Review of Riddick (2013) by Alexproductions — 11 Sep 2013

When I heard that Vin Diesel funded the whole film with his own money, I felt that he was the only one wanting to continue the Chronicles of Riddick. The newest film out of the trio features Richard B. Riddick, who we follow as he is being hunted by the "dead Riddick" team.

The movie took so many different turns that I wasn't quite sure what genre film it was. From thriller, to drama, to science fiction, Riddick definitely appealed to a large audience, especially with its PG-13 rating. With so much potential in the film, it seemed to me that director David Twohy did the least of his directing abilities to quickly make a "sloppy" film. He made it in such a way that it was part of the series, but it easily could've been a standalone film.

The first half of the movie was completely useless and left me bored stiff. There’s a presentation etiquette skill saying to always start with something engaging to put the viewers in the right mood. Riddick did the absolute opposite. After a good 40 minutes of basically no one saying a word on the screen, I was about ready to feel I wasted both my time and money, when the film suddenly picked up. I recognized that all of the little sea monster critters seemed like a bad rip off of the sea monsters in Prometheus.

A lot of the movie was quite predictable, especially when Riddick would be hiding somewhere. It was easy to know that he was somewhere in the scene, and the camera would pan to a corner where he would be, which bugged the crap out of me. A lot of other film critics tended to disagree with me on my harsh comments, saying "how good it was," but it really did nothing for me.

The last 35 minutes or so were entertaining, and I thought that overall Vin Diesel did a good job in the main role. There was one scene that impressed me, when Riddick was chained and flipped a knife in the air, kicked it, and cut a man’s head off. That was probably the only thing that was original for me.

Whatever, I won't remember the movie in a week, but that head scene will be what is shared with some friends tomorrow. I think that if you’re a fan of the other two (painful to watch) films in the series, definitely go see Riddick to get your full fill of Vin Diesel's movie (in IMAX 3D). Other than that, I was truly disappointed with the film, and for sure won't be recommending it.