Chronicles of Riddick

**Sonnie** · **07-01-06, 02:52 AM**

I put of and put off even renting this one for some reason. Then spontaneously picked it up in HD with my new player. Watched it tonight after semi calibrating the Toshiba A1 with the THX Optimizer and after moving one of my SVS subs to the rear of the room.

I must say... I really enjoyed this movie and will definitely watch it again. This movie (which is the extended version with extra footage) is loaded with action, lots of good bass and very good PQ in HD. Pretty cool effects add to the viewing experience. Of course Vin plays his typical stud daddy kick booty part. Fairly predictable but still it held its own well enough for me.

I never saw Pitch Black... well maybe a bit of it once on a movie channel, but couldn't get into it. I guess that's why I was thinkin' I wouldn't like this one. Plus I never heard much about it, but I do hope they make another one more like Chronicles.

Big thumbs up for this one...

**pierrebnh** · **07-02-06, 02:39 PM**

How does the descent onto the planet sound when the bad guys are invading? Always rattles the doors & windows here

Definitely a good demo disc.

**Sonnie** · **07-02-06, 05:14 PM**

Yup... same here, except no windows... still very good bass through much of the movie.

**khellandros66** · **07-03-06, 10:31 PM**

Pitch Black is great, you really need to watch it from the begining or else you are gonn sit ther and be like umm... what am I watching??

~Bob

**Sonnie** · **07-04-06, 03:19 AM**

I think I will watch it just to say I've see it all the way through.

**FlashJim** · **07-09-06, 04:10 AM**

I'm a big Vin fan and Pitch Black is the reason. My wife and I caught it in the theater and afterwards we had to Google Vin. We had never seen him before and he was just too cool.

Oddly enough, I've never seen Saving Private Ryan. I heard he stood out in that too.

**Wayde** · **07-09-06, 06:35 AM**

Back when it was making the rounds at the theater I thought I was the only person who liked Pitch Black. It's one of those love it or hate kind of movies.

It had a "foreign" (non-North American) feel to it. You know that feeling you get, something about the shots, dialogue and emphasis on things that perhaps a Hollywood film wouldn't. The best thing about the movie isn't necessarily the main impending threat (I don't want to give anything away) but the characters and how they work together. The suspense and mystery about the strange planet with multiple suns was very well done.

Septem8er Tapes

I just tried to watch a movie called September Tapes this weekend. I rarely stop a film in progress and fail to watch the rest, I might give it another try before the disk has to be back. Sept Tapes or I should say the title is actually Septem8er Tapes. Perhaps it should have been 53pt3m83r T4p3s.

It's supposed to be about a freelance reporter who makes his own investigation over in Afganistan (about 2002) trying to track down slippery Ossama. The reporter and crew disappeared over there but the tapes were miraculously recovered from an abandoned Al Quida cave.

Now, I could ruin any possibility of this movie in one word. "Blair Witch Project" Okay three words. Actually Blair Witch did it better. I'm not a particularly political person nor do I give a **** about political correctness but I felt giving this topic the Blair Witch treatment was a bit err... tasteless. But maybe I'm biased because they did such a horrible job at it.

At least in Blair Witch the film maker was using the same camera and had consistent quality footage. This one is a montage. The documentaries video specialist must have brought the camera equivalent of a Swiss Army knife because his shots toggled between grainy film, clean film, video etc. The voice overs were cheesy. To give a sense of journalistic immediacy shots were almost always off kilter. For instance someone is talking in a room but I'm looking at a shot way too close to his face, the top of his head is cut off. I'm no videographer but in a room when you're just sitting listening to people talk is different than ducking behind a car avoiding bullets. Why wouldn't the video guy have tried to get a straight shot when the environment was controlled? But he almost never goes for a straight shot, it's always wobbling, moving in and out of focus or grain. But every time the journalist gave his thoughts (no matter what day) the audio in the voice overs had the same poor quality, not different variations of poor quality but the same one.

