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Wing Commander
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Chris Roberts
Produced by	Donna Burkons Joseph Newton Cohen Jean-Martial Lefranc Todd Moyer Tom Reeve Romain Schroeder Neil Young
Written by	Chris Roberts Kevin Droney
Starring	Freddie Prinze, Jr. Saffron Burrows Matthew Lillard Tchéky Karyo Jurgen Prochnow David Warner
Music by	David Arnold Kevin Kiner
Cinematography	Thierry Arbogast
Release date(s)	March 12, 1999
Running time	100 min.
Country	United States  Luxembourg
Language	English
All Movie Guide profile
IMDb profile

Wing Commander is a science fiction film based on the Wing Commander video game series. It was directed by Chris Roberts, the creator of the game series, and stars Freddie Prinze, Jr., Saffron Burrows, Matthew Lillard, Tchéky Karyo, Jürgen Prochnow and David Warner. In the United States, the film is rated PG-13 for sexual references and sci-fi action/violence. The movie borrows heavily from naval warfare films such as Das Boot, going so far as to include a scene where the Tiger Claw is "depth-charged". Principal photography occurred in Luxembourg and post-production was done in Austin, Texas. The film was a financial failure, returning an estimated $11.5 million in US theaters on a budget of $30 million. ^[1]

Set one month before Wing Commander^{[citation needed]}, the story unfolds in the middle of an interstellar war between the Terran Confederation and the cat-like alien Kilrathi. The movie tells the story of Christopher Blair and Todd Marshall, young pilots assigned to the carrier Tiger Claw, as they fly their first combat missions. A massive Kilrathi armada is en-route for Earth and the Tiger Claw is assigned to fight a suicidal delaying action in order to allow the rest of the Terran fleet to reach Earth. Tensions exist between Blair and his fellow pilots due to the fact that he is part "Pilgrim". Pilgrims are a strain of humanity who have special abilities relating to interstellar navigation; they had previously fought a war against the Confederation.

The film has been criticized by some fans for altering the visual style of the most recent Wing Commander games. This is regarded as a somewhat tenous argument^{[citation needed]} given the extreme popularity of series creator Roberts' previous stylistic re-imagining of the series between Wing Commander II and III^{[citation needed]}. The most notable shift between Wing Commander: Prophecy and the movie is the appearance of the Kilrathi. Although the movie's Kilathi retain feline facial characteristics, they lose their signature fur entirely. Roberts' has since said that this change was a result of his ongoing unhappiness with the appearance of the 'live' Kilrathi, none of which lived up to his internal vision. He had previously re-imagined the Kilrathi between Wing Commander III and IV, going so far as to completely redesign the Melek character between the two games.^[2][3] Roberts, even after production of the film, was left unsatisfied with the results of the film version of the Kilrathi.^[4]

As with the FMV games, Roberts' cast the movie based on actors' skill rather than their physical resemblance to those who previously held the part^{[citation needed]}. This has become something of a tradition across the series. Paladin, for example, has gone from being a thin fair-haired man in Wing Commander I & II ^[5] (voiced by Martin Davies) to being a large dark-haired Scotsman in Wing Commander III and IV ^[6] (played by John Rhys-Davies) to being a middle aged French accented Turk in the movie ^[7] (played by Karyo). In one spinoff title, Super Wing Commander, he inexplicably wears an eyepatch ^[8]. The novelization of Wing Commander IV previously established that Paladin's Scottish accent was an affectation. The characters' in-continuity backgrounds, expanded in the movie novelization and its sequel Pilgrim Stars, remain virtually unchanged from the video games.

Wing Commander Arena, the latest game in the series, confirms that the Wing Commander movie is treated as part of the same canon as the video games. Arena includes references to events like the Pilgrim War ^[9] while using ships and settings which first appeared in the main series of games.^[10]

The novelization of the film by Peter Telep was fairly faithful to the film itself. However, in the book the plot to discredit Blair is more far-reaching and includes David Suchet's character, Captain Jason Sansky. There is also more general information about the Kilrathi and their first attack on a space station. The novel is based on the film's shooting script, which includes most of this information. Significant cuts removed the 'traitor' subplot from the finished film.

• Wing Commander at the Internet Movie Database