Star Wreck: In the Pirkinning ( Star Wreck VI: In the Pirkinning )

Star Wreck: In the Pirkinning (DVD) (*)

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Original Title: Star Wreck VI: In the Pirkinning
Language Selections:
English ( Subtitles )
Finnish ( Dolby Digital 5.1 )
Swedish ( Subtitles )

Product Origin/Format:
Finland ( PAL/Region 0 )

Running Time:
103 min

Aspect Ratio:
Anamorphic Widescreen (2.35:1)

Special Features:
Deleted Scenes
Interactive Menu
Making Of
Trailer(s)

Movie filmed in 2005 and produced in:
Finland ( Scandinavia, Iceland )

Directed By:
Timo Vuorensola

Written By:
Rudi Airisto
Jarmo Puskala

Actors:
Samuli Torssonen ..... Emperor James B. Pirk
Atte Joutsen ..... Kapteeni Joni K. Sherrypie
Timo Vuorensola ..... Commander Dwarf
Antti Satama ..... Info
Karoliina Blackburn ..... P-Liiton tiedeupseeri
Janos Honkonen ..... Sergei Fukov/Festerbester
Seppo Honkanen ..... P-Liiton tiedemies
Tiina Routamaa ..... Luutnantti Ruoska
Jari Ahola ..... Chief of Security Mikhail Garybrandy
Sonja Sjöblom ..... Tyttö Hesburgerissa
Santeri Humina ..... Poikaystävä
Ville Vuorensola ..... Jengiläinen
Rudi Airisto ..... Jeff Cochbrane
Niklas Vainio ..... Talok

Synopsis:

Great Star Trek Parody: Trapped in the past when their starship is destroyed Capt Pirk and his crew await the invention of the antimaterial drive. At first they go native so as not to alter events in our time. But when the day arrives for the invention of the drive that will allow them to return home they are shocked to discover that no one has invented it. The Captain decides that in order to 'protect' the past they know has happened and cause the creation of the P-Fleet that will save the Earth from the menace of the Korg they must interfere in Earth's history and 'invent' the drive themselves. Unfortunately for the Earth the Captain's megalomaniac tendencies result in him deciding to fight a global war in order to become Earth's Emperor. Can an Emperor who has travelled the stars settle on being Emperor of just one world? Can he even be satisfied with just one Earth?

Three starfleet officers from the future, Captain Pirk, the Plingon known as Dwarf and the android Info have been stranded back in time in Finland on present-day Earth. Pirk mounts a plan to recapture their ship, which they sold to Russian nuclear scientists. With the help of the Russian scientists, they then build the starship Kickstart, which Pirk uses to conquer the Earth and have himself declared Emperor. A new, unknown type of spaceship appears through a maggothole. Pirk leads his new fleet of ships to go through the maggothole to investigate. They discover that they are in a parallel universe and encounter the space station Babel 13 under Captain Jonny Sherrypie. Pirk declares war on Babel 13 but soon finds that the station's defences that are not quite as easy to defeat as they thought. Star Wreck: In the Pirkinning is a quite extraordinary example of the fan film. (In fact In the Pirkinning is part of a series and follows on from six other short Star Trek parodies that Finnish fan Samuli Torssonen began making in 1992). In the Pirkinning is an extraordinarily ambitious production. Samuli Torssonen and friends shot the film over a seven-year period on an almost-zero budget, which they financed themselves. Though In the Pirkinning has an amazing lavishness on screen, most of the film was shot in their own living rooms. In fact no sets were actually built for the film instead all the impressive bridge and space station sets were created virtually using actors who were filmed in front of a blue screen (which was actually a piece of blue linoleum placed against a wall) and then digitally inserted. The group states that most of the seven years it took to make the film was taken up by the time it took to render the visual effects on their home computers. The resulting film was distributed via the internet making it the most viewed Finnish-made film of all time. This in turn attracted a substantial amount of attention in international news. Star Wreck: In the Pirkinning is construed as a parody largely of Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987-94) and of the muchly underrated science-fiction series Babylon 5 (1992-8). There are lots of witty little fannish in-jokes aimed in Star Trek in the opening shot we see the Captain Kirk equivalent emerging from the bridge turbolift, only this turns out to be the bathroom and he has a train of toilet paper stuck to his shoe; in a long-running fan joke about Worf's always having to stand on the Enterprise-D bridge, the Worf equivalent here enters the new starship bridge and grumbles: 'Tactical's still missing a chair'; while he later comes out with lines like 'Plingon warriors do not take showers.' In the Babylon 5 parodies, we get an analogue of the cryptic alien Ambassador Kosh who moves about in his robe with elongated head and then in the background of one scene we see the actor inside the suit removing the helmet to scratch his nose; Captain Sherrypie, the John Sheridan (Bruce Boxleitner) equivalent, is fond of making noble speeches before battle is about to commence with hilariously absurd effect 'We're here to keep the peace, even if it means killing every sentient being in the galaxy'; and there lots of jokes about Commander Ivanovitsa and her obsession with parking regulations. Many of the jokes are apparently a lot funnier, as well as contain a number of local references, when one sees the film in the original Finnish. What impresses most of all about Star Wreck: In the Pirkinning is the level of the special effects. Though produced by a group of friends funding the film themselves and working in their own living room, these are easily on a quality that compete with some of the top multi-million dollar budgeted Hollywood science-fiction films at the moment. Indeed one need merely look at George Lucas's Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith (2005), which came out the same year, and Star Wreck: In the Pirkinning can easily stand alongside it, one might even argue has a far better command of its sense of wonder and dramatically staging the effects than Revenge of the Sith did. Samuli Torssonen and his crew stage some breathtaking shots of the Kickstart in drydock (modelled just like the drydock in Star Trek The Motion Picture [1979]), launching, lifting off from the ground and heading into orbit; or the newsreel sequence, which is a superb combination of digital effects and actual historical film footage that has all been merged in sepia tone. There is a beautiful final shot that pulls back from the three central characters stranded in the middle of a frozen wilderness and keeps on moving back until the camera ends up in orbit around the Earth. Most of all what really impress though it is the space battle sequences that take up nearly the last third of the film. Samuli Torssonen and crew stage these for the sheer love and beauty of seeing space battles and the results are completely dazzling. The film also does a superb job in its replications of the sets, the ships and costumes of both Star Trek and Babylon 5 . On the minus side, were you to take away the space battle and special effects scenes, Star Wreck: In the Pirkinning would only seem like an ordinary fan film with some cute fannish jokes. The special effects are allowed to dominate the film not too surprising as the effects are easily the film's real standout virtue and there are probably a few too many space battle sequences. One would maybe have liked to have seen a little more emphasis on plot like what the characters are doing in the past or why they sold their ship to the Russians. (Apparently all of this is explained by reference to the earlier Star Wreck: Legacy shorts...

This product was added to our catalog on Monday 15 December, 2008.

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