Excellent camera work and characterisation

Rating: 9/10 (29 August 2006)

Now I have to start by admitting that I think Vin Diesel is a decent actor. Yes, so he always looks like someone who might pop in to Miami Ink to get a new tattoo of an eagle on his back and then ride off on a Harley.... but he is very watchable. He is no Larry Olivier or John Hurt... hell, he's not even as good as Tom Hanks or John Goodman... but he does have a charisma and personality that fills the screen. He was great in boiler room, and with Riddick, he is good yet again.
I wasn't expecting a lot from the film - it has had some mixed reviews, and comparisons to the Alien series is understandable (even if the types of films are very different), but I have to say that the cinematography is on a par with (well recently) Three Kings and the special effects are pretty much flawless.
The story is... well... to be honest, secondary to the characterisation and the look of the film, but then, isn't that true of so many sci-fi efforts? Most of the characters are well developed, if a little "typical" at times, and it made a change for some of the peripheral characters to actually survive.
Oh, and yes, the whole thing about a species that can only come out to hunt every however many years.... and the fact that no other species on the surface would have survived without sunlight... let's ignore it! Anyway - easy to watch, worth a look