Arrrrr Mateys!

[tvordlj]

I can’t believe I went to a movie based on a Disney theme park ride!!! But I was looking for the most escapism bang for my buck and didn’t fancy something violent like T3 or something insipidly romantic. Pirates of the Caribbean has the ever changeable Johnny Depp, the superb Geoffrey Rush and the exquisitely beautiful Orlando Bloom. Seemed like a good one to try. Two and a half hours later and my buckle is truly swashed and me timbers shivered. The movie was good fun, pure escapism but didn’t take itself too seriously either. The three named men were so good that the supporting characters really did pale in comparison, even “the girl” though she was predictably feisty, brave, and strong.

The movie pretty much went through every cliché known to the high seas, from rope swinging to Davy Jones’ Locker but much of it was very firmly tongue in cheek so you didn’t mind the occasional “Avast” when the rest of the cast turned to look with contempt and disbelief at the utterer.

Now the story; The Black Pearl, to my surprise, wasn’t a precious gem to be recovered but a pirate ship. Captain Jack Sparrow lost the Pearl to a mutinous first mate, Barbossa and he wants it back badly. The crew of the Pearl are now cursed because of an Aztec treasure they stole. They are the undead now, unkillable, and they turn into skeletons when the moonlight hits them. This affords the predictable computer graphics effects when they or a part of them is touched by the light of the moon, always full in the movie. *sigh* guess there’s just no getting away from it is there. I guess all that fighting them off was just self preservation because… Duh, you can’t kill them! The last Aztec medallion is in the possession of the beautiful Elizabeth Swann, the daughter of the governor of Port Royal. She got it off a shipwrecked boy, Will Turner who is now a blacksmith in the fort. He loves Elizabeth. She probably loves him but her father wants her to marry the Naval Commodore.

Captain Jack spies the medallion but by the time he confiscates one of the Navy’s new ships, she is captured by Barbossa who wants the medallion as the last piece of the treasure so that the curse can be broken. The swashbuckling and adventure ensues on the high seas and is really quite fun. The reason it’s quite fun is Johnny Depp.

Johnny Depp never ever plays the same kind of character twice and usually avoids big Hollywood blockbusters like this. He’s really great in it however, playing it up, roguish, camp as a row of tents, swaggering and fey. This is a pirate that isn’t filled with darkness, not over flowing with testosterone and he doesn’t growl and bully the crew. Instead, he comes across as a down on his luck, selfish and not-a-very-good pirate but in reality is smart like a fox after his ship and revenge on Barbossa. He wobbles and staggers through the movie as if he’s always a bit drunk but that seems to serve mainly to put people off guard. He’s charming and soft spoken but can be very shrewd and manipulative for his own means as well. Geoffrey Rush’s Barbossa is mean, tough, a serious pirate. He’s threatening and scary yet a little haunted as well. He plays Sparrow’s nemesis with just the right amount of a combination of pomposity and dangerous force. It looked like he had good fun playing the role.

Orlando Bloom is the mild mannered earnest young blacksmith but he’s an expert swordsman and has a past that he’s going to find difficult to accept. His heart is filled with Elizabeth, who he knows is far above his station so he loves her from afar. But when she is captured he springs into action and becomes the hero and a believable one. Of course this is the same man who plays the stalwart Elf in Lord of the Rings so we know he’s got a brave heart and lots of courage ;) Keira Knightly plays Elizabeth. Plucky, brave, willing to save both Will and herself when the male ego and “silly” Pirate Code gets in the way. She’s a relative newcomer to movies, having made a handful of British productions before now.

The movie was in part filmed in the Caribbean, around the Grenadines and St. Vincent. One of the ships is an actually Tall Ship and the others were partially constructed on floating barges. The only thing I thought odd, and this is just me I’m sure, is when the fully clothed pirates turn into skeletons, their clothes turn into torn bits of cloth hanging off them and when they’re back to “human” again, *poof* the clothes are untorn and normal, if a bit raggedy and dirty. *shrug*

Overall though, very good movie if that’s what you’re looking for, adventure and escapist fun.