"PITCH BLACK" SETS AN ECLIPSE ON ITSELF...

Written by Thomas Chau
Edited by Andrew Marcus

Cast: Vin Diesel (Richard Riddick), Radha Mitchell (Caroline Fry), Cole Hauser (William John), Keith David (Imam), Claudia Black (Shazza)

Premise: A transport ship containing 40 passengers heads for a new world when it collides and lands on a seemingly barren planet. Amongst the survivors is a convicted serial killer. But he is the least of their fears when a total eclipse falls and something beyond their worst nightmares arises from the dark...

Overall Rating:

Rated R for strong violence, mild gore, language

In Pitch Black, several survivors find themselves stranded on a deserted planet, looking for any signs of life. Unfortunately, a parallel can be drawn to the audiences watching the movie, for you find yourself wondering if there is any life whatsoever to the movie itself.

Pitch Black is a failed attempt by director David N. Twohy of "The Arrival" to revitalize his sci-fi/action career, simply because it lacks the thrill and scare factor which it attempts to provide. The movie opens with the only gut-wrenching sequence in the entire film, in which a ship enters a meteor shower and the assistant captain Carolyn Fry along with her co-pilot Cole struggle to save the rest of the passengers on-board, one of whom is a convicted serial killer. The rest of the film struggles to capture a significant amount of the audiences' attention. The ship crashes onto a mysterious planet which is incredibly bright with constant daylight due to the circulation of the three suns that belong to that planet. Only 9 walk out alive...physically, that is. But the characters themselves seem to have no life whatsoever. Each character drops dead at one point or another but after a few minutes, you just don't seem to care.

The character development in this film was the biggest disappointment. Typically in any successful survivor film, the filmmaker tends to select a diverse group of characters that can hold the audience's attention for two hours. With this particular group....well, it just seemed both cliched and a bit cheesy at the same time. The most laughable part of the film was Riddick's (played by Van Diesel) inexplicable transformation from a ruthless murderer to a good samaritan.

The group soons discovers the hidden horrors which lurk in the dark on this planet, and realize that if they can simply stay in the light, they will be fine. Unfortunately, however, a total eclipse of sunlight begins to form and total darkness falls on the planet...as well as the film. From here on out, the action and the suspense becomes duller with some shocks and surprises here and there. Unfortunately, the surprises are too few and too far between. You can't help but laugh at the unbelievably stupid mistakes some of the characters make and will ask yourself "What the hell was he/she thinking?" The film comes to a decent ending but fails to erase the memories of just how dull the rest of the movie is.