Impressive, a surprise package!

Rating: Null/10 (5 March 2001)

It was doomed to be B grade from the start. Not overly big budgeted (by sci-fi today standards) no star power on the surface (Vin who?) and a few Aussie appearences spelt failure as I approached Pitch Black.
Im happy to say I left with a broad smile and that old sci-fi fire inside of me. The solution to overused inter-planetary science fiction plots was actually quite simple, and Pitch Black worked it well! Character! The solid script work really rounded each character development off quite nicely, focusing more on the changes in the players rather than their reactions to the flying nasties. (quite scary too) It was fresh to see an alien movie not about the aliens primarily. The characters all bounce off each other with great effect, particulary Riddick, Fry and Johns. There are no surprises plot wise, but when it comes to the metamorphasis of certain characters (not giving anything away) there are some neat pay offs and impressive changes. A cheeky approach to the traditional good versus evil if you will. The direction is impactful in selected scenes. The crash at the beginning and the intense "escape in the rain" with Riddick rivals something like Jurassic Park, especially the most memorable scene with Riddick coming "face to face" with an alien. The setting calls for some unique camera trickery. The director played around with some cool color filters to give the desert planet a truly hypnotic feel under its three suns. What steals the show, however (apart from some chuckle performances from some of my fellow aussies) was Vin Diesel. Yes, it'll be hard to forget his name now. He has a very "Arnie" presence in this movie, kind of like the Terminator, big, bad and as tough as chewing on a car tyre. His best lines, delivered in that gravely dirt road voice, rival big Arnie's antics in T2. "Don't you cry for Johns....don't you dare..." the line of the year!! The only bumps in this film are some of the lesser characters, such as a Holy man who decides to collapse into a frenzy of sorrow only after his third boy is killed (he must'nt have been attached to the more youthfull, other two) and the aussie's resembled bait for the flying killers. (except for Fry, but she had an American Accent, which must have acted like a repellent to the aliens). Overall a big surprise. It well deserves its praise as one of the most engaging sci-fi's of recent times. Four out of five stars.
"Don't you cry for Johns....don't you dare...." I luv it!