Tampa Film Fan

home sick with the chronicles of riddick

Stayed home sick from work today, so I didn’t feel like watching anything that required concentration or intelligence. Sent The Husband out to rent mindless entertainment, so we ended up watching The Chronicles of Riddick and Exorcist:The Beginning.

I saw Chronicles in the theater, but the director’s cut on DVD adds in a few flashback/vision scenes that help explain Riddick’s background more fully. The theatrical release could have used those extra four or so minutes of explanation. Entertaining flick, but nothing life-altering. Vin Diesel will never have a role more suited to his looks, muscle and tough-guy act.

Exorcist:The Beginning — or, as I like to call it, Exorcist: The Snoozing — is a prequel that tells the story of young Father Merrian’s struggle to regain his faith and exorcise a big, bad, scary demon, blah blah blah. Stellan Skarsgard plays the young priest (played by Max Von Sydow in The Exorcist). According to Entertainment Weekly, there is another version of the prequel (also starring Skarsgard) that was filmed, shelved, completed, and positively received at the Brussels International Festival of Fantastic Film in March.