After being hit by debris of a comet, a space ship is forced to make a crash landing on a seemingly deserted planet. Among the survivors are a group of Muslims (heading for New Mecca in space!) and a policeman (or is he a mercenary?) escorting a convict called Riddick to a distant prison colony. In reality the seemingly deserted planet harbors a species of bloodthirsty creatures, who have devoured all previous inhabitants and visitors. They're only waiting for new blood. The group members will have to cooperate with each other (and the convict) in order to escape ...
A real sleeper, Pitch Black was largely overlooked when first released, then found an audience on several horror festivals and eventually became a cult favorite. So far, there are two sequels, The Chronicles of Riddick (2004) and the recent Riddick (2013). There's also an animated movie featuring the anti-hero Riddick.
It's easy to understand why it was overlooked (and why some people still don't like it) ... but it's also not too difficult to understand how it got a cult following. Pitch Black is slow-moving and the first half lacks action and excitement; it's also rather talkative, with too many corny characters having bizarre conversations. But it also has great atmosphere, the horror scenes are suggestive and scary, and the final half hour is particularly fine. The concept of the planet is wonderful: three different suns causing red-hot (and blue-hot and green-hot!) days, a total eclipse of all suns offering one pitch black night. And whatever you may think of Vin Diesel: he's ideally cast as the muscle man with night-sight eyes.
