NationMaster - Encyclopedia: Pitch Black (film)

Pitch Black (also known as The Chronicles of Riddick: Pitch Black^[1]) is a 2000 science fiction action movie directed by David Twohy.^[2] Look up pitch-black in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Promotional poster for Pitch Black, deemed This work is copyrighted. ... David Neil Twohy (18 October 1955â€”) is an American movie director and screenwriter. ... Ken Wheat is the writer of Pitch Black and brother of Jim Wheat. ... Vin Diesel (born Mark Sinclair Vincent on July 18, 1967 in New York City), is an American actor, writer, director, and producer, known for his muscular physique and deep voice. ... Radha Louise Mitchell (born November 12, 1973 in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia) is an Australian actress. ... Cole K. Hauser (born March 22, 1975) is an American actor. ... Keith David (born June 4, 1956) is an Emmy Award winning, African-American film, television, and voice actor most known for his roles as Childs in John Carpenters The Thing, Goliath in the cartoon Gargoyles, playing the Arbiter in Halo 2 and Halo 3, as well as voice overs... Lewis Fitz-Gerald: Born in Adelaide, Australia on November 15 1958, Lewis is a graduate of the National Institute of Dramatic Art, Lewis film credits include Pitch Black directed by David Twohy, Dead Heart directed by Nicholas Parsons, Spider & Rose directed by Bill Bennett, Evil Angels (aka A Cry in... Graeme Revell was born in New Zealand in 1955. ... David Eggby is a British cinematographer. ... This article or section does not adequately cite its references or sources. ... Focus Features is the art house films division of Universal Pictures, and acts as both a producer and distributor for its own films and a distrubutor for foreign films. ... This article is about the American media conglomerate. ... is the 49th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2000 (MM) was a leap year starting on Saturday. ... The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ... Arabic redirects here. ... The Chronicles of Riddick is a science fiction series, spanning three films and two video games. ... The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Fury is a made-for-video animated film set between the films Pitch Black and The Chronicles of Riddick. ... The year 2000 in film involved some significant events. ... Science fiction is a form of speculative fiction principally dealing with the impact of imagined science and technology, or both, upon society and persons as individuals. ... This article is about motion pictures. ... Director Herbert Brenon with actress Alla Nazimova on the set of War Brides, 1916 A director is a person who directs the making of a film. ... David Neil Twohy (18 October 1955â€”) is an American movie director and screenwriter. ...

In the film, a dangerous criminal (Richard B. Riddick) is being transported to prison in a cargo spacecraft. When the spaceship is damaged in a meteor shower and makes an emergency crash landing on an empty desert planet, Riddick escapes. However, when predatory flying alien creatures called "Bioraptors" (dubbed "Big Boys" by Riddick) begin attacking the survivors, Riddick joins forces with the crew to develop a plan to escape the planet. Vin Diesel as Riddick. ... A meteor shower, some of which are known as a meteor storm or meteor outburst, is a celestial event where a group of meteors are observed to radiate from one point in the sky. ... This article is about science fiction. ...

Plot

As the movie opens, the Hunter Gratzner, a cargo spacecraft with basic accommodations for 40 passengers en route to the Tangiers system, accidentally crosses through a meteor shower while on auto-pilot (due to all passengers and crew being in cryo-sleep) and suffers catastrophic damage. With the captain having been killed during the initial meteor strike, the docking pilot Carolyn Fry, awoken by the ships computers, wants to dump the passenger cabin after dumping the previous two compartments to level out the spacecraft as it plummets to the planet below so the crew can survive. The navigator Greg Owens (also awakened) keeps her from doing so by jamming a door open with a piece of equipment, preventing the ships computer from accepting Fry's order. The ship eventually crash-lands on a strange, brightly lit desert planet M6-117 (actually the moon of a larger gas planet) and only 12 people survive. Fry survives, but Owens is mortally wounded in the crash and dies shortly afterward. Among the other survivors are a dangerous criminal (Richard B. Riddick, headed for a new prison), his captor William J. Johns, a Muslim (Imam with his three disciples Hassan, Ali and Suleiman), a young stowaway named Jack, an antique dealer named Paris, and two Australian settlers, Zeke and Shazza. Not to be confused with cryogenics. ... For other uses, see Captain (disambiguation). ... A navigator is the person onboard a ship responsible for the navigation of the vessel. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... There is also a collection of Hadith called Sahih Muslim A Muslim (Arabic: Ù…Ø³Ù„Ù…, Persian: Mosalman or Mosalmon Urdu: Ù…Ø³Ù„Ù…Ø§Ù†, Turkish: MÃ¼slÃ¼man, Albanian: Mysliman, Bosnian: Musliman) is an adherent of the religion of Islam. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ...

