at the same time Jonathan Frakes and Robert Picardo appear in the film with one liners basically. OK they were not "captains" but Kate Mulgrew was. And she really seems to have a thing or two to say about Star Trek, career, family and loss, and she is dismissed very quickly. Furthermore the little screen time she had is lost on stupid dialogues like "is it possible to be a female captain on the bridge of Star Trek?", "I was, so it's possible", "so it's impossible but you did it"... what?!That being said there are good things about this film. At least Bakula, Mulgrew and Stewart have something to say when questioned, about any topic, more or less related to Star Trek or acting and life. Patrick Stewart especially has a few surprising moments of openness. At a point I think he was even a little bit choked up remembering things. And you don't even need to be a trekkie to appreciate what these people have to offer.Unfortunately this was a "feature length" film and that is just not enough to even attempt to poke at their minds and life/career experience. I really hope Will Shatner has some 9 hours of footage on his editing room floor with these people, and he will came back with another version of this film, somewhere in the future. Otherwise these actors were disturbed for far too little.