Pitch Black
Rating: R
Director: David Twohy
Starring: Vin Diesel, Radha Mitchell, Cole Hauser

There's a reason so many movies rip off the "Alien" series. When you do it right, you make a great movie. The problem is, nobody seems to bother doing it right anymore. Which is why "Pitch Black," despite being the second "Alien" rip-off this year alone, is such a rarity. It was exciting. It was scary. It was a butt-load of fun.

Things get off to a flying start when a spaceship crashes into a seemingly deserted planet. This is the first good sign -- very little tedious background stuff and a spectacular crash right from the get-go. The pilot is snuffed, leaving Carolyn Fry (Mitchell) as an unwilling leader and the story's de facto Ripley character. When the dust settles (and there certainly is a lot of dust on this barren desert planet), the quirky survivor roster is introduced. Possible victims include: an annoying antiques dealer (bad comic relief), a stow-away kid, some religious pilgrims (Islamic? vaguely), a few Australians, a mysterious cop (Hauser), and last but not least a psychopathic serial killer with eyes that see in the dark (Diesel).

It doesn't take long for our group to figure out why this planet is bone dry -- it has three suns, creating a perpetual daytime. The quest quickly turns to a search for water (with the shipwrecked crew quaffing hard alcohol in the meantime), which, in turn, leads them to an abandoned mining site. The psychopathic killer, of course, escapes by dislocating his shoulders and popping them back into place with a grunt. He chases and menaces the crew light-heartedly as they slowly piece together the clues that....

...something on this planet has killed every living organism. It first appears by snatching one of the Australians underground and dining on him, pirhana style. This leads our increasingly worried heros to deduce that the creatures are allergic to light (on a planet with three suns?). They shrug the underground demons off and set about repairing an escape ship left conveniently at the mining camp. Then comes the eclipse.

On a basic plot level, the movie satisfies because it truly sets up several situations where the audience groans, "Oh man, they are so screwed." The nocturnal, bat-like aliens are quick, evil, and vicious, and they don't spend too much time pussy-footing. When they charge a character to eat it, they usually succeed. At the same time, the characters figure out ways to get out of trouble that don't depend entirely on plot conveniences...well, okay, there are at least three little instances of deus ex machina, but it's a sci-fi movie, plot holes are practically a requirement.

While the sloppy science might bother the more anal lab coats out there, it's obvious that a lot of thought went into the other aspects of the movie. Director David Twohy and his cinematography team (the same team responsible for "Mad Max") do a marvelous job of portraying the shadow-less atmosphere of a thrice sunny planet, and then the dark purple undertones of lightless terror. It's a palpable relief when, towards the end, an interior with regular lighting is shot, and our good friends the shadows make a reappearance. Also, the visualization of the monsters' sonar ‘sight' is nothing short of groundbreaking. The visual feel of this movie has as much impact as "The Matrix" with a third of the budget.

Kudos also to the actors, who take an above-average script and give it some oomph. Vin Diesel is the stand-out, giving his serial killer the perfect balance of bad-ass, funny and troubled to make this unlikely character come to life. There are dozens of lines that had the potential to sound fake, and Diesel overcomes all but a few of them.

I admire this movie so much that I'm going to go out of my way to provide it with a canned quote for its newspaper advertisements. "A thrilling joy ride from start to finish...‘Pitch Black' makes me miss my old nightlight." B+

Boiler Room
Rating: R
Director: Ben Younger
Starring: Giovanni Ribisi, Vin Diesel, Nia Long, Ben Affleck

Let's not spend any time talking about this movie's similarities and differences with "Wall Street" and "Glengarry Glen Ross." Countless other reviews have dwelled on it. Let's just say that for writer/director Ben Younger, it's unfortunate that this whole dark side of the stock broker thing has been done before, and done very well, and leave it at that.

What we have here, underneath the near-cliche (but fun as hell to watch) hyperactive stock brokers who cuss and scream and make self-important speeches about money that end in powerful periods...under all that, what we have is one great story. Just one, nestled in among three subplots, but one strong enough to make this movie worth seeing.

Seth Davis (Ribisi) has dropped out of college to run an illegal casino out of his New York apartment, which would be bad enough, but is made worse by the fact that his dad (Ron Rifkin) is a judge. After a family blowout, Davis decides that there are two things in life that are important to him: becoming a millionaire and earning his father's respect. One night both goals are offered to him on a silver platter when a broker (Nicky Katt) from a firm called J.T. Marlin recruits him.

Impressed by the money and the unabashed greed of the firm, Davis joins enthusiastically after a pep talk by Ben Affleck (who otherwise isn't much of a factor in this movie). It turns out that he's good at this cold-call selling, and becomes the firm's star recruit. The money and the promises build up, but so does the evidence that J.T. Marlin isn't completely on the up-and-up.

It isn't long before Jiminy Cricket crawls up Seth's ass and starts using his colon as a bullhorn. Ribisi plays this out extrememly well, showing in vivid vein-popping detail how painful it can be to have a conscience. There are a few genuine people at the firm -- the secretary who's Seth's love interest (Long), and a senior broker who lives with his mom and is so good at what he does that he uses the phone like a boxing ring microphone (Diesel, who's outstanding again) -- but for the most part Davis isn't ready to join the fun and casually ruin peoples' lives as he swindles them out of their money.

Now about that one story. The stock broker stuff, the romance stuff, the FBI stuff, that's all old hat. Been there. Done that. What's unique about this movie is its father/son subplot, which has also been done before, but rarely on this gut level. Judge Davis is not a touchy-feely man. At one point he interrupts his son, who's trying to talk about their relationship, and says, "Relationship? What are we, dating?" Ouch, dad.

This is tough love at its best, most realistic level. "Boiler Room" is mostly about a dad who has high expectations and a son who thinks the only way to fulfill them is by side-stepping the law. It's about a dad who, when he found his young son lying on the street with a broken leg after a bike wreck, slapped him in the face. And never knew what to do with him after that.

Everyone in this movie is selling something, constantly. The underlying moral of the movie is that if you're not selling, you're buying, and if you're buying, you're losing. Always Be Closing. Greed is Good. Sell. Sell. Sell.

But there's one moment near the end when father and son discover something that's not for sale, the only no-sale call in life, and it's that calm oasis around which the rest of the movie turns.

Like I said, it's just too bad the rest of the plot has all been done before. B-