We went to see Chronicles of Riddick last night. for free, no less. we had to stand outside for a while and of course yesterday was the muggiest day of the year, thus far. We also had to sit through Regal Entertainment`s The Twenty which i firmly believe is the reason the floor of movie theatres are sticky; it`s your brain leaking out of your ear. the twenty featured ads for the new Universal Studios Mummy themed ride, Evercrack 2, oh sorry Everquest 2, some new limited series on TNT about terrorism closely followed by an ad for the US Army. It boggles the mind, but we`re not here for that.
After the obligatory ad for Pioneer and the competition they`re hosting; what you didn`t think we got in to see a sneak peek of Riddick on my good looks and charm alone did you?
What can I say about the movie? It`s not high art and in light of some of the other crap that we`re being offered as entertainment this year, we could have done worse, plus it was free. It was entertaining, Judi Dench was great, wasted but great. Most of the special effects were quite good, particularly the matting for Dame Judi`s character. Vin Diesel looked good, did some cool shit, kicked some ass and in at least one scene had every woman in the audience`s panties soaked. Thandie Newton put in her best performance since… well ever, I don`t particularly like her, but I suppose seeing her in costumes that relied on an over abundance of cleavage and smouldering looks, she was damn near perfect. The end is pretty much what you expect when you walk into the theatre, the plot is fairly straight forward and the gaping holes are kept to a minimum.
Chronicles of Riddick is not high art, it`s summer entertainment and could help you pass some air conditioned hours in the company of friends on afternoon, I should warn you however, if you have motion sickness problems or are in danger of psychotic flashbacks when strobes are involved I`d advise you to avoid some scenes in this movie.
