Vin Diesel power in Riddick fails to fuel Pitch Black series Riddick - Trailer Left for dead on a sun-scorched planet, Riddick finds himself up against an alien race of predators. PT2M30S http://www.smh.com.au/action/externalEmbeddedPlayer?id=d-2jp3j 620 349 May 16, 2013 Rating: 2 out of 5 stars Rating: 1.5 out of 5 stars 1 vote Sci-Fi David Twohy RIDDICK Directed by David Twohy Rated MA, 118 Minutes Cinemas everywhere Reviewer Rating: 2 out of 5 I was a fan of the first Riddick film, Pitch Black. It was the movie that gave Vin Diesel his career breakthrough. These days he is best known for the revhead hit series The Fast and the Furious, now in its sixth instalment and showing no signs of box-office fatigue. But he never had a leading role before he came to Australia in 2000 to play Richard B. Riddick, a runaway space criminal, in Pitch Black, much of which was shot in Coober Pedy with a largely Australian crew and several Australian actors led by Radha Mitchell as Diesel's co-star. The eyes have it: Vin Diesel reprises his role as space fugitive Richard B. Riddick. Photo: John Saxby Co-written and directed by American sci-fi veteran David Twohy, it was a film with a relatively modest budget and perfect timing, arriving before sci-fi movie-making became as bloated and overpopulated as it is today. The writing was tight, the characters were either beleaguered or obnoxious enough to keep you interested, and thanks to Australian cinematographer David Eggby, who devised its sun-struck look, it had a strong sense of originality working for it. And there was Diesel's Riddick - big, bald, gravel-voiced and belligerent with eyes that glowed in the dark, enabling him to see at night. He wasn't a hero - simply the lesser of the storyline's many evils. The film attracted a cult following strong enough to spawn a sequel, a video game, a DVD anime and, now, a second sequel. Along the way, the budgets have grown, the CGI has become more elaborate and the series' intergalactic politics more tortuous, but the basics remain the same. In each film, Riddick is dumped on a hostile planet and forced to survive. In Pitch Black, it was a world scorched by two suns. In the follow-up, The Riddick Chronicles, he was consigned to a similarly hot spot - a prison planet called Crematoria. In this one he's been left for dead in a craggy wilderness that seems too inhospitable to sustain life, until the first of its many predators turns up. If they don't get him, skin cancer will - in the real world - but we're many light years away from there in this movie. Thanks to Eggby's cinematography it has a strange golden shine that is the most effectively sinister thing about it. Twohy directed and co-wrote all three films and has been able to attract some worthy names to put on funny costumes for the cause. Judi Dench wore white robes in the last one as leader of the Elementals, a race at odds with the cosmos' evil imperialists, the Necromongers. But even her participation failed to inject human interest into either the plot or the ambience, which was dominated by CGI and filmed in tones of pewter and gunmetal grey. It was a big disappointment and its lack of success put this one on hold for a long time, but Twohy and Diesel were both determined to have Riddick live again so here he is - with a much smaller selection of antagonists than he had in the over-produced Chronicles. For the first 15 minutes or so, his supporting cast consists entirely of two breeds of CGI monster which he has to outrun, outmanoeuvre or outfox - something he does so effectively that he acquires a baby one as a pet. There is no end to his talents. Then come the human predators - two gangs of mercenaries out to collect the bounty he has on his head as a result of his earlier adventures, together with a party of Necromongers. It's led by Riddick's old enemy, the euphoniously named Vaako, played by New Zealander Karl Urban. There's also an Australian connection. The former rugby league star Matt Nable, whose look of melancholy pugnacity has earned him a thriving career as a character actor, shows up as one of Riddick's most intrepid adversaries with an old grudge to settle. They're accompanied by two particularly hard-working heavies - Battlestar Galactica's Katee Sackhoff and Spanish actor Jordi Molla. But none of them have the grunt necessary to put any pep back into the series. Most of the film's energy goes into the blood-letting. Riddick's retirement is long overdue.