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'Trekkies,' the final premiere
Fanatical fans flaunt their obsessions in a spacey documentary
It's hard not to laugh at the sight of several Klingons galumphing down a Los Angeles sidewalk, telling an interviewer about the miniature golf tournament they'll host next week.
And who could resist a superior smirk at David and Laurel Greenstein and their small black poodle, Tammi, as they're interviewed for the film "Trekkies" while sitting in the Trek Room of their home. Especially because all three are dressed in Star Fleet uniforms, and because the adjoining bathroom has Star Fleet towels. But they aren't the most committed fans interviewed in "Trekkies."
David Greenstein may wear his uniform while shopping, but at least he didn't wear it while sitting on the Whitewater jury in Little Rock, Ark. Barbara Adams did. Every day, she shouldered her way through the crowd of photographers and news cameramen around the courthouse, a diminutive woman with a pixie cut and full "Star Trek" regalia, right down to the phaser and tri-corder.
"I am a Star Fleet commander," she tells co-executive producer Denise Crosby in the film. "I wore my uniform during jury duty, as anybody in the military would." She wears civvies for her job at a print shop, but every morning she pins her Lt. Commander's pips and communicator badge to her shirt and clips tri-corder and phaser to her belt. At work, the call her "Commander."
Then there's the Florida dentist whose office is completely decorated with "Star Trek" tchotchkes and who wears a Star Fleet uniform, as do his staff, his wife and his kids. Or the Klingon couple at a convention who indulge in a bit of Klingonian love play, which looks to human eyes a lot like assault with intent to maim. Or the intense young fan who, having just gotten his new "First Contact" uniform in time for a big convention, tells the camera that uniform is quite good actually -- except that the piping around the collar is the incorrect width, of course, and some of the materials are incorrect. But actually it's quite good -- for a rush job.
Yes, there are lots of people to chuckle at in "Trekkies," lots of hopelessly space-addled fans who'll buy any comic, any action figure, any trinket and who'll gaze devotedly at any former cast member. So it's no small achievement that Crosby (Tasha Yar on "Star Trek: The Next Generation") and director Roger Nygard ("Six Days in Roswell") turn all these people into sympathetic characters.
Credit Crosby for some of that sympathy. Though her character was killed off years ago, she still deals with ardent fans. Like William Shatner, James Doohan and Leonard Nimoy (she interviews then and many others from various casts), she is overwhelmed by the fervor and dedication of the fans. And Nygard's other documentary about the 50th anniversary of the alleged UFO crash at Roswell prepares him to be sensitive with those whose beliefs stray beyond the mainstream.
Their treatment of Trekkies is exemplified by the film's most telling scene, a voice-over by David Greenstein as he goes grocery shopping in his Star Fleet uniform. "Some people will want to say 'Get a life!'" he says, "But this is a part of my life."
Whatever. By the end of "Trekkies," you'll find yourself thinking that the world just might be a better, gentler place if it was full of people who believed in honesty and equality despite color, gender, shape or ability; Trekkies, in other words. For sure, miniature golf (with Klingons) would be a lot more entertaining.