Release Date: May 25, 2007
Starring: Johnny Depp, Geoffrey Rush, Keira Knightley, Yun-Fat Chow, Orlando Bloom
[rating:3/5]
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.
What do you mean presequel? Curse of the Black Pearl was #1, Dead Man’s Chest was #2 and At World’s End was #3. At Worlds End was part 3 of the trilogy not part 2. Not sure what you’re talking about.
Reply: I know that.. Perhaps the way I said it was a little confusing? In any case, I think I reworded it better to make more sense.
[...] I was secretly hoping this movie would be as awful as Pirates 3 so I could later write a scathing review on it. (Bitching is in!) However, what I saw in the movie [...]