Riddick is quite easily my
most anticipated and awaited movie of 2013. There are several franchises I’m
fond of and follow, but not having known there will be a third installment, and
the sudden news of it a few months ago, made it that much more thrilling. Add
to that, information about it being closer to the original Pitch Black from 2000, and starring Katee Sackhoff of Battlestar Gallactica fame, took the
excitement factor up several notches. In this third installation, Riddick finds
himself again stuck on a planet, with little semblance of human presence beyond
that of a deserted mercenary outpost. What follows is his battle with both the
converging environmental elements, and the bounty hunters out for his head.
Unlike
the all-out commercial blockbuster that the second movie in the series was, Riddick starts of slow, and gradually
gives away bits of information, letting audiences make connections and
understand the current setting unhurriedly. Without giving away too much, let
me just say that the way the world around him slowly goes from deserted with
dangers, to nothing short of menacing, is pretty cool. The narrative does feel
very similar to Pitch Black, sharing
a lot of common elements; but an area the original did better was the final plot,
and the various stages of complexity the characters had to deal with to
overcome it. Though Riddick was
similar, the end struggle just didn’t feel as daunting. Perhaps the slow
build-up and character development of the new characters consumed way too much
of its 2 hour runtime. That said, sci-fi action buffs will not be disappointed.
Similarly franchise fans will also find enough here to relate to. Riddick is dark, and estranged like Pitch Black, only that Pitch Black shocked and awed audiences,
while Riddick just mirrored Pitch Black. Being an R rated movie, as
per the request of fans, expect some intense carnage, and some violent bloody
body dismembering. With the high
expectations I had, I will admit that I was a little disappointed, but that’s
not because the movie was bad, and probably was because I wanted to be blown
away, as I was with Pitch Black.
It
should come as no surprise that Vin Diesel owns and lives the Riddick
character. After all, Vin Diesel is the face of the Riddick franchise, and the Fast
& Furious franchise, and he plays pretty much himself in the lead roles
of both franchises. So in his own skin, it’s no shocker that he totally does
justice to the two characters. Lookup his filmography and you’ll notice that his
primary focus has been these two projects. Katee Sackhoff plays Dahl, an oozing
attitude, hard-ass, similar to her role as Starbuck in Battlestar Gallactica, only grittier. As in, now the punches get
bloody, when before all there was, were punches. The rest of the talent was pretty
decent, with Jordi Mollà and Matt Nable playing the heads of two bounty hunter
crews, each coming with very specific traits and characteristics, and
portraying them effectively; Dave Bautista of WWE fame played Diaz, also doing
an okay job of his fairly limited role.
With
all the excitement and anticipation, I had to go see this one quick, which
meant at the theatre. The presentation was good, a straight forward non-3D,
non-Dolby Atmos, 35 mm experience. Picture was clear, with color tones clearly favoring
dusty baked mustard of the desert during the day, and a dark bluish black in
all the dark sequences. There are no brilliant, reds or greens, in keeping with
the desolate and dark theme of the movie. There were a few scenes that were
cut, which needless to say was a disappointment. Sound was good, and I did
notice some positional sound in various sequences. From a tech perspective, the
special effects were nice, and the CGI was totally believable. That said, it
all worked, but I can’t speak of anything standout.
My
Recommendation: Watch It (Old school Riddick, Pitch Black style)
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