Riddick (2013) - Review

A surprisingly entertaining third entry in the franchise.

Prior to the release of The Dark Knight Rises, director/writer Christopher Nolan consciously and boldly stated the most obvious problem with the project: 'How many good third films in trilogies can you name?' And he's a got a point; there really aren't that many. The aforementioned third Dark Knight film and The Godfather: Part 3 are the only ones that comes to mind, and even then they can't really hold a candle to the first two. But the point I'm trying to make here is that, regardless of whether or not Riddick can be considered as a so-called 'threequel', after viewing it I'm heartily under the impression that it's the best of the three in the franchise so far.

It picks up a while after the events of The Chronicles Of Riddick, as we see the titular character narrowly avoid an assassination attempt by his peers, albeit finding himself buried alive on a desolate planet. Things become more and more awry and, with no other options, he decides to launch a distress beacon from an outpost. Two teams show up; a haphazard group of mercenaries with a psychotic leader, and a well-trained team of mercenaries. Both know that Riddick is somewhere in the surrounding area, at which point the story depicts the hunt for Riddick, as well as Riddick's attempts to bring down the two groups and escape the planet.

The first twenty minutes don't give a great first impression; it was a painfully dull affair, as we see Riddick aimlessly roaming around, and I was quickly regretting my decision of paying for a ticket. But then things to a 180 degree turn, and Riddick sharply transgresses into what the franchise does best; it becomes a riveting action-survivalist story, as our protagonist learns how to survive on the relentlessly hostile planet. This is only improved by a sequence depicting his efforts to overcome a group of scorpion-type creatures that infest the planet, as well as his interesting alliance with a dog-like animal who watches his back throughout the story. As a character, Vin Diesel is almost born in the role of Riddick as a no-nonsense survivalist anti-hero. In a way his performance can be likened to Arnold Schwarzenegger as The Terminator, because both use their unique acting abilities to their own advantages in their respective characters. Diesel gives as much of a solid performance as can be expected in a character that is fixed in his need to survive, it is clear that he has plenty of faith and personal investment in the character.

In terms of the rest of the cast, character development goes about as far as you would expect in a film involving clear-cut bounty hunters and mercenaries - there's really very little of it. Jordi Molla's portrayal of the borderline psychotic Santana is relatively solid, although he echoes a distracting likeness to a dishevelled Alfie Boe a lot of the time, which averts from being able to take his character any more seriously than the aggravating pain that he is... Although this is an element that was probably intended based on his (spoilers) eventual and necessary demise. Matthew Nables depiction of Boss John is your typical straight-talking, strong-willed mercenary, and as a result his character isn't anything particularly special. There are arguably anti-feminist/fan-service elements in the depiction of the films only female character, mercenary Dahl, boldly pulled off by Katee Sackhoff. Her character is one of pro-feminism, but how she is portrayed by the camera-man, at times, isn't. 

Structurally it would be easy to assume that this is a typical one vs. ten battle, as if Riddick would slowly and ingeniously pick off his antagonists across the films two-hour running time... Which he kind of does. That is, at least for a little while. But the story eventually reveals itself to be one concerning unionship and general survival, as we see Riddick unpredictably team up with his pursuers in an attempt to survive the planet itself. It becomes a much more predictable affair towards the end, and the conclusion feels like something of a lazy cop-out compared to the rest of the films relatively stable story-telling.

I must admit, I was very much surprised by Riddick. It has it's dull moments, there's no doubt about it, but the bottom line is that a surprisingly large percentage of this film is undeniably intriguing to watch, and if you've already plowed through every other current new release, it's well worth going to see.