Riddick manages to escape, and Johns leaves to track him. Zeke and the others take it upon themselves to bury those who died in the crash. While Shazza and Jack are searching the ship for bodies, a shadow alerts them to the presence of a nearby person. They fear it is Riddick, but their fears prove baseless when it turns out to be another unknown survivor. Zeke, however, not knowing what Riddick looks like and fearing it may be him, shoots and kills him before being told it was not Riddick, who has used the commotion to sneak into a chair Paris was using to keep watch under a parasol and relaxes with Paris' drink for a moment. When Zeke goes on to bury Owens and the survivor he killed, he notices a small hole in the wall of the pit in the sand. He uses his hands to shovel sand away from the hole and creates a man sized opening. Crawling inside, he is attacked by unseen creatures and brutally killed. Shazza comes to investigate his screaming and sees Riddick, who had also just arrived at the pit. She accuses him of killing Zeke, and he runs away, only to be caught shortly afterwards by Johns, who was hiding behind a stone and surprised him. Riddick is questioned as to whether he killed Zeke, and replies that although he has killed many people, Zeke was not one of them. When Fry investigates the cave, she soon discovers that some kind of vicious creatures exist underground.

While searching for water, an abandoned mining settlement is discovered several miles from the crash site. To the great excitement of the survivors, they find a large supply of water and even a small ship capable of leaving the planet (once its power is restored). While exploring the settlement, young Ali goes into the coring chamber and accidentally disturbs a nesting brood of young creatures, who rip the skin from his body. This finally demonstrates to the others not only that the creatures (henceforth called 'Bioraptors') do exist and are incredibly dangerous, but to their relief it also shows they have a strong need to avoid sunlight as well. However their relief is short lived when Fry discovers (via a moving model of the solar system they are in) that every 22 years, for one month, the planet undergoes a total solar eclipse. She also realizes that it must have been during the total darkness of the last such eclipse that the creatures were able to kill all the previous residents of the settlement and, to everyone's dismay, this last eclipse occurred almost exactly 22 years ago. This article is about mineral extractions. ... Photo taken during the 1999 eclipse. ...

Now knowing they must escape the planet before the eclipse starts and the creatures emerge, Fry remembers that there are energy cells back in the Hunter Gratzner wreckage that will power the skiff they found. The survivors decide to use a solar powered ATV to go back to the crash site, retrieve the power cells, and then try and get back to the skiff and escape before darkness falls. This article is about the astronomical term. ... The ATV is commonly called a quad (quad-bike) in Australia, New Zealand and the United Kingdom. ...

Unfortunately, when they are only a few hundred yards from the crash site, the eclipse begins, causing the solar powered ATV to stop. Even worse however, as they are walking the rest of the way to the wreckage in the fast approaching darkness, huge swarms of Bioraptors suddenly emerge from large mounds all over the desert. Shazza is torn in half while running to the ship, but the rest make it inside. However they are now trapped inside a cargo container at the crash site without adequate supplies and with seemingly no safe way to get back to the skiff and escape. Download high resolution version (847x363, 53 KB)The survivors drive back to the ship for the remaining powre cells before darkness Pitch Black. ... Containers in the port of Kotka (Finland) on the Baltic Sea. ...

