It’s been more than a week now and I’m still a little torn up over the death of Ricard Montalban. Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Khan should not be dismissed as a flat out great movie, and a lot of the reason it’s so great is because of Ricardo, creating a character which is without a doubt, one of the greatest villains in all of movie history.
Khan belongs on a pedastool with Darth Vader, Anton Chigur, and whatever other iconic baddies you want to throw up there. Don’t dismiss him just because he’s in a Star Trek movie. He’s not just in a Star Trek movie he’s in The Star Trek movie. What The Dark Knight is to Batman and comic book movies Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Khan is to Star Trek and space science fiction. Thank god for Ricard Montalban.
Star Trek 2 is also where William Shatner gives one of his greatest performances. Not his greatest mind you, just one of them. His greatest actually happens in Star Trek 3, an overall inferior movie but full of surprisingly brilliant stuff from Shatner. Watch the scene where he first learns of the death of his son and you’ll know what I mean. But I digress. This is about the greatness of Ricardo Montalban and his relationship with Shatner.
Bill, who has lately started making a career out of being a pretty awesome talkshow host, has a new video out in which he talks a little about Ricardo and their work together. Interestingly, he and Ricardo never actually had any scenes together while Star Trek 2 was being filmed. If you remember, Khan never leaves his ship and Kirk never actually goes on board it. Their communication happens via viewscreen and communicator, which means their various parts of their conversations were filmed separately. When Kirk shouts his now legendary “Khaaaaan!”, he’s shouting it into his communicator as Khan whirls through the sky above him, assuming he’s left Kirk below, buried alive… buried alive.
But take a minute to watch the video below, and see what Shatner has to say about the legendary Mr. Montalban. It’s worth your time, even if you’re not a fan of Trek. Here it is:
