Pitch Black (DVD)

...begins the spectacle that is Pitch Black. The beginning of the film still leaves me breathless, the visuals used when showing the ship spiralling out of control towards the planets surface as various compartments of the ship were being jettisoned are fantastic, the camera shaking violently, the speakers pushing out oodles of atmospheric noise to put us right in the middle of the crashing ship. You are willing the people on board to survive what ...
...often lost on film makers. Pitch Black is really the film that launched Vin Diesel's career (even though he was in Saving Private Ryan, who remembers him for that?), and for me it is still his best outing. And what a first outing it is. Riddick is one mean hombre, a murderer who is being taken back to the slam after escaping, he is brutal, he is tough and he is dangerous but as we see in the film he is not totally devoid of humanity, but even then ...

sjp1966 10.10.2007 (11.10.2007) · Read full review
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Review of Pitch Black (DVD)

...much fun who cares right? Pitch Black is fun and it is rather well made as well and was in many ways the springboard for Vin Diesel's continuing career as the new darling of the action movie genre. Here he is great, launching himself into the Arnie style role he has been given with gusto, delivering the occasional one-liner and generally looking mean and kicking butt. The rest are equally good, although they slip neatly into stereotypical quirky ...
...waiting for when...or is it? Pitch Black has a few surprises up it's sleeve in this respect. Yes, you've got the same stereotypes thrown into the cinematic mixing bowl but the result which pops out of the oven is something very different than what you'll be expecting I assure you. It's rare to see surprises in this kind of movie, Pitch Black gets brownie points for having them. In terms of special effects there are some absolutely gorgeous shots ...

wampyrii 05.02.2003 · Read full review
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Review of Pitch Black (DVD)

...to write my op on Pitch Black. Bought by me on Sky Box Office Multiplay for the princely sum of £3.25, I’ve just watched it for the second time. Pitch Black is a futuristic sci-fi horror sort of affair. We begin on a spaceship cruising through space with a passenger cargo onboard. Among the crew are Carolyn Fry (Radha Mitchell), Greg Owens (Simon Burke) and William Johns (Cole Hauser). The passenger cargo includes Jack (Rhiana Griffith) a ...
...pipeline including a sequel to Pitch Black called The Chronicles of Riddick (thank you superpricee). I think this is a great film. Sure, it might have its little mistakes or weak parts of the script, but so does any film. The effects are fantastic, the acting is great (superb on Diesel’s part), the music very effective and the tension all over the place. And sorry for my girliness, I couldn’t really extol the virtues of Vin Diesel in ...

jess0910 24.11.2001 · Read full review
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Review of Pitch Black (DVD)

...a long time to see Pitch Black. A looooooooooong time. You see, it was originally slated for a cinematic release in April of last year. Then it was put back to May. Then July. When it finally came out in (I think) September, I was beginning to wonder if it would actually be worth the wait. Well, it definitely was. And now, after buying the video release last week, I've been reminded of just how good a film it is. PLOT: PB is one of the most original ...
...film - but it was Pitch Black that made him a star. Here he plays the murderer Riddick, and his famous gravel voice just sets off the character perfectly. Diesel brings exactly the right level of understated menace and cold steel to the role of the bad guy. Although Riddick becomes the hero of the piece, this is no criminal with a heart of gold - he IS a murderer, he IS a psychopath, and you are left in no doubt about this. Although Diesel is by ...

superpricee 09.10.2001 · Read full review
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Review of Pitch Black (DVD)

...other space-based horror films. Pitch Black is a Sci-Fi B-movie, a low-budget special effects extravanganza, and from the outset, you will be sure that you already know the plot: boy meets girl, girl falls for boy, incidental red-shirted extras get eaten by huge monsters with funny shaped heads, boy saves girl from funny-headed monsters, boy and girl ride off into the sunset. Again though, a pleasant surprise that the script, though predictable ...
...permanent, eclipse. Total eclipse. Darkness. Pitch Black. With this, out come the aliens, in their masses, and as the group is thinned out, we learn more and more about the people we are watching. The film is at this point a fight for survival, and stays that way until the very end. From the outset, the film is saturated with superb imagery. The daytime desert scenes look almost bleached, they are so blindingly bright. In contrast, when night falls, ...

ILoveJackDaniels 02.04.2002 · Read full review
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Review of Pitch Black (DVD)

Sometimes the only difference between a low and a high budget movie is the wages paid to the cast. This little gem of a film, featuring not a single actor I’d ever heard of, is a case in point. The plot is fairly standard; spaceship crashes on hostile world, seemingly barren. Survivors, both crew and passengers have to band together in order to discover inhabitants and get their ship airworthy. The inhabitants turn out to be colonies of blood ...
...sun goes down. Luckily there are three suns and no night, unluckily there is a total eclipse every twenty-two years and it happens to be due. OK there are some gaping holes in the plot, but this film is so good in all other areas that it really doesn’t matter. Of the three main characters, none are truly heroic, and this is great. Aren’t you sick of the whore with a heart of gold? The brooding misunderstood bad guy who just needs a chance ...

baddog 02.06.2001 · Read full review
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Review of Pitch Black (DVD)

...and its a keeper! Pitch Black starts off as a bog standard sci fi space film. A ship travelling through deep space with its crew all safely asleep in stasis, a bad sign, to be sure, to be sure. When a meteor shower strikes, the Captain is killed before he can even get out of stasis, and there is only two members of staff left to try and guide the ship down onto a (conveinently) nearby planet. Que exciting, will they, wont they make it alive? Come ...
...the planet is plunged into pitch blackness, with only a few candles to light the way, the fear factor is really turned up. Although, as I said, the effects on the aliens arent skimped on when you do see them up close, this film relies more on what you cant see to set the mood, and it works to very good effect, in much the same way as it did in Alien. For you blood hounds out there though, fear not, because what you do see is gory enough to satisfy ...

claires_cult 24.09.2002 · Read full review
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Review of Pitch Black (DVD)

...tongue firmly in its cheek, Pitch Black sets out to convince us that a case of Jack Daniels is an effective deterrent against a horde of alien beasties. Sure it is. Impression ********** Don't get me wrong, this is a good film. My favourite thing about it is that it has intelligent moments. Not that it is an intelligent film, it is a horror-sci-fi shock and spatter movie firmly paying homage to the Alien films. It does strike me though, that the ...
...money to finance other projects, scratched their goateed chins at Cannes one day and said '**** it, lets do a sci-fi horror splatter movie' and then sniggered their way through a brainstorming session. Plot **** The plot is cut to the bone. Ship crashes on alien planet, generating tension for later. The passengers - plus one fugitive in chains - are left to fend for themselves. They find an old mine with a ship that they can escape in but it has ...

Saturn 25.11.2001 · Read full review
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Review of Pitch Black (DVD)

...Well, you should be! Because Pitch Black is an exciting, edge of your seat Sci-fi horror thriller. The basic premise of the film is that a cargo ship, transporting people to a distant planet, accidentally gets caught in an asteroid belt. The ship takes heavy damage and crashlands on a desert planet with three suns which keeps the planet blazed in permanent daylight. The crew is dead except for the pilot and all that is left of the passengers are ...
...:- * Into Pitch Black A good ’making of’ documentary. * A brilliant Feature Commentary with Director David Twohy and actors Cole Hauser and Vin Diesel. This is probably the best commentary I’ve ever heard on DVD. It’s very informative but at the same time gut bustingly hilarious (Especially Hauser bragging about how many aliens he’s bagged with his shotgun) * Feature Commentary with Director, Producer and Visual Effects ...

robbroome 05.09.2001 · Read full review
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Review of Pitch Black (DVD)

...ruins an evening. Well fortunately Pitch Black is as entertaining as the trailers made it look - just a little meatheaded at times... The plot is simple and derivative, but as far as entertainment value goes, this one provides a fairly good way to waste an hour or two. It begins with a spaceship on the way to a distant galaxy called New Mecca. However it never reaches its destination because it has an accident en route and the cripple ship must ...
...this sort of movie goes, Pitch Black is a worthy addition to the genre. When compared to other recent sci-fi movies which have included Virus, Ghosts of Mars and Supernova, it is easily the best sci-fi made for a while...but thats not saying much given this kind of competition(and don't mention A.I. to me, I haven't seen it, and it sounds so cheesy I'm not sure I want to). If you are a fan of sci-fi/action movies then I recommend you check it out. ...

wampyrii 09.10.2001 · Read full review
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Review of Pitch Black (DVD)

When I was first invited to watch this film at a friend’s house, even after hearing good things about it, I was still sceptical about how much I would enjoy a derogative and generic film such as this. But once settled down to my friend’s wonderful home cinema set up, I found myself quickly drawn into David Twohy’s alien world of washed out bleak landscapes and distinctly stark imagery. His clever use of limited palettes has already ...
...budgeted films kicking around at the moment. The plot The premise of the story revolves around the crew and passengers of a transport taken off it’s predetermined course by a rogue meteorite shower which knocks out the ships systems and wakes up the cryogenically frozen crew and passengers who find themselves hurtling toward an unknown planet at breakneck speeds. Suffice to say most of the people survive and after recovering their senses, start ...

Sandman 19.06.2001 · Read full review
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Review of Pitch Black (DVD)

With monsters that look like a false smiling Anthea Turner, this film is quite chilling. THE PLOT ********* This film starts in much the same way many Sci fi alien films do. Please don't be put off by that. The films starts with a rather large space carrier (economy class trans space travel if you like), The pilot, crew and all the fare paying passengers are in the usual cross-space stasis/sleep. Tucked neatly away in their cosy monitored pods. ...
...the side of the ship, this hull breach awakens the co-pilots. Fresh from her who knows how many days sleep Fry (Radha Mitchell - no relation to Grant, Phil or Peggy) is awoken by the hit. She looks across the hull just in time to see the captain turned into a multi-holed tea bag by second serge. The co-pilots leave their pods and head for the cockpit to take control of the hurtling ship. The craft is being pulled toward the surface of a nearby planet, ...

beckslayer 06.10.2001 · Read full review
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Review of Pitch Black (DVD)

...was really looking forward to Pitch Black. It took forever for the film to be released since i saw the first trailer and i was getting extremely frustrated that it hadn't come out...then it did, Hooray! Or so i thought. As a big Alien fan i was hoping for something of similar greatness. It's been ages since we had a good Sci-Fi flick...ages. Looks like we are gonna have to wait some more. The basic premise is this... A ship crash lands on a planet ...
...a criminal that was being transported. Upon landing (sort of!) they find an outpost but no people, where could htey all be? Soon they realise that all the people must have dissapeared around the time of a solar eclipse. Then they realise that the planet is permanently day time. Then they find some creepy aliens and believe they only come out during the night. Then they realise that a solar eclipse is coming....it does and the creatures come out ...

Staggly 07.06.2001 · Read full review
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Review of Pitch Black (DVD)

Pitch Black has got numerous reviews on here rating it very highly. After reading a few of these reviews and watching the trailer I decided that it was a film that deserved to be watched, so off I trundle to my local blockbuster store to get myself a copy. I have to say now that I wasn’t really all that impressed with the film and the I awarded it only 2 stars for the actual film itself with another star being awarded for the visual effects. ...
...he was put in a pitch black cell for months, so he has to use goggle in the daylight to protect his eyes from the daylight, however, when night falls and all is black, he can see clearly. The twist in this film is that the mass murderer actually turns out to be the nice who who protects them all!! Predictable eh!! I think that’s enough about the story anyway as if you like Sci-Fi films, it will spoil it for you, plus I feel that I’m the ...

GR-Design 14.06.2001 · Read full review
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Review of Pitch Black (DVD)

Mans fear of the dark is well documented, just look to your own childhood- ‘Were you afraid of the Dark?’ Evil is traditionally associated with the black of night and most films prey upon the darkness to depict the psychological horror in your head, Hitchcock being the master of using light and shadow in his best, most chilling films. The newest film to use such a gimmick is ‘Pitch Black’ a Sci-fi horror hat came to my attention ...
...When the transport freighter Hunter Gratzner is hit by a comet tale and the ship crashes into a forsaken planet where all is cast in a searing glow of the planet’s three suns, their problems only just begin. The ship suffers major damage with 29 fatalities reported only nine members survive. The leading officer Fry, played by Radha Mitchell (Neighbours (tv series) 1985), takes on the captaincy and try’s to make what she can of the situation. ...

Saul_Walker 25.02.2001 · Read full review
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Review of Pitch Black (DVD)