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Pitch Black (Unrated Version)

Pitch Black (Unrated Version)

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Rating: 3 stars
Summary: High on visuals, little weak on story, but Deisel rocks!
Review: I grew up in a big house with a cavernous basement. Parts of it felt benign, but there were a couple of areas that had crawlspaces leading to unknown territory. I didn't like to get near those two large, dark holes high up in the limestone walls. My memories of that basement are why a movie like 'Pitch Black' is scary to me. Those with no fear of the dark will be unimpressed by it.

A space craft travelling in some distant galaxy is hit by a meteor shower. Several people, including the captain are killed. The next in command, Frey [Radha Mitchell] manages to crash land the ship onto a planet with three suns. [Whether it's possible for such a place to exist is beyond me!] The survivors include an extremely dangerous criminal named Riddick [Vin Diesel], who is being transported back to prison. At first, it seems the planet is forever in sunlight, and the main trouble is with finding and containing Riddick. When it turns out that the planet is actually about to be plunged into total darkness, the problem with Riddick pales in comparison to what is soon to come to life in the dark.

The movie spends too much time dealing with lots of typical earthbound problems among these marooned human beings. I would have preferred that it had spent more time exploring the wonders and horrors of the bizarre planet. At least it has the remarkable Vin Diesel in a career-making role as Riddick, the best sci-fi antihero since The Terminator. And, while the creatures owe a lot to Ridley Scott's 'Alien', but they still sufficiently scary.

Perhaps my favorite element of the film is the cinematography. It was made in the wastelands of the Australian outback, which is a very alien terrain. Add to this setting photography saturated in blues and yellows, and 'Pitch Black' really looks like it was shot on another planet.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: The Best "Creature" Film Since John Carpenter's "The Thing"
Review: Pitch Black is pure Sci Fi. True to it's genre, and extremely well produced on top of that. The style in which the movie was shot is surprisingly fresh, and creates a mood only a top notch film can create. The visuals are very well done, (keep in mind this is not a high budget movie), but I could have been fooled. Somehow they managed to create some of the most visually spectacular imagery available at it's time.
The acting is solid. Vin Diesel was meant for this part, and he acts it out to perfection. All the characters were well plotted and cast. Very impressive cinematography.
The plot is not recycled. As much as I'm a fan of aliens, I enjoyed this film more. Granted it's not scary, but the visual style makes up for it. The razor aliens are well thought out...make more sense than most aliens on screen. They are perfectly adapted to their environment in terms of being able to handle the terrain, and very capable in the arts of the hunt. The best "creature" film along with John Carpenter's "The Thing" which I also highly recommend.
The highlights are the incredible visual style, flawless acting, and a highly entertaining story. A great immersive experience.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: HOW DO MOVIES LIKE THIS GET MADE?
Review: Please, if you loved this movie, have your head examined.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: A Sci-fi blast!
Review: I just saw Pitch Black for the first time and I didn't expect much but I must say that I really liked it. Critics called it a disappointing second film from the director of the Arrival but even though I liked Arrival I think this is a big step above that. Vin Diesel gives the biggest break through performance of the year next to Hugh Jackman's in X-Men. Radha Mitchell and Cole Hauser also give fine performances. Besides having a good cast this movie is also full of a lot of nail biting suspense. It doesn't only come from the aliens that attack when it's dark but from Vin Diesel's character as well because you never know if you can trust him even if he is the hero. Diesel's so good at Riddick that I wouldn't mind seeing him reprise the role sometime. This is a lot better than the other Sci-Fi's of this year like Super Nova and Mission to Mars so check it out

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: cool sci - fi flick
Review: i rented this expecting bad acting , cool effects , and not scary looking monsters. boy am i surprised. i loved it. vin diesel is my fave actor. the only change would be make it longer. hello its 1 hour and 10 minutes long.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Awesome Sci Fi!
Review: Not since James Cameron's Aliens has there been a suspenseful Sci Fi story as exciting as Pitch Black, directed by David N. Twohy (The Arrival). The story starts off where a team of space explorers crash land on an unknown planet, where they find out that before long the outlying planets will arrange in a row, unleashing an enormous swarm of vicious extraterrestrial creatures. Vin Diesel is Riddick; a prisoner on the spaceship, Cole Hauser as William J. Johns and Radha Mitchell is Carolyn Fry, the hard-hitting leader of the expedition to escape off the planet.