The only way you'd like this movie is if you're obsessed with conspiracy theories about why we're over there (the mid east) in the first place. Then you might find some ideological solidarity with the narrator and you'd be conned into believing it's a "good" movie. But personally I'm bored of them and I've heard them all.

Whew ... that's my sunday AM rant off only one coffee.

**Phil M** · **07-09-06, 08:34 AM**

Quote:

khellandros66 wrote:

Pitch Black is great, you really need to watch it from the begining or else you are gonn sit ther and be like umm... what am I watching??

~Bob

Thanks for the hint - picked it up at Blockbuster last week.

**Praetorian** · **07-27-06, 06:22 PM**

Sonnie, your probably very lucky you watched them in reverse. I loved Pitch Black, and not just because of its indie status, but because the characters were all human (even Riddick), flawed, and eminently fallible. It had a good plot, solid acting, and while the effects were not overly "special" it was not over-the-top. Chronicles really "Hollyweirded" the story for me, turned Riddick into this super-powered alien, and relied on effects to distract the audience from a weak plot. However, watching it for it was, I could see it as enjoyable, watching it in the context of Pitch Black, then you’re screwed.

**Darren** · **07-27-06, 06:28 PM**

I liked and own both Pitch Black and The Chronicles of Riddick. Good movies.

**Sonnie** · **07-27-06, 06:41 PM**

I bit and picked up Pitch Black on HD-DVD... I may give it the watch tonight or tomorrow night. I still gotta fit some of PULSE in somewhere and I stupidly rented a movie yesterday... like I don't got enough to watch already.

**07-27-06, 09:51 PM**

Riddick is sort of our reference disc for testing speakers and subs. It has some dynamic and challenging audio with lots of LFE, bass attacks, voicing issues, special surround effects, etc.) While I enjoyed both immensely, I'm with whomever said that Pitch Black is the superior movie. Great grabber opening. Good character snapshots, and some reasonably good FX that don't overpower the plot.

They both come highly recommended by me, but then...I'm a SCI-FI fanatic!!

Gimme Santa Claus vs. the Martians and I'm happy.

**Sonnie** · **07-28-06, 01:06 AM**

I did watch Pitch Black all the way through tonight. It was pretty good, but I think I like Chronicles better myself...

I was disappointed in the ending of PB but the overall movie was good. Those bright scenes with the blue was pretty cool... extremely detailed.

I agree... Riddick is more of a tough guy in Chronicles and the two movies are a lot different from each other. I'm glad I own them both... but you wouldn't have to watch PB for COR to make sense. Personally I'll give COR the nod on PQ and SQ.

**bobgpsr** · **07-28-06, 01:42 AM**

Agreed. I am in the process of re-watching CoR (SD DVD upscaled) on my Tosh just after watching PB on HD DVD. I had to make a "backup" copy of CoR so I could do upscaling on the Toshiba HD DVD player via component.

The colors are washed out compared to HD DVD discs but the resolution result watching 2 ft from a 37" 1080p LCD display is impressive. Maybe I can hold off double-dipping CoR to HD DVD

The plot lines of the two movies are so different. CoR's bass is awesome.

Bob

**Rezon_8** · **07-28-06, 03:29 AM**

Hi All,
To the people who own Pitch Black, does it have both the DTS & DD soundtrack? If it does, try listening to the crash landing at the start of the movie (from the start when things turn to sh... sorry, go wrong until they hit the planet) in DD and then, listen to it in DTS. I would be interested in your opinions. I found the DTS track had a lot more spatial information.

**Wayde** · **07-28-06, 08:08 AM**

I know the scene you're talking about. I really like that scene in DD. I now know why they put the Riddick three pack on sale so cheaply, I didn't realize there was a DTS version out there (slaps forehead)

I just picked up PB/CoR/Fury animated whatever you call it.

I loved PB and CoR, the anime, although done by Peter Chung who I really like, it's so good.

**Sonnie** · **07-28-06, 08:24 AM**

I don't recall seeing the DTS option on the PB HD-DVD, but maybe I overlooked it. I did think the menu was layed out pretty cool with its own sound effects, slide menu, etc.

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