After the release of the film's sequel, The Chronicles of Riddick, Pitch Black was released on DVD under the title The Chronicles of Riddick: Pitch Black to match Universal Studio's branding strategy.

This movie is loosely based on Isaac Asimov's short story Nightfall. Initial concept art for the movie in fact, displays its title as Nightfall.

Tagline: Fight Evil With Evil

Cast

Plot

As the movie opens, The Hunter Gratzner, a passenger spacecraft, crash-lands on a strange desert planet. Most of the ship is destroyed; only 12 people survive. Among them are: a dangerous criminal (Riddick, headed for a new prison), his captor Johns, the surviving pilot Fry; an Islamic imam with three young boys (settlers headed for New Mecca), a young stowaway named Jack and some other men and women.

Assessing the situation, they realize that the planet's three hot suns illuminate the surface continuously, creating the desert conditions. The ship's destruction has left them without food or water; only a few personal possessions, including a stash of alcohol. Led by Fry, the survivors gather what little they have and set off in search of water.

The group is disoriented, scared, and barely cohesive. This is no brave band of survivors; there are personality problems and arguments right from the start. Nobody is happy to discover a dangerous criminal among them, either. Riddick has altered eyes which enable him to see in the dark, an adaptation to prison mines where he worked. Because of this light-sensitivity, he needs to wear welding goggles during daylight (especially in the harsh continuous sunlight of this planet).

The survivors find strange boneyards and then lose a person in a bloody struggle near a burrow. Is the escaped Riddick to blame? Fry investigates and discovers flying predatory creatures living underground. Riddick tells the survivors that they now have something other than him to fear.

Near the boneyards, they find an abandoned research base. This provides a water generator and some shelter. Even better, there is hope for escaping the planet, in the form of a small spacecraft (the skiff). Then it is discovered that the three suns will be eclipsed by another planet in the system soon, and not rise again for months.

The skiff needs power cells to restart its electrical systems, for which they must return to the ruins of their ship. But then the suns set. All of them. In the dark, the creatures of the night begin to stalk the survivors. Riddick becomes one of the group's most important assets.

Hiding in their ship with their only sources of light, they make a plan to take the power cells back to the skiff. Riddick, with his superior night vision, leads the remaining survivors through the dark. The group takes all their available light sources with them after learning that light damages the creatures.