After they discover (at the cost of Hassan) that the Bioraptors are actually harmed by light, and knowing that while in prison Riddick had a procedure, "eyeshine," performed that allows him to see in the dark, the group decides to arm themselves with flashlights, fluorescent lights, and rifle-sized glow-wands and move out into the open to try and make it back to the skiff (dragging the heavy power cells behind them), using a makeshift sled with a rig on it which provides power to the various flourescents and glow-wands. During the trip, Paris panics and runs away from the group, accidentally destroying the light-providing rig. Paris remarks to himself that he was supposed to die in France but never even saw it. Alone in total darkness, he takes a swig of alcohol and spits out fire (via a lighter), revealing for a moment that he is surrounded by Bioraptors. For other uses, see Light (disambiguation). ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ...

The rest of the party light torches using strong alcohol salvaged from the cargo container. After coming upon their previous tracks they realize that they have been walking in circles. Riddick has done this deliberately to buy time due to the hundreds of Bioraptors in the canyon ahead. It is found out that young Jack is not a boy but a girl, and is menstruating. The Bioraptors hunt by scent, and smell her blood. The menstrual cycle is the periodic change in a womans body that occurs every month between puberty and menopause and that relates to reproduction. ...

Johns privately speaks with Riddick about the prospect of killing Jack and dragging her behind them in order to keep the Bioraptors occupied. Riddick feigns interest in the plan to see if Johns is serious. When its clear that he is, they get into an argument that becomes increasingly violent until Riddick wounds Johns and leaves him for dead. A Bioraptor soon decapitates him with its axe-like head.

Riddick then learns after examining a dead Bioraptor's skull that they 'see' through echolocation and, because of their widely separated ears, have a blind spot directly in front of them. See: Animal echolocation: animals emitting sound waves and listening to the echo in order to locate objects or navigate. ... Blind spot can refer to: In ophthalmology, Scotoma, an obscuration of the visual field Optic disc, also known as the anatomical blind spot, the specific region of the retina where the optic nerve and blood vessels pass through to connect to the back of the eye Blind spot (vision), also...

The group moves on into a canyon, and Suleiman is wounded when a Bioraptor attempts to grab his leg. He manages to drive it off with light, but he is soon attacked again and dragged away before he can be saved. Another Bioraptor attacks Jack, but Riddick quickly kills it in the nick of time. It begins to rain, causing the torches to fail. Riddick finds a small cave and tells Jack, the Imam, and Fry to get in and wait for him to return. Fry finds bioluminescent larva and puts them in a bottle, which she uses to ward off the Bioraptors as she journeys to the escape ship to find Riddick. Riddick was preparing the ship to leave without them, having determined that he could not help them get to the skiff alive. Fry orders him to come back with her and get the others, but Riddick refuses, and tries to convince her to abandon them. Fry is overwhelmed with guilt and begins to weep, before remembering her attempts to purge the passenger compartment of Gratzner, and she attacks Riddick. Bioluminescence is the production and emission of visible light by a living organism as the result of a chemical reaction during which chemical energy is converted to light energy. ... A larval insect A larva (Latin; plural larvae) is a juvenile form of animal with indirect development, undergoing metamorphosis (for example, insects or amphibians). ...

Riddick, enraged by her sudden attack on him, tackles her and puts his knife to her neck, and asks her if she would die for them. She says she would. Riddick merely says: "How interesting."

They go back to the cave, and all four leave together for the escape ship, but Riddick trails behind and is attacked by a Bioraptor. Using its blind spot, he is able to hide directly in front of it and it begins to leave. His plan is thwarted when a second Bioraptor lands behind him, since he cannot hide from both of them at the same time. After the others arrive at the skiff, Fry goes back for Riddick. She finds him badly wounded and tries to help him to the ship, reminding him that she said she would risk her life for the others, not him. She is then suddenly grabbed and pulled away by a Bioraptor.

(At the very beginning of the movie, the viewer is shown a scene of what at first glance appears to be an ordinary pan-out of the camera from the landing site and from Riddick's face; at the point of Fry's death, however, it becomes clear to the viewer that what was actually shown at the start of the film was Fry being carried off into the night by one of the creatures after being impaled, from her point of view.)

