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Pitch Black (Widescreen Unrated Director's Cut) Customer Reviews (58 - 60 of 69 Reviews)

Pitch Black (2000)
Director: David Twohy
Cast: Vin Diesel, Radha Mitchell, Cole Hauser, Keith David, Claudia Black.
Running Time: 107 minutes.
Rated R for violence and language.

Obviously, "Pitch Black" is a major rip-off of "Alien" or any other monster/alien/ghost film ever made. With that criticism set aside, this film, directed by David Twohy, is highly entertaining and devilishly dark at the same time. The film revolves around a group of space vessel inhabitants who stumble upon an unknown planet that has three suns. The amount of suns; however, is not the most unusual spectacle on the planet, for they are stalked by ravenous flying creatures that thrive on darkness.

With the help from Vin Diesel as the creepy, blinded warrior, Riddick, the crew must figure out how to not only survive on this horrific planet, but somehow leave before a solar eclipse wipes out all light from the planet and allows the flesh-eating monsters to have more exposure. Excellent special effects and some interesting cinematography, but this action-packed science-fiction romp is hampered by sub-par acting peformances and a mediocre script. Certainly not the worst of its kind, but because they are so many of its kind, "Pitch Black" seems overdone, less original, and only moderately satisfying.

Thrilling, entertaining, slick film.
Pitch Black features a fairly common sci/horror plot about a spaceship crash landing on an apparently desolate planet that happens to be inhabited by flesh-eating creatures. There's nothing unusual to this plot, and it offers basically no surprises. This would seemingly offer up a boring movie, or at least one that doesn't rise far above made-for-TV status.

In fact, just the opposite is true of Pitch Black. It is exciting and thrilling, and occasionally even a little scary. The actors are all really, really good in their roles. And the screenplay is written to allow even minor characters a bit of fleshing-out. The visuals in this move are also very, very good with scary creatures that look like the old "Aliens" film and hunt like the raptors of "Jurassic Park", a character with strange but cool shiny eyes, and computer graphics that are light weight enough not to distract. The cinematography in this movie is awesome! With light shifts of red to blue, and back again, it gives the wonderful anticipatory thrill missing in many of today's sci/horror flicks that rely solely on explosions and blood drenching scences. The direction is also very good in this movie. Basically, what the makes of Pitch Black did was take an old story and clean it up with great acting, cinematography, direction, and writing. The total of their efforts brings us a movie which thrills, even though the plot is old news, because perhaps for the first time, it was done well enough that we could believe it.

My only complaint about this movie is the vagueness of the Riddick character and what he is about. At the end, it is left unsure whether he really was an evil criminal that somehow 'became' good on this planet, or if he was a misunderstood character. Because of this unclearness, it leaves the viewer in doubt about his character even after the movie is over. It would have been nice to get more inside the head of this character at the end. I can only hope that the coming movies will give us a little more.

DVD contains a typical, boring 'making of' and some interesting commentaries. Nothing spectacular or worth making a buying decision over.

Modern Sci-Fi Epic inspired by, not derivative of, Aliens
Science Fiction (and horror, for that matter) films are so numerous that their stories have been copied, remade, expanded upon, narrowed down so much that there is hardly an original idea still floating around in this genre. "Pitch Black" does little to change that fact. The concept of a rogue alien species endangering and eliminating human life is hardly a new one. The Alien Trilogy provides the seminal work for this type of story and several dozen other movies have tried to copy that formula to varying degress (mostly lesser) of success. "Pitch Black" manages to avoid the pitfalls of the path already paved in its approach to re-telling a similar story. A transport ship carrying 40 commercial passengers (and 1 maximum security prisoner) encounter a meteor storm that forces a crash landing on a barren planet seemingly devoid of life, leaving only about a dozen of the passengers still alive. The initial trick is in making the viewer think that the now escaped prisoner, Riddick, (played with remarkable style and depth by Vin Diesel) is the true threat to the survival of the rest of the passengers. The real danger isn't Riddick, but a species of carnivorous, raptor-like animals (seemingly inspired by the species in Aliens) indigenous to this planet. Initially, these animals are not much of a threat as they are deathly afraid of light (which scalds them) and this planet is privy to three (!) suns. However, in an unexpected twist of bad luck, the survivors find out that they are about the experience an event that occurs only once every 22 years on this world... a total solar eclipse of all three suns. Once the eclipse starts, these creatures are free to roam the surface of the planet and devour whatever prey they may find (humans, in this case). The goal of the survivors becomes trying to transport energy cells from the crashed ship to an intact escape ship left behind by the previous set of unlucky souls from 22 years earlier.

With the interesting twists in its premise, this movie would still not be much more than sci-fi rehash with a gimmick if it were not for the stellar performances put in by an underrated cast. Diesel is the most noteworthy as convicted murder Riddick. This role practically sets itself up for a mail-it-in performance of detached coolness. Yet, Diesel brings surprising pathos to Riddick that enables the viewer to empathize with his struggle to do whats right for Riddick (because, he is a criminal after all) or do whats right for the survivors (because he is human at the core). One scene early in the movie demonstrates this range perfectly. Johns, the mercenary cop who tracked down and captures Riddick, taunts Riddick while making a deal the ensure his cooperation and assistance in trying to get the survivors off-planet. To drive home the point that Johns is definitely in control, he quickly points and fires his rifle at Riddick, intentionally missing him by a few inches telling him, "Now I want you to remember this moment, as a way things could have gone, but didn't". Johns, gets a little too close to Riddick after this and gets surprised when Riddick, now unrestrained by the cords holding him at bay, grabs the rifle from Johns, quickly flips around in his face and screams at him "Now you remember THIS moment!". While it would be easy to display over the top rage or unnatural coolness during this turn of events, Diesel's facial features betray a sense of frustration and fear in knowing very well that Johns could have killed him and that he does indeed control Riddick.

Vin Diesel is a relatively new actor who first came to audiences' attentions playing Private Caparzo in "Saving Private Ryan". He has such a prescence that watching him on-screen is truly compelling, from roles like a shady stock broker in "Boiler Room" to science fiction a**-kicker in "Pitch Black". Diesel's Riddick makes some of the characters played by Schwarzenegger and Stallone look like Little Lord Fauntleroy. Diesel could own Hollywood before it's all said and done. Cole Houser adds strength in the role of the merc cop Johns. Johns is seems focused primarily on greed (Riddick is a large payday to him) and his next drug hit. He is so cold and calculating that by far exceeds Riddick as the most dangerous human. Radha Mitchell as the ships surviving crew member and Keith David as an Arab holy man also turn in effective performances in the struggle to survive this alien world.

While certainly not an original story, "Pitch Black" takes familiar plot elements and weaves them together into a re-telling that is refreshing and captivating.

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