(T)Raumschiff Surprise - Periode 1

... put in some time travel.

"Traumschiff" could have been a great comedy, if Michael Herbig had decided to stick with the Star Trek/Star Wars theme. Sadly, the "Dreamboat Surprise" from the title only has the part of an extra in this film, appearing briefly at the beginning. The second half of the film is ruined by a time travel story, which is awful because A. it uses the most clichéed settings of time travel stories (the middle ages, the wild west and the presence) and B. it is not funny. Given the title of the film, I expected lots of fun on board of the gay spaceship "Surprise" with its lewd and girlish crew that prefers having "Kaffeekränzchen" instead of exploring the unknown regions of the galaxy (as seen in the great post-credits bonus). The last thing I wanted to see was actors reprising their parts from "Der Schuh des Manitu".

Now that I have expressed my disappointment I want to add that the CGI-effects in this film are exceptional for a German production and are very good (however useless, because this is supposed to be comedy, so we're in need for laughs instead of eye candy) and that three or four scenes really made me laugh - among them the best Darth-to-Luke-I-am-you-father-parody I have ever seen.

I saw the movie and it was great! I couldn't stop laughing. The whole room (over 300 people) couldn't stop laughing. This movie is awesome funny. Everybody who liked the jokes of "Manitou's shou" will LOVE (T)Raumschiff Surprise!

I can't agree with antialias11, because I can't understand how somebody can't laugh all the time through this movie. I think Bully, Tramitz, and Rick were great. The jokes on other Sci-Fi-Movies were great - all jokes were great.

Bully did a great job again. Let's hope he'll do another movie :D

"(T)Raumschiff Surprise" is sometimes funny, sometimes hilarious but it is also embarrassingly stupid at times. It has some new jokes but what I found shocking is that some of the jokes were "borrowed" (from Austin Powers; Loriot,...). So really you have creative ideas and funny and original jokes but in the same scene you have old or plagiarized jokes and gags that are complete misses.

I like Bully and I think he is funny, loved "Der Schuh des Manitu". There was a huge hype around this movie and when I finally saw it I was disappointed as the movie did not deliver. About a year after watching it the first time, I watched it again and I laughed about 5 times and smiled maybe another 10 times. I remember laughing quite a bit the first time I watched it but even back then I found it disappointing.

This movie is not quite as bad as the IMDb-rating (5.4) suggests but way worse than the hype around it makes you believe it is. (Most of the time my ratings for a movie are below the IMDb-average so me rating it the same as the average voter while saying it deserves a higher score is not a contradiction. Hope you can follow.)

** 5.5/10 **

This movie is so insanely gay! And I mean it in both sense of the word. No wonder this comedy broke the German box office with its madcap, low-brow, at times, crass humour. But it's all in good fun.

If you're looking for a plot, be reminded that a spoof-fest only has an outline of what resembles a story. The story's not award winning material to begin with, and it was never the intention of doing so.

In the future, Earth has colonized Mars, and some aliens aren't happy with it, so war is declared on the Earthlings. Somehow, Earth's last hope lies in the hands of Dreamship Surprise and its crew of merry men, led by the gayish Captain Kork, and equally feminine-like officers Mr Spuck and Schrotty. Needless to say, the crew of Dreamship Surprise is a complete spoof of Star Trek's Starship Enterprise crew, right down to the uniform, the multi-racial crew, and the technology available on board. Serious Trekkies might not take this too kindly though, to see their beloved franchise taken to "new" heights.

To save Earth from the aliens, the team has to travel back in time to prevent the discovery of alien lifeforms in Area 51. But it's made more difficult when Kork and crew are more interested in their rehearsals for an upcoming Miss Waikiki competition (don't ask). Which is crazy I tell you. If you think that the Chicken Little ad now showing in theatres is cute, you haven't seen nothing yet! Spoofing obvious movies like Star Wars - pod-racing, battleships hovering in orbit, the Jedi Council, Coruscant, Queen Amidala, Han Solo, Emperor Palpatine, Darth Vader, Stormtroopers, the list goes on, and Star Trek - the main leads, there are also numerous references to movies like Austin Powers (the phallic-shaped starship), Back to the Future (time travel), Minority Report and even A Knight's Tale. Spoofing and combining key characters from Star Wars and Star Trek have been attempted before in Hollywood comedies, but definitely not in the manner that Dreamship Enterprise had.

Stay tuned during the credits, where some blooper scenes are shown, and if you stay until the end of the credits, you'll be rewarded with yet another short hilarious scene.

Definitely recommended for an evening after a hard day's work.

Do you know the show this is based on? Well I mean the German tv show Bullyparade - but of course it would also help if you knew the Science Fiction shows and movies this is based on too - actually spoofs would be a better description. Apart from that I was actually surprised to see Til Schweiger in this ... actually not just to see him, but to see him "work" - no pun intended.

Jokes are hit and miss (again with the puns), but you can tell they love the things this is based on. You may take offense because this mixes Star Trek and Star Wars lores and tropes ... but it is not meant to offend. The innuendo throughout the movie on the other hand ... not sure how this will be taken. A fun movie that those familiar with what this means, will be able to enjoy a lot more than others ... also comedy ... can you lower your expectations and just laugh at almost anything? It would help immensely.