Pirates of the Caribbean: At world’s end
Release Date: May 25, 2007
Starring: Johnny Depp, Geoffrey Rush, Keira Knightley, Yun-Fat Chow, Orlando Bloom
Rating: 
Since everyone and their mother is doing a review on newest Pirates of the Caribbean movie, I thought I’d hop on board and tilt the ship a bit (har, har).
Before the actual movie had started, the first thing I had noticed was how empty the theater was. I don’t go to the theater much, but when I do its always for movies with a lot of hype and anticipation associated with them—Harry Potter, Borat, Pirates of the Caribbean, Superman, etc.
I think the problem herein (as it is made clear as the movie progresses) was the sequel to the first, Dead man’s chest. The second movie in this series of (so far) three was like the first part of At world’s end—If you didn’t see that movie, you’d be lost in this one. Hell, I saw Pirates 2 and I still got lost in this one.
The second thing that earned this movie 3/5 instead of something higher was the absolutely HORRIBLE sense of “funny”—and I use funny within with quotation marks because it was not funny at all. Out of the many scenes set up to be funny (were they trying to turn this into a comedy?), I only laughed out loud in one.
At that brings me to my next point: The “comedy”. In my mind, Pirates of the Carabbean was never supposed to be a comedy. Obviously, being a Disney movie geered more towards a younger crowd I understand (and even enjoy) the fact that there has to be some sort of comic relief element to balance out the intense battle scenes, but the directors went cringingly overboard on that particular element in Pirates 3. The humor was—for a lack of better words—lame.
I also felt that it lacked the amazing plot twists the first movie had and the only shocking part of the movie was sort of disappointing and a little sad. Also, Jack Sparrow seemed a little out of character (”It’s because he didn’t have any rum!” my brother said) and that kind of disappointed me, seeing how I loved his character in the first two movies.
Aside from the fact that it was a little hard to follow (though that has always been a characteristic of these movies, due large in part to the nature of Captain Jack Sparrow, the highly unpredictable lead character) and the humor was 99% awful, the movie still wasn’t too bad. My ten year old brother was in absolute awe of the battle scenes, particularly the grand one in the end, and while I was mainly indifferent about them I suppose that shows what kind of audience these movies are geered too.
Advice on how this movie could have been better:
#1 - Stop trying to be funny.
It came naturally (or it didn’t come at all) in the first two movies.#2 - The last movie, Dead Man’s Chest, should have had an actual ending instead of an ending that felt like a “to be continued..” For those who didn’t watch the second movie again between the first week it came out and the first week the third installment came out, it was hard to remember what had happened in Pirates 2… LAST YEAR.
The Nigerian scam - in new packaging
In our line of business, we get to meet a lot of people. We sponsor life mastery seminars in both the US and Canada as well as health shows. Among the tons of people we meet at these events, “Ernie” was one of them. His real name is not Ernie Flipflop, but that’s what we’ll call him.
Ernie is neither American or Canadian, nor does he live in Continental America. He called us once at 1AM here (apparently he forgot about the eight hour time difference) and when I woke up to look at the caller ID it showed a long string of numbers and no name. And by ‘long string of numbers’ I really do mean a lot of numbers—like 15. Ernie is currently in Africa, and this is where this story begins.
Several nights ago the phone rang at something like 3 or 4 in the morning. I saw the caller ID and saw the 15 digit long string of numbers and ignored the call. My mother (whom the I presumed to be Ernie would be calling for) was working a night shift that night and therefore was not home.
Two days ago, my mother decided to call the number back. A woman answered, and this is how the conversation went:
Lady: Hello?
Mother: Hi, is Ernie there?
Lady: Who?
Mother: Ernie Flipflop?
Lady: Who?
Mother: Sorry, I think I may have the wrong number..
Lady: Just hold on a second.
{Silence while the lady hands the phone over to the man}
Man: Hello?
Mother: Ernie! It’s Renee from (company name here).
Man: ..Where?
Mother: {city here} at the {seminar name here}
Man: OOOOOOH, Renee!
My mother and this “Ernie” (whom she soon realizes is not the real Ernie, or the at least the Ernie she is looking for) start to talk. Whenever mother asks specific questions, like “how are you enjoying the juice?” he evades the question. She asked several specific questions he never answered, and that’s when she started realizing something very weird was up.
