When I tried to watch “Star Trek: The Motion Picture” on TV in the 80’s I did think it was long and boring. I don’t think I got through the whole movie.
When I watched it years later, I liked it. It was a visual masterpiece. There was a lot of fan service with the panning shots of the Enterprise leaving the dock and the introduction of the characters.
I get what they were trying to do with visual storytelling. They were drawing inspiration from “2001 A Space Odyssey. “
I actually think “Star Trek: The Motion Picture” was more enjoyable to watch than “2001 A Space Odyssey” which I found hard to understand and painfully boring to watch. I don’t know how that movie is considered the greatest science fiction movie of all time.
In “Star Trek: The Motion Picture” they were facing a force that was huge and vast in scale, probably more powerful than any Star Trek antagonist past, present or future:
It made the Borg look like nothing.