Pitch Black, later re-dubbed The Cronicles of Riddick: Pitch Black is an interesting amalgam of rehashed "haunted house in space" tropes from Alien and the "Alien Vision" from Predator along with a few new character and technical twists.
The film starts in space, as a passenger ship is struck by debris. Carolyn Fry, the pilot (Radha Mitchell), can do nothing but attempt to land the ship on a nearby inhabitable world. Upon lading, the survivors set out to find a way off the planet and recapture dangerous prisoner Riddick (Vin Diesel) who has escaped the ship in the chaos. Along their exploits, the survivors discover that the planet they are on is inhabited by nasty, bat-like creatures that come out once every total eclipse, a rarity in a solar system that boasts 3 suns. And wouldn't you know it, the eclipse it set to happen shortly after the ship crash lands...
All of the main characters have various secrets to hide, led by the ever ambiguous Riddick. The film never quite decides if he should be vilified as murderer or lionized as a hero. It tries to have it both ways, in fact, showing him menace the crew one moment and inspire a young kid the next. Other than Riddick and Fry, a cop may not be as straight as he seems (Cole Hauser, Higher Learning), and the boy he inspires (Rhiana Griffith) may have a secret back story. Keith David (The Thing) and Claudia Black (Stargate SG-1) round out the passengers on the ship. As is the case with this type of movie, everyone who doesn't have a name is probably going to die.
It's a shame that the film's concepts of survival and triage come into play only during the last 30 minutes. The most interesting part of the film dramatically is when the ship's acting captain Fry, still wracked with grief over an earlier decision, is offered the option to leave with one of two groups of survivors, leaving the other to die. In some ways, the characters of Fry and Riddick are inverse versions of each other, each making survival decisions, one with guilt, the other without. It's arguable who is the true protagonist of the film.
The use of color in the film is expertly done. As the planet has three suns of three different colors, the light filter changes as each sun moves through the sky to prominence. This may not be scientifically accurate, but it's a cool trick nonetheless. Once nightfall sets in, the use of various flares and flammables, provide ever changing color schemes. The film ends up being shot in blue, yellow, red and green throughout. If you count Riddick and the alien's POV shots, the color count expands to include purple and black & white.
I'm not sure how the physics of this world would work, and I'm not sure the movie has decided how they do either. Though the idea that ravenous, nocturnal creatures come out to eat during eclipses seems plausible enough, but the speed in which the eclipse takes place and the darkness lasts seems to be solely based on plot convenience. Then of course, what do these desert dwelling creatures eat when there aren't settlers or stranded travelers available for snacks? Perhaps the creatures only live for a short period, eating, laying eggs, and dying in the same evening. Maybe the world was once lush, and the creatures, parasites from another planet, wiped it out. It's not really explained nor is it central to the plot, but if the filmmakers worked out a few of these technical details, it might have elevated the aliens from "boogeyman" status.
The film occasionally resorts to cheap tactics to scare (things jumping out of the dark while the soundtrack makes a loud noise), yet there are also genuinely unsettling moments. The film is hit and miss in its attempts to Riddick the next great space hero.
The franchise would take a turn for the worse in terms of coherent storytelling during the next feature, and no franchise can be considered "traditional" when its best entry is arguably the tie-in video game. That said, Pitch Black on its own is a well made creature feature in space. It's a shame that the film wasn't able to lift itself out of genre constraints, mostly due to the film failing to fully flesh themes and failing to create a plausible scenario. It's too well shot and has too many good ideas to be full on camp, and is too half baked to be praised on all levels. It just is... if you like that sort of thing. The film was directed by David Twohy who co-wrote the screenplay with Jim Wheat and Ken Wheat.
Review based on the Unrated Director's Cut which runs 4 minutes longer than the Theatrical version. A bit of gore as well as some character development appears to have been added in this version.
© 2011 Beyond the Films