Then, the turning point: “My dear Renee… My late father just died.”
Now, if any of you have ever heard of the Nigerian scam or its spinoffs you will imediately know where this is going. But my dear mother had never heard of any Nigerian scam, nor did she know where this was going. After a couple minutes of conversation, Ernie asked if she would be “online” (meaning in her inbox) - She said yes, they hung up, and she sent him an email as he requested.
The email conversations are included below if you’re looking for a long, terribly written read. But in a nutshell, my mother has two phone numbers (he gave her different one than the one she had called back) of a scammer. She talked to one of them–on the phone!
If you do decide to read the emails below, keep an eye out for the following:
HOW TO SPOT A NIGERIAN SCAMMER, OR ITS SPINOFF:
1. BAD SPELLING AND GRAMMAR.
According to Sillicon.com’s special report on the Nigerian money scam this is a common factor in these scams. You’d think that after swindling the US alone of $100 million they’d learn to write in English properly, or at least try a bit harder. Geesh.2. THE “GOD” CARD, IF YOU USE IT FIRST.
Overused to the point where you want throw up.3. IDENTITY CRISIS.
A lack of consistancy in his various names.4. HOW HE CAN’T EVEN SPELL THE NAME OF THE PERSON HE IS IMPOSTERING RIGHT!
He goes from “Desire Adams” to “Enrie Desire Adams” to finally “Ernie.”
Now, on to the emails..
Ring ring ring, BANANA PHONE!
I am getting awfully sick of tech trends.
As of lately, iPods were the latest measure of how cool you were. The bigger the space, the more gazillions songs it could hold, and the slimmer it was, the cooler you were. They were, if not still are, somewhat of a fashion statement. “Match your iPod with your outfit!” was the subliminal message the cult of Mac was screaming at its devoted followers and prospect converts.
I almost go sucked into it. When I was shopping around for an MP3 player around Christmas time, the lime green iPod Nano was looking rather delicious—Looking being the keyword here. All my friends, many of them already devote members of the Cult of Mac, were gunning for me and my lime green iPod Nano soulmate. But then I started thinking with my brain instead of my eyes.
Has anyone ever bothered comparing the features of an iPod to other competitive MP3 players? Once I started doing my research, I soon discovered that my engagement with the lime green iPod nano was going to have to end. It just didn’t cut it. I found true musical love with the Sansa. For the same price (or cheaper) it had more space and more features than its comparable iPod relative. Why on earth would you buy an iPod Nano when you could own a Sansa e280 and get FM radio (& recording), Music, Movies, Pictures, and Voice recording for almost the same size and a cheaper price? It even has a scroll wheel!
They say that sales is 20% logic and 80% emotion. I read that in a book somewhere. Are we even truly aware of how the sales industry is approaching sales these days? It is interesting to note that the best salespeople are the ones that never seem like they’re selling you somthing, but rather, subliminally manipulate you into selling that product or service to yourself.
And then there is the latest mobile phone craze. What do RAZR, KRZR, SLVR, PEBL, and RIZR all have in common? Well, aside from being a set of arranged characters a couple letters short of actual words, they’re also outrageously expensive phones nobody actually needs but everyone wants.
I was recently at a high school grad showcase (fancy word for grade 12 only talent show) where I happened to witness just a prime example of what I’d consider the mobile phone companies’ prime targets: overtalkative teenagers.
Girl: “Oh my gosh, this is a THREE MEGAPIXEL CAMERA!”
(I dryly remark that my first digital camera wasn’t even that)
Guy: “Forget that, I have a SIX megapixel camera on my phone at home”
(I silently wonder just how many phones he has?)
Girl: Runs thumb over glass screen Wow, this phone is amazing.
Guy: (Looking smug now)
One out of every three or four kids there had their mobile phone out and were looking at it. How did I know this? Simple. The auditorium was poorly lit until they starting pulling out their phones—It was a safe guess judging by the blueish glow the room took on.
I’m not old. I don’t consider myself majorly “out of the loop” when it comes to technology. But somehow, just somehow, I missed the cinching point where mobile phones went from “a cordless phone I can use anywhere” to “a slim, slick, thin, sexy sliver of technology that not only happens to be a phone, but also mp3 player! and a high-quality camera! and a video camera! and a PDA! and everything else you could ever dream of but will probably never use!”
… And by the way, since when did cell phones have six megapixels?
