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CinemaSins Movie Reviews
“Hey, the first PotC movie made tons o’ money, let’s make another one!”
Sigh. Yes, Johnny Depp plays Captain Jack Sparrow, and rather brilliantly. There are lots of good supporting actors, like Naomie Harris and Bill Nighy (but what a waste to put him in so much makeup, as cool as it was), and Stellan Skarsgard, and a whole bunch of others. Including someone I can’t mention without it being a major spoiler. The special effects were incredible.
But.
Does this sound familiar?
The characters have to go here and talk to this person. Then they have to find that thing, and the other thing that makes it work. Beautiful special effects. Whoops, there’s a fight. Then they go somewhere else and talk to someone else and get more information. Some witty repartee. People show up in the right place at the right time with either no explanation or one that doesn’t make a lot of sense…but look at the beautiful special effects! And another fight…and solve another problem to find out where you need to go and get there…and talk to some more people…and…I think you get the picture.
It was just like a frickin’ computer game.
Except it was way less satisfying than a computer game, because the audience didn’t even have the pleasure of solving the puzzles themselves…it was like watching SOMEONE ELSE play a computer game.
There was little or no character development, it was seriously plot-driven, there were no amusing interludes or discussions or digressions. Oh, but there were a lot of fights, that’s better than characterization, right? This was just sad.
Yup, the special effects were really cool…but as the Otter has said before, with that big a budget they could have paid for better writing.
Like they had in (you knew I was going to say this, didn’t you?) THE FIRST PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN MOVIE, which was phenomenal and wonderful and ever so much better than this one.
Yes, I’ll plonk down my ten bucks when the final movie comes out…but that’s it, and I sure won’t be buying either of the sequels on DVD. Just in case you were wondering.***
Go see this for Serious Honey Johnny Depp and for the f/x…and then forget it, it’s not at all worth remembering. ****
Oh, duh, I just saw the pun in the title. Still not worth the 10 bucks.
***And although I rarely amend reviews after the fact, this time I am compelled to: the third Pirates of the Caribbean movie is ABSOLUTELY WONDERFUL. Watch this dog, and then go on to the third, and enjoy it. It’s worth it.
**** And I finally rewatched this (as I remembered) awful movie…and it wasn’t quite as bad as I remembered it. In light of the third, there’s some good plot advancement, and some stuff you just GOTTA know. But there’s probably an hour or so of filler, people chasing each other around, that just doesn’t have to be there…and the cliffhanger at the end is MIGHTY annoying. So yes, see this but only if you have time to go IMMEDIATELY to the third, like I did last night when Maid-of-Awesome, The Boyfriend, Mr. Otter and I stayed up (well, some of us anyway) til 1 am having a two-movie pirate-fest with #2 and #3. Mighty satisfying, I must say…especially the third.
theotterlimits 