The action is impressive, the CGI is really cool, and Vin Diesel (The Fast and the Furious) is one of the most excellent anti- heroes ever! The film does have flaws, the narrative is often sketchy, and the story is predictable, but the action makes up for it with some of the best visual effects ever seen on film.
The DVD extras are as impressive as the film, with a commentary from the director, Vin Diesel and Cole Hauser, more commentaries from the director and visual effects supervisor, a 'making of' featurette and production notes.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: "You're not afraid of the dark are you?"
Review: This film was fantastic, it was recommended to me by an online friend so the next day I headed out and rented it and it was one of the biggest shocks I have ever had from renting a film. It shocked me because it was so good, after reading a couple plot out lines I figured all I would have to look foreward to was the cool sounding creatures. To my great suprise it turned out this film offered a fun story, great characters, some of the best special effects I have seen in a very long time and yes, Riddick.

Riddick (Vin Diesel) is the main protagonist of the film, he is an escaped convict and multiple murderer, who somehow, turns out to be the most likeable character in the film. After seeing this film Vin Diesel became one of my favorite actors. Also this film featured some other pretty interesting characters, who I can't really describe without spoiling the film. But Johns (Cole Hauser) was very interesting and I think was kind of missed or forgotten due to Vin Diesels great character. I would say, had Riddick not been SO cool Johns would have became somewhat of a cult hero.

And the beasties, I refer to them as Raptors, are some of the coolest movie monsters I have seen in quite some time as well. Especially the POV shots from them, a visual interpretation of what echolocation looks like. And you see many stages of life for these creatures as well, from baby "hatchlings" to full grown adults or "big boys". The portrayal of these creatures is strikingly realistic. They're in my top 5 best movie monsters list.

As for the DVD, this seemed to be more promising than it turned out to be. I expected much more gore in the "unrated" version but there was very little extra blood and guts, it mostly just featured more stuff that was probably cut for time constraints. The commentary was really good too, David Twohy, Vin Diesel and Cole Hauser all on the same track, it was pretty funny when they told stories from the set and funny little happenings around the set and things. The rest of the features, I felt, were some what lacking, Raveworld thing, it seemed to have nothing to do with the film at all. Cast and Crew bios were kinda lacking as well.

All in all, buy this version instead of the "R" rated version just because theres some fun new footage, but don't buy it because you think theres more gore or anything, there really isn't.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Good enough for a sequel!
Review: It's rare to find a good movie that is a good SCI-FI movie. Yeah, it is a bit of a horror flick, but Pitch Black is a very interesting Sci-Fi movie.

Vin Diesel made his mark here for millions of fans and I look forward to what he does next. He is a cross between Michael Clarke-Duncan and a little Arnold Swartzenegger with a touch of Sylvester Stallone. He could well be the first in a new line of action heroes for the new millenium.

The movie is good and the effects awesome. Of course, I love the visuals of what the Aliens see as well as what Vin Diesel's character sees (the character having had his eyeballs polished while in prison on another planet), as some of my own artwork is slightly akin to what is shown in the movie.

Very worth your time and money.

...

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Surprisingly good...
Review: A sci-fi thriller of the survival/action variety, Pitch Black utilizes surprisingly slick, MTV-like visuals (thanks to director David Twohy) and above-average acting to deliver a guilty little film pleasure.

The basic plot would have been carried further with better writing, but any attempts at greater art are completely undermined by easy, cheesy, eye-rolling one-liners ("It did NOT know who it was [bleep]ing with." -- Riddick to a quickly decimated alien scumbag). The special effects are usually rather good considering the rumoured low budget and tight production schedule.

Outstanding performances (considering the genre) by Radha Mitchell (Fry), Vin Diesel (Riddick) and Cole Hauser (Johns, also son of actor Wings Hauser) elevate the film to something much more intelligent than past offerings of a similar concept (alien planet, people getting offed one by one, one of the group is a threat). Worth renting. Worth buying for fans of this type of cinematic fare.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: relax and enjoy
Review: Wow some of the bad reviews for this movie need to settle down. There are far worse movies than this. I think they accomplished their objective...it was entertaining and fun..at least i thought so. Not every movie need to be citizen kane. Just sit back and relax and watch vin diesel in his tank top...I gave it two screenings in the same day just for that.


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