Better to See Pitch Black Than Ultraviolet

I just watched a sci-fi action double feature. Both movies are set at indeterminate points in the future, and, oddly, both movies feature titles that indicate they can't really be seen; "pitch black" is the absence of all light, while "ultraviolet" is a color beyond the visible spectrum.

Still, if you must watch a movie based on a state of light that can't be seen -- a dilemma I'm sure happens to us all on occasion -- I whole-heartedly suggest Pitch Black over Ultraviolet.

Director/ writer David N. Twohy's Pitch Black -- a blend of action, horror, and science fiction -- tells the story of a sleeper ship that crash-lands on a distant planet. The survivors of the crash at first think that they are on a planet completely devoid of life, but they soon discover that a human settlement was once here, not too long ago. But where did all of the settlers go?

To their dismay, they find out. Terrible, horrifying creatures live under the planet's surface. These creatures fear and are hurt by daylight (I know how you feel, little guys!) but come safety of the nightfall, they swarm the planet's surface, to devour all other life -- which now includes our hapless shipwreckees.

At first, all the passengers look for leadership from the sole surviving crew member, the reluctant first officer (now captain) Carolyn Fry (Radha Mitchell). However, as it becomes apparent that the creatures only live and attack in the dark, leadership gradually shifts to Richard B. Riddick (Vin Diesel), who has the helpful ability to see in the dark. The only problem with this arrangement: Riddick is a sociopathic convict who has the potential to, at any time, turn on the very people who need to trust him with their lives.

This is a very good movie. The astronomy and related sciences surely don't hold up under scrutiny (the planet is so close to its neighboring body that the gravitational stress would surely make it unlivable) but the story is entertaining enough.

It's interesting to note how many horror movies make stabs at thoughtful discussions about belief in God. Some of these movies -- exorcist movies, for example -- even make belief in God a part of the plot. But other horror movies take a stab at it too, from Taste the Blood of Dracula to Dusk Till Dawn. Pitch Black is no exception, and I like how the movie -- without making a big deal about it -- lets God's spokesman be a Muslim for a change, instead of the stereotypical Christian bugging the protagonist about whether or not he's found Jesus.

I do have one nitpick about the movie. Please don't let it dissuade you from seeing the movie, as it has very little bearing on whether or not this is a decent flick.

Here's the nitpick: There's a lot of talk about the planet's unique astronomy. Specifically, it has three suns, so it almost never experiences nightfall. Investigating at the abandoned settlement, the shipwreck survivors find a planetarium that reveals that, once every 21 years, the suns line up, and are blocked by the larger neighboring planet in a tri-solar eclipse. The event plunges the entire planet into roughly twelve hours of darkness (although, just at the crucial moment when they are planning their strategy to escape from the night creatures, everyone inconveniently forgets how long the night lasts, since it didn't seem important when they were first learning it).

Okay, here's my question: Why bother with all this stuff about three suns, almost eternal daytime, and solar eclipses, if none of it turns out to be relevant? Why not just say, "the creatures come out at night," and be done with it? Maybe I missed something, but the astronomy, for all the talk that went into it, never seemed important to the fact that it's night time, and now it's dangerous.

Still, this is a good little action flick. The characters are interesting, the dialogue intelligent, the action exciting, the horror scary. The tone of the film was reminiscent of one of the science fiction greats, Ridley Scott's Alien.

Then I watched Ultraviolet, and my good mood immediately faded.

First problem, right off the bat: too much exposition. Voice-over narration fills the first several minutes -- quite simply too long -- describing the fictional world of the movie and its main character. Within this one, extended monologue, the voice of Violet (Milla Jovovich) redundantly describes the future as "a world you might not understand" not once, but twice. (She later repeats this claim a third time in the epilogue's narration as well.) The primary thing to remember from all of this talk is that an epidemic of vampirism (or, more specifically, a disease that mimics vampirism) has swept the land, and there is now a power struggle between humans and vampires that is in danger of turning into all-out war.

We then meet Violet face to face. In an extended action sequence, Violet breaks into a high-tech facility, steals an alleged "briefcase" which actually has no resemblance to an actual briefcase (but, you see, it's a science fiction briefcase), breaks back out of the facility, killing dozens of guards in the process, and then engages in a chase scene as she escapes on a motorcycle that can travel on vertical surfaces as easily as horizontal surfaces.

So, to review: We've got the break-in, the fight over the briefcase, the escape, and the chase scene. That's, by my count, four action scenes back to back, and yet despite the mountain of exposition that had preceded all of this, we don't yet know what's going on, who anyone is, or why we should care about what's happening on the screen. This is an increasing problem with action films today: Filmmakers are so eager to wow audiences from the git-go, that they forget to first make us care about the people in the scene. Without any context to go on, I really don't give a damn if they catch Violet or not.

