Review of Riddick (2013) by Hoops2448 — 10 Sep 2013

Riddick despite his B movie status is an iconic movie character and Vin Diesel is excellent as the titular hero but its a shame that director David Twohy decided to essentially remake Pitch Black for the third instalment of the semi popular franchise.

The film follows what happens when Richard B Riddick (Diesel) is betrayed and left for dead on a planet filled with creatures trying to kill him. He is forced to summon two ships of bounty hunters to the planet to find a way off world before a dangerous threat reaches him and the ships he has just called.

While Pitch Black was more of an ensemble survival film, Riddick relies solely on the abilities of Diesel with a few fun side characters dotted about for good measure (a cameo by Karl Urban early in the film is a nice way of keeping the continuity of the disastrous Chronicles of Riddick.

) For his part Diesel is excellent, an intense presence worthy of the character. The visuals are great for a film on a reduced budget and the world Riddick finds himself stranded on has much more personality than the one in Pitch Black.

The film opens with a gripping 25 minutes of Riddick surviving and learning the rules of his new environment and while a man alone on a planet sounds boring, it is by far the best aspect of the film as it really gets to the core of the Riddick character as Diesel conveys so much of Riddick's thoughts through his facial expressions and actions.

Light on dialogue and intense the first act is riveting stuff. Katee Sackhoff makes a welcome addition to the Riddick world as mercenary Dahl and Matt Gable shows up with an interesting link to Riddick's past that makes for an interesting new dynamic to a seemingly predictable affair.

The ending while generic is exceptionally well realised and directed by Twohy with some beautiful shots depicting the desperate situation Riddick and the surviving mercenaries find themselves in. It's actually rather moving up until an obvious plot twist ruins it all.

The film does have some clunky writing and some poor performances but Twohy is smart enough to kill them off early to avoid embarrassment. Ultimately its a nice return to this universe after the calamity that was the Chronicles of Riddick and if Twohy manages to maintain the enjoyable B movie cheese I will continue to watch this hit and miss series.