“Paris P. Olgilvie. Antiquities dealer, entrepreneur”
“Richard B. Riddick. Escaped convict. Murderer.”
My son and I just got back from the new movie Riddick. This was one of the summer movies we had been waiting to see since both of us are die hard Riddick fans. This is largely because Riddick is the only dude that could possibly give Batman a run for his money. And unlike some people, we loved the previous film, The Chronicles of Riddick. While not as exciting as Pitch Black, the first Riddick movie, Chronicles had a visual appeal that blew away the low-budget indie look of Pitch Black all while reinforcing the notion that the title character was indeed the ultimate badass.
The title of the new film is appropriately named just Riddick. It seems that after some criticism about Chronicles the director combined the best elements of the earlier films in creating Riddick. While the film was not remotely original, it is just different enough to still be good. Riddick was very reminiscent of the first movie, Pitch Black, while setting up a tie-in to resolve the second film while leaving open future opportunities for the franchise to continue. If you are a Riddick fan it was definitely worth seeing.
While I like Riddick as a character, I am also a fairly big Vin Diesel fans as well. As the father of biracial kids I can’t stress enough how important it is for minority children to see positive visual representations of people that look like them in the media. This is going to date me, but I remember the impact that Richard Roundtree and Jim Kelly had on me when I saw them in “Shaft” and “Enter the Dragon” years ago. And despite all of the racial progress that has been made over the years, ever since Wesley Snipes went to jail there aren’t many black, or biracial, action heroes left for us to support. All at that are left are Vin and the Rock. This was one of the reasons that the last two Fast and Furious films are among my recent cinematic summer movie favorites.
Racial solidarity aside, there are other reasons why I am a fan of Vin Diesel. First, Vin rarely makes a bad film. Even his “bad films” like xXx are still pretty entertaining. Second, he never takes himself too seriously. Now some might disagree that this gravelly voiced actor is always too serious, they would be wrong if they took the time to look past the basic fascade of his characters. The characters he portrays always have a vulnerability to them even as they are beating the bad guys into submission. There is always an element of humor in his acting that, while adding levity, doesn’t come off as overly corny. And third, and most importantly, Vin comes off as a true action movie geek in all of his interviews. He truly understands what the fans want to see because he is one of us. This maybe that is why it appears that he is reviving all of his old franchises. Despite the huge pay day he stands to make, the big budget films of late have been extremely disappointing. Man of Steel, Star Trek, Pacific Rim, Iron Man 3 all missed the mark when it comes to finding that sweet spot with the fan base. It is partly why the rumors that Vin is trying to restart the xXx series have been growing. So between Riddick, Fast & Furious, and XXX he is gonna get paid. That doesn’t even take into account that Marvel is looking at him to be in Guardians of the Galaxy and maybe Avengers as Groot and/or Thanos.