Rubbish!

Rating: 2/10 (28 December 2003)

This film IS a cheap imitation of Alien, and ISN'T actually an excellent movie all round. And a good indicator (for me), to what is a bad film, is when I just want it to end, and that's exactly what I thought, not even halfway through watching this.
It's hairthin plot, - spaceship crashes on a desert planet, and the survivors attempt to find a way off it by endlessly traipsing across sand dunes and deserted townships looking for another ship to fly home in (which is conveniently provided for them). And then there are the alien creatures (uninventively handicapped by an aversion to light) who pose a constant threat to the would be space travellers during the night. But in comes Vin Diesel (whom I havent seen in a decent film yet... yes, XXX sucked) who, averse to the light but, attired in his shades that look more like diving goggles, eventually comes to the aid of the others with his ability to see in the dark.
Anyway, in a nutshell, Pitch Black suffers from a poor script, a substandard cast (Radha Mitchells' American accent is one of the worst I've heard), but most importantly, an unoriginal premise, unsuccessfully rehashed. It is substandard fare, prosaic with very little going for it except for some nice special effects here and there, but ultimately hard to sit through to the end.