With the whole pandemic situation taking place Hollywood has halted production on everything they were creating. In addition to that, theaters were shut down. Only now are both beginning to start up again. In the meantime the release of no new movies meant that there weren’t any new DVDs being released either. Sure there were some movies that had been shelved, most of them low budget flicks, but nothing noteworthy for the most part. So what does that leave to watch being released now? Old movies being given new life by companies like Arrow Video.
I’ve praised Arrow in the past but that’s because they always do an amazing job with their releases. They search for the best print available, take the time to make a pristine transfer and add on plenty of extras to keep fans happy. This week they’ve turned loose a 2000 release that while watching I realized I’d forgotten how good it was. The movie also featured a breakout performance by its lead actor that led to superstardom for him. The movie is PITCH BLACK.
In the future a spaceship called the Hunter-Gratzner is transporting passengers in a cryogenic state. When a meteor shower rips through the hull the crew is awakened, the captain killed by one of the tiny meteors. Now in charge Carolyn Fry (Rhada Mitchell) attempts to land the ship on a planet they are cascading towards. The crash of the ship kills most on board with only a handful surviving. Among the survivors is prisoner Richard Riddick, one of the most feared murderers in the universe.
The survivors split, some burying the dead while others search the landscape of this barren planet, sandy and hot, hoping to find water. As their search moves forward they discover the graveyard of giant animal bones and a base in the distance. The base gives them hope with a small shuttle there in need of power cells, ones they can transport from their crashed ship. But something else is here as well.
At the crashed ship digging a hole for the dead one of the survivors finds a hole in the ground. Checking it out, he is sucked in by something, something hungry. When the others show they find Riddick there, free and telling them the death wasn’t his doing. When Carolyn goes into the hole to find out what happens she discovers a number of creatures living beneath the surface and barely escaping them.
It isn’t long before the group figures out the creatures can only come out in darkness. At the same time they find out the planet is about to go dark during an eclipse that will last days. They rush to transport the cells to the shuttle, one by one being picked off as the darkness grows and the creatures surface. Finding they need him Riddick is freed and all of them work together. But who will survive?
The movie qualifies as a science fiction film but in truth it’s more than that. There is the sense of a thriller here, trying to find out who or what is killing them off. There is the character study of a dangerous man who may or may not find redemption in helping others. There is the horror element with the fear of the dark and what lies in it. All of this combines to make a satisfying movie experience for all.
Arrow is not only releasing this film in blu-ray format but in 4K HD as well. But the extras…wow. They include an archive commentary track by director David Twohy and stars Vin Diesel and Cole Hauser, an archive commentary track with Twohy, producer Tom Engelman and visual effects supervisor Peter Chiang, NIGHTFALL: THE MAKING OF PITCH BLACK a new interview with Twohy, new interviews with cast members Rhiana Griffith and Claudia Black, cinematographer David Eggby, visual effects supervisor Chiang, and composer Graeme Revell. There is a making of featurette, a comparison between the CG tests and the final footage, additional behind the scenes material, archive bonus features from the 2004 release of the film on disc, a short prequel narrated by Cole Hauser as John detailing his hunt for Riddick, THE CHRONICLES OF RIDDICK: DARK FURY an animated short film that bridges this film with the second of the trilogy THE CHRONICLES OF RIDDICK, DARK FURY bonus features, SLAM CITY a motion comic from the film’s official website, INTO PITCH BLACK a TV special about what took place before and after the events of the film, RAVEWORLD: PITCH BLACK EVENT footage of a dance music event held to promote the film, theatrical trailers plus trailers for the two other films in the trilogy and the video game, image galleries, a reversible sleeve with newly commissioned artwork by Luke Preece and for the first pressing only a collector’s booklet with writing by Simon Ward on the creature designs, production notes and an interview with Vin Diesel.
All of these extras are enough to make picking this release up worth the money. But if the movie isn’t good then why bother? The fact is that the movie IS just that good. If you don’t remember how good then you need to see it again. If you’ve never seen it you need to do so. It launched the career of Diesel but it’s more than that. It’s solid entertainment.
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