Good sci-fi/horror film.

Rating: 7/10 (31 October 2006)

Pitch Black starts sometime in the future somewhere deep in outer space where 40 commercial passengers are in cryo-sleep aboard a spacecraft waiting their destination. Unfortunately the spaceship is caught in a meteor storm which breaches the hull, after a bumpy ride Officer Carolyn Fry (Radha Mitchell) manages to land what's left of the ship on the nearest planet. The only survivors are Fry herself, bounty hunter William Johns (Cole Hauser) & his bounty Riddick (Vin Diesel) along with religious Islamic nut Abu al-Walid (Keith David), intergalactic antiques dealer Paris Ogilvie (Lewis Fitz-Gerald), Sharon Montgomery (Claudia Black), a guy called Zeke (John Moore) & some young boys including Jack (Rhianna Griffith). Together they must work to survive the chances of which improve dramatically when they discover an old abandoned settlement complete with spaceship, unfortunately it seems that the planet is infested with flesh eating creatures that can only survive in complete dark which is OK considering the planet has three suns. However by some amazing coincidence the day they happen to crash on this particular planet the first eclipse in 22 years that plunges the entire planet into total darkness occurs, now that's unlucky...
This Australian American co-production was co-written & directed by David Twohy & I have to admit I liked it a lot more than I thought I would. The script by Twohy along with Ken & Jim Wheat is surprisingly good & intelligent, at it's heart Pitch Black is an Alien (1979) clone but it's certainly one of the best. The character's make this film what it is, they are very well written, there aren't any real clichés among them, they all have an edge to them & unbelievably I actually cared for these people. Because there are no major a-list actors in Pitch Black it make the who's going to die & who isn't question a lot harder to call. The film starts off a little slowly but once it reaches the 40 odd minute mark & the flying creatures are let loose it never lets up, although having said that the first 40 odd minutes are used well to set both the character's & situation up so when the creature do start to attack it actually means something. I'm sure many other's have questioned this but why would an animal such as the one in Pitch Black evolve which can be hurt by light when the planet it's living on has three suns & has an eclipse every 22 years? Also what would these things feed on since the planet is pretty much dead? Don't give me that cannibalism rubbish either, I mean eventually they would all eat each other & there would theoretically only be one left who would eventually die of starvation anyway.
Director Twohy does a good job, there are no massive CGI effect scenes & he instead keeps things quite low-key & understated. The special effects that are here though are excellent & the scenes of the suns going behind the large ringed planet are cool. I'm not sure about the bleached colour in a lot of shots but at least it creates a pretty good alien environment & atmosphere. The film is lacking in gore, there is a rotten skeleton, a severed foot, someone injects a needle into their eye & someone has there head bitten off but that's about as nasty as it gets.
Apparently shot in 60 days on a budget of about $23,000,000 Pitch Black is well made with that Hollywood polish to it. The acting was pretty good from a mostly unknown cast although Vin Diesel has gone on to be a major Hollywood star & I have to say I thought he was great in this & played his part brilliantly with great menace.
Pitch Black is a great sci-fi/horror film & better than I had expected. In 20 odd years time I don't think anyone will look back on Pitch Black with the same regard as we do with Aien now but it's good solid entertainment that gets the job done. Well worth a watch. Followed by The Chronicles of Riddick (2004) & the straight-to-video animated film The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Fury (2004).