Free Enterprise (1998)

"Free Enterprise" is at its most charming as a love letter to the original Star Trek series. The dialogue is peppered with references and Kirk's "risk is our business" speech is even trotted out to win back a lost love. And then there's William Shatner, fully willing to make fun of himself.Outside of the hero worship, it's kind of an awkward romantic comedy, dressed up in hip L.A. culture. For some reason, this isn't as novel as it was back in the nineties and I think it's largely due to the dialogue. I mean, there are ways to subtly depict geek lifestyle rather than just name-checking everything. That actually gets pretty old.Regardless, the leads are well cast, it's got its share of one0liners, and I can appreciate the tone of the whole thing.6/10

A movie for Trekkers, made by Trekkers, about Trekkers, etc. Trekkers (oh, not 'Trekkies'-savvy?) are "Star Trek" fans, usually very obsessed fans. However, the 2 main characters here, despite fitting the standard Trekker profile of letting Trek dominate their lives, are well-rounded in other aspects: one of 'em, despite never having any money and a loser sensibility, is pretty successful with girls & doesn't have problems 'getting some.' The other is successful career-wise, with normal interests, as well. The filmmakers obviously wanted to show Trekkers as more than just weird geeks. However, something doesn't jibe with this presentation: the 2 guys come across as SO normal, it's hard to believe they've got every Trek episode memorized. That being said, this flic is a Trekker dream, filled with pop cultural references (for other Sci-Fi famous flics,too) and in-jokes that will probably baffle those not informed about Trek sayings & terminology (one scene is even filmed at a famous site from one of the classic episodes, but this was already done in "Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey"/1991). In the plot, the 2 guys, who both work in the film industry in L.A., happen to spot their idol, William Shatner, in a bookstore (Shatner, who portrayed Capt.Kirk in the classic Trek series and movies, is played by ...William Shatner). He doesn't live up to their expectations of a hero, even coming across as a bit of a loon, setting the stage for the re-evaluation of their lives. In all, the movie comes across as a bit silly and even pointless, with non-too-subtle moralizing about what's important in life, and apparent low-budget origins. But even non-Trekkers should find it mildly amusing. The DVD even has explanations of all the arcane Trek references, including optional subtitles. I'm still not sure what the title means (The Enterprise, of course, was the spaceship, er, starship in Trek, but so what?).

Sorry to those who think this thing's an instant classic, but 'Free Enterprise' was terrible.  The only movie I've seen that was worse was 'Dogma.'  Even though William Shatner, like George Carlin in 'Dogma,' gives it a microgram of watchability, this flick was not funny, not interesting, not entertaining, and definitely not worth remembering.I dig Shatner and Star Trek/sci-fi and got most of the desperately hip references, but I just loathed virtually all of the characters.  I didn't care about anything in this movie!  'Master of Disguise' had better dialogue.  'The Ladies Man' had more believable relationships.  And what was with the film editing?  It was like watching a deck of cards being shuffled (badly)... hell, 'Memento' was easier to follow than this celluloid disaster. Not even Shatner's throwaway rap scene at the end could save the stinker that is 'Free Enterprise.'  I was half-hoping he'd grab a microphone and repeat his famous "Get a life" skit from SNL, instead saying "Get a tub of cyanide and drink deeply."Shame, they took a good idea and drowned it in a bottomless pit of a screenplay.  I hope the kids that made 'Free Enterprise' grow up someday and make a real movie.  (I see they're making a sequel to this, 6 years later.  I guess they had nothing much else going on...)

I really enjoyed this film and would recommend it to anyone in the mood for a funny/stupid movie. William Shatner was great as himself, a larger than life past middle aged self styled poet. He is truly the "Captain" for the common man.There is not very much substance to the movie but I really enjoyed the wierdness and nerdiness of it. It is a good laugh but nothing to take very seriously, except of course for Bill's one man performance of Ceasar, which I thought was just about as much Bill as any one can handle :-)