When night falls on a strange planet, the crew and passengers of a crashed spaceship are picked off one at a time by swarms of lightning quick flying aliens (sporting six-inch razor-teeth and armored exoskeletons) in this smart, stylish, almost original Alien knock-off. Spectacular effects and fantastically other-world production design set the atmosphere on the desert planet, and (more importantly) the characters that don't get quickly eaten are well-developed, interesting and volatile--especially Riddick (Vin Diesel) a cold-blooded, mass-murdering prison escapee whose animal/survivalist instincts and night-vision eyes are the group's best asset (and their second biggest fear). The mostly Aussie cast includes Radha Mitchell (High Art) as the ship's girl-power pilot. A strong, optional purchase. (R. Blackwelder)[DVD Review--June 1, 2004--Universal, 112 min., not rated, $26.98--Making its second appearance on DVD, David Twohy's 2000 sci-fi thriller Pitch Black: Unrated Director's Cut edition is virtually the same as the previously released “unrated” version, and includes the same audio commentaries (one by Twohy and costars Vin Diesel, and Cole Hauser; the other by Twohy, producer Tom Engelman, and visual effects supervisor Peter Chiang) and five-minute “making-of” featurette. New to this edition are a two-minute intro by Twohy, the three-minute featurette “A View Into the Dark” exploring the depths of central antihero character Richard B. Riddick, “The Johns Chase Log” 17-part pursuit log (featuring text and graphics) leading up to the opening of Pitch Black and accompanied by voiceover from the film's bounty hunter William J. Johns (Hauser), a four-part “The Chronicles of Riddick Visual Encyclopedia” with commentary by Hauser, the two-minute “The Game is On” preview of The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay interactive game, an “Advancing the Arc” brief look at the making-of animated spin-off The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Fury, and a weblink. Bottom line: released purely to pump up the media volume for the sequel The Chronicles of Riddick, this is not worth the upgrade for those who already own the original release of this better-than-average B-movie.][Blu-ray Review—Mar. 17, 2009—Universal, 109 min., R, $29.98—Making its first appearance on Blu-ray, 2000's Pitch Black sports a nice transfer and DTS-HD 5.1 sound. Like the previous DVD, the Blu-ray release includes two versions of the film (theatrical and uncut), two audio commentaries (one by director David Twohy and costars Vin Diesel and Cole Hauser; the other by Twohy, producer Tom Engelman, and visual effects supervisor Peter Chiang), a two-minute intro by Twohy, “Johns' Chase Log” segment (8 min.), a five-minute “making-of” featurette, the three-minute featurette “A View Into the Dark” exploring central antihero character Richard B. Riddick, “The Game is On” featurette on the old Chronicles of Riddick video game (2 min.), “Dark Fury: Advancing the Arc” on the animated sequel (2 min.), and a brief visual encyclopedia featurette (2 min.). Exclusive to the Blu-ray release are “Pitch Black Raw,” allowing viewers to compare barebones CGI and daily rushes to final scenes, a picture-in-picture track, and the BD-Live function. Bottom line: a decent Blu-ray release of the opening film in a popular franchise.]
Pitch Black
Universal, 108 min., R, VHS: $106.99, DVD: $26.98 (unrated), Oct. 10 Vol. 15, Issue 5
Pitch Black
Star Ratings
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