This results in an epiphany for Riddick, because he is amazed that she would sacrifice herself to save him. He says she shouldn't have died for him. Riddick gets into the ship and, in a final act of defiance, allows dozens of the creatures to swarm the outside of the ship before starting the engines, thereby incinerating more of them, and crushing many more with the skiff's windshield. He explains this to Jack as: "We can't leave... without saying good night." This article is about a feeling, for other meanings see epiphany (disambiguation). ...

As they are leaving M6-117, Jack asks Riddick what to tell anyone they encounter on the trip home. Riddick delivers the film's final line: "Tell 'em Riddick's dead. He died somewhere on that planet." Riddick, Jack, and the Imam fly off into an uncertain future.

Cast

Vin Diesel (born Mark Sinclair Vincent on July 18, 1967 in New York City), is an American actor, writer, director, and producer, known for his muscular physique and deep voice. ... Vin Diesel as Riddick. ... Radha Louise Mitchell (born November 12, 1973 in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia) is an Australian actress. ... Cole K. Hauser (born March 22, 1975) is an American actor. ... Keith David (born June 4, 1956) is an Emmy Award winning, African-American film, television, and voice actor most known for his roles as Childs in John Carpenters The Thing, Goliath in the cartoon Gargoyles, playing the Arbiter in Halo 2 and Halo 3, as well as voice overs... Lewis Fitz-Gerald: Born in Adelaide, Australia on November 15 1958, Lewis is a graduate of the National Institute of Dramatic Art, Lewis film credits include Pitch Black directed by David Twohy, Dead Heart directed by Nicholas Parsons, Spider & Rose directed by Bill Bennett, Evil Angels (aka A Cry in... Claudia Lee Black (born October 11, 1972 in Sydney) is an Australian actress, best known for her portrayals of Aeryn Sun and Vala Mal Doran in the science fiction television series Farscape and Stargate SG-1 respectively. ... Rhiana Griffith (2004) Rhiana Jade Griffith (born April 16, 1985 in the Hunter Valley region of New South Wales, Australia) is an actress, artist and model. ... Firass Dirani is an Australian TV actor who played the role of Nick Russell in Power Rangers: Mystic Force. ...

Related works

The setup of the movie is close to the short story Nightfall by Isaac Asimov. The Chronicles of Riddick is a science fiction series, spanning three films and two video games. ... Nightfall is an influential science fiction short story (later adapted into a novel) by author Isaac Asimov, about the coming of darkness to the people of a planet ordinarily illuminated at all times on all sides. ... Isaac Asimov (January 2?, 1920?[1] â€“ April 6, 1992), pronounced , originally Ð˜ÑÐ°Ð°Ðº ÐžÐ·Ð¸Ð¼Ð¾Ð² but now transcribed into Russian as ÐÐ¹Ð·ÐµÐº ÐÐ·Ð¸Ð¼Ð¾Ð² [1], was a Russian-born American author and professor of biochemistry, a highly successful writer, best known for his works of science fiction and for his popular science books. ...

The movie's sequel, The Chronicles of Riddick, was released in 2004 and was also directed by David Twohy. A short animated movie, The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Fury, directed by Peter Chung, was also released that year. Dark Fury bridges the gap between Pitch Black and Chronicles of Riddick. In 2000 a prequel to Pitch Black was released named Into Pitch Black, which was supposed to be a Documentary movie. The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay, a game for the Xbox and the PC, was also released in 2004. For other uses, see Sequel (disambiguation). ... The Chronicles of Riddick is a 2004 American science fiction / fantasy / thriller film. ... The year 2004 in film involved some significant events. ... The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Fury is a made-for-video animated film set between the films Pitch Black and The Chronicles of Riddick. ... Year 2000 (MM) was a leap year starting on Saturday. ... Documentary film is a broad category of visual expression that is based on the attempt, in one fashion or another, to document reality. ... Escape from Butcher Bay Categories: Computer and video game stubs | 2004 computer and video games | Windows games | Xbox games ... The Xbox is a sixth generation era video game console produced by Microsoft Corporation. ... One of the first PCs from IBM - the IBM PC model 5150. ...

Contents

Plot

Cast

Related works

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References

External links

Contents

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Cast

Related works

See also

Trivia

References

External links

Plot