Aylmer to Zazzoo and Beyond: Riddick

Friday, September 6, 2013

Riddick - Review

Riddick
(2013 - September 6)
Action | Sci-Fi | Thriller
1 hr 59 min

Rated: R | Some sexual content and nudity with very vulgar sexual inuendos, strong language and graphic violence.
Grade: C+

Director: David Twohy
Writers: David Twohy, Jim Wheat (based on characters created by), 3 more credits »
Stars: Vin Diesel, Karl Urban, Katee Sackhoff | See full cast and crew

Riddick, the latest chapter of the groundbreaking saga that began with 2000's hit sci-fi film Pitch Black and 2004's The Chronicles of Riddick reunites writer/director David Twohy (A Perfect Getaway, The Fugitive) and star Vin Diesel (the Fast and Furious franchise, xXx). Diesel reprises his role as the antihero Riddick, a dangerous, escaped convict wanted by every bounty hunter in the known galaxy. The infamous Riddick has been left for dead on a sun-scorched planet that appears to be lifeless. Soon, however, he finds himself fighting for survival against alien predators more lethal than any human he's encountered. The only way off is for Riddick to activate an emergency beacon and alert mercenaries who rapidly descend to the planet in search of their bounty. The first ship to arrive carries a new breed of merc, more lethal and violent, while the second is captained by a man whose pursuit of Riddick is more personal. With time running out and a storm on the horizon that no one could survive, his hunters won't leave the planet without Riddick's head as their trophy. (c) Universal

After seeing the trailers for this film I went into the theater with very low expectations...I was surprised, pleasantly. For the genre, for what it is, I found myself drawn in by it. I liked it. Some of the CGI was very unimpressive, particularly some of the landscapes but overall pretty effective.

The audience was very much a Riddick fan base and seemed to be very much in to the movie. They appeared to be having a good time and were getting the insider references that were going over my head. Admittedly I am unfamiliar with the Riddick franchise, so I went to Wikipedia for some background:

Richard B. Riddick, more commonly known as Riddick, is a fictional character and the antihero of four films in the Riddick series (Pitch Black, The Chronicles of Riddick, the animated movie The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Fury and Riddick), as well as the two video games The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay and The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena. Actor Vin Diesel has played the title role in all of the Riddick-based films and video games so far.
Within the canon of the series, Riddick is shown to be a highly skilled predator - he is extremely mobile and stealthy, especially for someone of his size, has a vast knowledge of how to kill almost any humanoid in a variety of ways, is an extreme survivalist, and is notoriously hard to contain. He is also, self-admittedly, a dangerous convict and murderer - yet despite this, he is sometimes shown to perform moral or even atypically heroic actions, usually against his own better judgment and survivalist nature.

Riddick is a Furyan, a warrior race obliterated by a military campaign that left Furya desolate, and is one of the last of his kind. One of his most defining features are his eyes, a characteristic inherent in a certain caste of his species (The Alpha-Furyans), although he implies in Pitch Black that they were "shined" by a back-alley surgical operation. This allows him to see in the dark with no difficulty at all, but also renders his eyes incredibly sensitive to concentrated light, ergo he wears tinted welding goggles for protection.
Riddick was once a mercenary, then part of a security force, and later on a soldier. He is also an experienced pilot.

The Riddick saga has a fairly dedicated fan base. Listening to the comments of people at the theater it was surprising how many knowledgeable fans that were there for a midnight showing.

I liked Vin Diesel's performance, the supporting cast was also good for the genre, this isn't Shakespeare after all, we're not expecting classic performances but you want to watch the movie without the acting blatantly distracting from the experience, so that you can become immersed in the storytelling.

The one big disappointment was the language and gratuitous nudity, both completely unnecessary. The film could have been good entertainment for a much broader audience without these two distractions. The most egregious for me was the graphically vulgar sexual banter and quips, and of course, the only character, Luna, who shows any religious faith is belittled for it and is dismissively portrayed as weak, foolish and cowardly..."Hooray for Hollywood" and it's not so subliminal Godless agenda. Without these negatives I might have given Riddick a grade of B-. However, after seeing this third installment I just might in fact be interested in checking out the earlier films on DVD, although I never go as far as to play one of the video games.