Hey folks, Harry here... Before I get into introducing Beaks' piece on PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN (not Carribean as Beaks would lead you to believe), I wanted to alert you local film geeks in the Austin and surrounding area with kids to a screening I'm doing this Saturday at Alamo Drafthouse. It's free if you bring kids. I'm talking about my Noon screening of CAPTAIN BLOOD starring Errol Flynn. Generally considered the greatest Pirate film of all time, though I dearly love SEA HAWK and THE BLACK SWAN, it will be presented in a gorgeous 35mm print. I scheduled it, because I specifically wanted to show kids a REAL pirate movie before Disney got their rodent teeth sunk in. So wrangle the kids and meet me down there, I'll provide an introduction to the genre, do door prizes and you'll get a cool film!
Ok, onto Mr Beaks now, let's see what my verbose thesaurus reading buddy has to say about Bruckheimer's swashbuckler...
PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: THE CURSE OF THE BLACK PEARL (d. Gore Verbinski, w. Ted Elliott & Terry Rossio and Jay Wolpert)
THE ISLAND. THE PIRATE MOVIE. THE PIRATES OF PENZANCE (1983, featuring Linda Ronstadt!) PIRATES. CUTTHROAT ISLAND. The last few decades have been downright Bobby Brown rough to the pirate film, and that’s without discussing the sorry misfires in which these peg-legged bastards play a significant role (e.g. HOOK and SIX DAYS, SEVEN NIGHTS). As of late, running the skull-and-bones up on a major studio production has been to strike terror in the hearts of filmgoers the world over, most of whom have probably never partaken of the genre’s best from back when it was really cooking (make mine Curtiz’s CAPTAIN BLOOD). But as we near the twentieth anniversary of cinema’s last great swashbuckling adventure – THE ICE PIRATES, of course – that scurvied cur Jerry Bruckheimer has seen fit to test his sea legs with a $100 million-plus production based on the most sure-fire source material at his disposal: an amusement park ride.
This should be a highly dubious proposition, but ever since THE GARBAGE PAIL KIDS MOVIE (“Out of the garbage pail and into your heart!”), moviegoers have been on notice that any media property or product is fair game for the filming. And since Disney is hurting for commercially viable live-action fodder, playing on the nostalgia for an attraction that’s been entertaining families for over thirty years is a smart move all around. But while there’s little surprise that this picture came to pass, what about its entertainment value? Given the studio’s suspect track record of cannibalizing their most lucrative and well-known properties (101 DALMATIONS, FLUBBER and THAT DARN CAT), is there any reason to expect that something so crassly commercial in its conception should be any good?
Working from a passable script from the wholly average team of Elliott & Rossio, director Gore Verbinski has certainly done his part, imbuing PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN with a suitably epic sweep enhanced by a touch of the quiet menace he brought to THE RING. From the outset, via an eerie, fog-drenched opening in which a British Naval vessel discovers a young boy adrift on wreckage from a ship of mysterious origin, Verbinski puts the audience on notice that he’s not simply hacking about revitalizing one of Disney’s prized properties. He’s making a real movie here, and it’s been designed and shot to the briny, sea-faring nines. The rather convoluted story concerns the legend of the Black Pearl, a phantom pirate ship comprised literally of a skeleton crew damned for all eternity for having made off with a cursed treasure of gold medallions intended as a gift for the Spanish Conquistador, Cortez. To undo this curse, they need to find the one missing medallion, which was given to the child of “Bootstrap” Turner – an honorable pirate who opposed the spending of the loot – and spill his heir’s blood. That medallion, however, has inadvertently passed into the possession of Elizabeth Swann (your “Sexiest Tomboy Beanpole”, Ms. Keira Knightley), the recalcitrant daughter of Governor Swann (Jonathan Pryce), who oversees a small British colony in the Carribean. It was taken by Elizabeth many years ago to protect its rightful owner, Will Turner (Orlando Bloom), the boy from the prologue, from being discovered as the descendant of pirates. When Elizabeth clumsily reintroduces the medallion to the ocean’s depths, the Black Pearl is signaled, and the undead pirates return to claim the totem of their salvation, which involves kidnapping the bonny lass when she claims to be the true descendant of “Bootstrap” Turner.
Nursing a longstanding crush on the lovely Elizabeth, Will is determined to chase down the Black Pearl and rescue her. But standing in his way is the colony’s newly-appointed Commodore Norrington (Jack “Tom is Crushing Me” Davenport), to whom Elizabeth has been promised by her father. Thus, Will is forced into taking more drastic measures decidedly pirate-esque in nature. To this end, he’ll require the assistance of an actual pirate to pull it all off (at this stage, Will is not aware of his true origin). Unlucky for him, he’s stuck with Captain Jack Sparrow, whose reputation as the most incompetent pirate terrorizing the seven seas alights with him from a sinking dinghy as he arrives in the colony with the stated intention of stealing the fastest ship in the harbor. Perpetually drunk, and seemingly forever of the verge of collapse, Sparrow, it turns out, was the Captain of the Black Pearl until his men mutinied under the leadership of his nemesis Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush). Realizing they need each other to achieve their disparate ends, Will and Sparrow commandeer a ship, and take to the high seas to rescue Elizabeth.
Though Orlando Bloom is unquestionably one of the hottest male sex symbols going (I saw NED KELLY earlier this year, and was amused when Heath Ledger’s name was greeted with silence, while Orlando’s credit sent the women audibly atwitter), and a joy as Legolas, he’s a bit of a cipher in PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN. Then again, he’s been saddled with the Luke Skywalker role. Depp, on the other hand, gets to play the scoundrel, and he responds with a shambling charisma that makes Sparrow the most dashing buccaneer the screen has seen in ages (then again, running back over that aforementioned list, that’s not necessarily the high praise that was intended). Sure, Rush is a hoot as the villainous Barbossa, and Knightley proves a spry damsel in distress, but they’re mere foils for Depp. He *is* the movie, managing to melt hearts even as he sports heavy black eyeliner and a smattering of rotten and gold teeth. In a way, his seductive turn as a gypsy in the otherwise dismal CHOCOLAT was a warm-up for Sparrow, and it’s a joy to watch such an engaging actor cast off the dour shackles of cheerless fare like FROM HELL to remind audiences why they fell for him in the first place.
Because, for all of the fun homage to the familiar scenes from the ride (and they’ve worked in a good deal of them), the seamless f/x (dig the way those pirates turn to skeletons in the moonlight), and the enjoyment of Verbinski’s excitingly-staged battle sequences, this would be just another random summer blockbuster without Depp. Though ostensibly an epic adventure buoyed by a romance between an unlikely pirate and his fair maiden, PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN unexpectedly works best as something else entirely. It’s a love story between a man and his boat. That this ends up being so oddly resonant is a testament to Depp’s brilliant work. Somewhere, in an alternate Hollywood that doesn’t venerate playing drunks and retards as the pinnacle of thespian achievement, they’d give Oscar nominations for a performance like this.
Faithfully submitted,
Mr. Beaks
Alrighty then, I'm all excited to see this one! I've been a fan of Depp's since his Elm Street days. I love his work as a whole, and anyone whose inspiration was Lon Chaney Sr, is good people in my book! I wonder if there is any Pew or Merry in Depp's Sparrow? Hmmmm...