When the movie finally takes a moment to rest, and stop bludgeoning us over the head with action, action, ACTION!, Violet pauses to have a holographic conversation with her boss and lover Nerva, who had sent her to steal the briefcase in the first place. Nerva informs her that the briefcase's contents include a bomb which she can somehow activate without opening the case, and instructs her to detonate the bomb if it looks like the original owners might succeed in re-obtaining it from Violet. Violet objects to detonating the bomb, because, she argues, "there's no reason for all of those humans" in the blast radius to die. Okay, except, just a few minutes ago, Violet's voice-over narration explained that she "hates humans and is determined to kill as many as I can -- to kill them all." And now, just a few minutes later, she's objecting to killing humans? It's bad enough that director/ writer Kurt Wimmer clearly wasn't expecting his audience to pay attention -- but apparently he wasn't paying attention to his own movie either!

I won't get too much into the rest of the plot, which somehow manages to be convoluted and simplistic at the same time. Suffice it to say that Violet, despite her claimed hatred for humanity, finds herself having to protect a young human boy from both the human and vampire factions in the war; something about the boy's blood being able to cure all vampires, or kill all vampires, or kill all humans (the script keeps changing which it is). Rather than delve into the intricacies of plot, let's explore some random observations about the movie:

1. In the future, characters can change their appearance at will. Eye color, hair color, clothing color, even clothing style, changes before your eyes. The movie never explains what kind of technology this is. Holographic technology? Some kind of mind-over-matter telepathic projection device? Who knows. I do wonder, however, why people in the future change their appearance so often? I mean, I can understand that, if changing your outfit was as simple as thinking about it, then it would happen all the time, but I noticed that people tend to change their clothes, hair, etc. especially when they are about to go into battle. Even taking into account how easy changing clothes may be, if a bunch of people were about to try to kill you, and you knew it, would you really take a moment to say to yourself, "hm, I think I might look better in red in this light"?

2. Another example of improbable technology: Combatants can generate guns and swords out of thin air, just by thinking about it -- perhaps an extension of that whole "magically changed my clothes, so why not my arsenal?" technology. Question: If you can instantly generate an automatic weapon in your hands -- as characters repeatedly do in this film -- why do people so often fight with swords? I mean, I know sword fights look cool in a movie, but if people were trying to kill you, and you had the choice between a sword and an automatic weapon, which would you choose pretty much every time?

3. Every shot in this movie looks extremely artificial and two-dimensional. The budget for the movie is clearly a high one, so the special effects team, with today's movie technology, clearly had the option to make everything look realistic. But they chose to make it look like a video game. Now, because the opening credits include a lot of comic book covers (to establish the tone of the movie) one might be tempted to say, "no, dumb-bell, it's supposed to look like a comic book!" Except it doesn't. It looks like a video game. But why?

4. The actors are good. In a movie that depends so little on actor performance, that doesn't mean much, but I guess it's worth something. The under-appreciated but always reliable William Fichtner is likable in a supporting role, and Nick Chinlund is effective as the villainous dictator, "Vice-Cardinal" Daxus. But why is Daxus's title "Vice-Cardinal" when his role has nothing to do with religion? And why does Daxus have to wear those silly nose-plugs? I know, I know, the exposition established that people in the future are terrified of disease. But still. Come on. He looks ridiculous.

5. Why are so many cops and soldiers trained as ninjas? Ninja cops? Why? Because they can magically generate swords? But see point #2.

6. Violet's a vampire. I get that. And in this movie, vampires don't have any of the traditional vampire weaknesses against sunlight, garlic, etc. So Violet's like a female version of Blade. I understand, I really do. But then what's her super-power? Clearly she has one, as she is capable of defeating lots of enemies -- and I do mean lots of enemies -- single-handedly, regardless of whether they're human or vampiric. How good is she at fighting? Example: Daxus gloats that he is protected by 700 soldiers. That's right, seven hundred. Violet defeats them all by fighting with her magically generated guns and swords. They have magically generated guns and swords too. But she wins. Her one against their 700. That's seven hundred. Kinda makes the Bride defeating the Crazy 88 in Kill Bill seem realistic in comparison.

Now, I took a moment to imagine myself as one of the Vice-Cardinal's guards. I'm in a vast army of bodyguards. An army of 700 bodyguards. I have just seen this one woman single-handedly wipe out 650 of my comrades. What in God's name is going to motivate me to rush at her with a sword? Is the 651st guy really thinking, "well, she got lucky with those first 650, but I'll get her for sure!"

I don't care how much Daxus is paying his men, I think after seeing Violet kill the first two or three hundred, the rest might want to suddenly go home sick that day.

7. SPOILER: Of course, after Violet defeats Daxus's army without breaking a sweat, Daxus himself -- an administrator -- turns out to be a better fighter than his army of 700 highly trained soldiers. Because, yeah, if I had a choice between the U.S. Army and a CEO to kill an armed criminal, I'd wanna call the CEO?

8. SPOILER: At least the climactic battle between Daxus and Violet treats us to the delight of seeing them fight in the dark, with flaming swords. Why not flaming swords? I mean, if you're going to have a sword fight in the dark, you need some light, right? Best to somehow light the blades on fire, rather than turn on the light switch.

I am not making this up.