Verdict: Hungry aliens, stupid humans: the usual.

Details: Starring Vin Diesel and Radha Mitchell. Rated R for profanity, sci-fi violence and gore. 1 hour, 47 minutes.

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Review: "We're hemorrhaging air," shouts docking pilot Fry (Radha Mitchell) as her hole-riddled spaceship flames through a planet's atmosphere like a hunk of intergalactic Swiss cheese. Air isn't the only problem. "Pitch Black" starts hemorrhaging its brains and any originality soon after the star cruiser crash-lands on an alien desert floor.

At first the nine survivors worry most about Riddick (Vin Diesel), a murderous convict who has snapped his chains and is playing cat-and-mouse games in the dunes. Soon, though, these folks realize that there's something worse out there: sharp-toothed beasties living in caves beneath the sand. The humans are fine so long as it's daylight, and, hey, this planet has three suns. But guess what: Here comes the first eclipse in 22 years, and the humans are about to become monster hash.

"Aliens," anyone? The sense of deja vu isn't helped by Mitchell's Ripley-like role as a flawed heroine known by her last name and hellbent on keeping her passengers alive. Plus, there's the surrogate mother-child bond she develops with a stowaway kid.

Hey, imitation equals flattery, right? The problem is, "Aliens" not only covered this territory already, it did so with enough finesse to make it one of the best popcorn movies of the past 20 years. "Pitch Black" is just the latest rip-off, packed with caricatures. There's a fussy antiques dealer (Lewis Fitz-Gerald), a tough geologist (Claudia Black), the edgy lawman (Cole Hauser) transporting Riddick and a Muslim (Keith David) with three young pilgrims. These four skirt the line of racist buffoonery, praising Allah repeatedly, even when they're on the verge of getting munched.

In the movie's last hour, writer-director David Twohy pretends to explore his stick figures' moral choices, and he forgets to deliver the thrills. During the dull patches, you may puzzle over a few details. For instance, what exactly do these monsters eat during their 22-year hibernation periods? Sand? It's also annoying that the number of creatures menacing the cast varies arbitrarily from scene to scene.

A nuanced actor even in a genre flick like this, Mitchell ("High Art") brings a (perhaps misplaced) emotional conviction to her role. But the movie's real star is the hyper-muscled Diesel. Jammed into a tank top and kept glistening wet, he's shot like the sexiest new sport-utility vehicle to come off the assembly line. By comparison, the computer-generated, winged critters seem puny. They look like the offspring of a lizard and an anvil.

— Steve Murray, Cox News Service