posted by NotAnyRon on August 14, 2006; screened on July 8, 2006
Gore Verbinski
-
2006
My dad used to talk about the old serials he used to watch as a kid, where the ending was always a cliffhanger. Pirates has the same feel as I imagine those old shorts had, filled with swashbuckling fun and action, not to mention the maddening finale that just sets you up for the next installment. The two big differences are that my dad's flicks were supposed to be throwaway shorts before the main feature (funny how he never talked about the features) and he only had to wait a week to find out how the main character got out of his jam. We've got to wait until next year at least!
Like all Johnny Depp films, he steals the show, but this time it's less than usual, although not because he's less than stellar. Gore Verbinski has assembled nearly the same wonderful cast as the first film (minus the always fun Geoffrey Rush) with one phenomenal addition, Bill Nighy as Davy Jones. Nighy is completely unrecognizable under the flawlessly realized computer generated squid that he has for a face. Nighy and the effects team are the second star of the film. In fact, I'll go so far as to say the film will have my vote for the Visual Effects Oscar in 2007 (if only I were a part of the Academy).
I liked this film enough that it actually surprised me when I went back to read the review of Curse of the Black Pearl and realized that I didn't actually enjoy the first film all that much. I do remember feeling as though the effects were lackluster on the first film. I also didn't seem to have an appreciation for the supporting cast. Orlando Bloom and Keira Knightley definitely pulled their own weight in this installment. I also complained about the lame plot in the first film. I didn't mind the convoluted and ridiculous plot in this film one whit. It's so convoluted, in fact, that the scalawags Pintel (Lee Arenberg) and Ragetti (Mackenzie Crook - aptly named for the part) are used to keep the audience up to date at one point. It turns into a hilarious aside, where even the explanation is so complex that we're just as lost after as we were before.
Maybe it was simply a matter of my mood at the time, but this film fit into the long tradition of wonderfully ludicrous action films for me. I enjoyed all 150 minutes of it and when it was over, I was wishing for more.