MOVIE REVIEW

Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl, The  (2003)

Starring: Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom, Geoffrey Rush
Director: Gore Verbinski

Rating: PG-13

Studio: Walt Disney

Release Date: 7.09.03

Review Posted: 7.09.03

Spoilers: Minor

By Sara Michelle Fetters

"Yo-Ho! Pirates a Lively Good Time"

After Disney’s first attempt at turning theme park attractions into feature length motion pictures, the absolutely abysmal The Country Bears, and the catastrophic track record of recent pirate films – Cutthroat Island anyone – the thought of sitting through the almost 2 ½ hour Pirates of the Caribbean: the Curse of the Black Pearl was not exactly high on my to-do list. When Jerry Bruckheimer, who’s most recent “kid friendly” (and I use that term loosely) film is the year’s worst attraction Kangaroo Jack, came aboard as producer my interest level plummeted even more.

Then some interesting things started to happen. First off, Bruckheimer had the audacity to hire Shrek writers Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio – not exactly favorites at the mouse house after their little green ogre took the first Oscar for animated feature away from them – to pen the film’s screenplay. Then he hired Gore Verbinski, finally finding his creative stride with the wonderful horror remake The Ring, to direct. Finally, he managed to persuade actors as diverse as Johnny Depp and Geoffrey Rush to walk the plank for him on the film, two actors not exactly known for having much in the way of affinity for big budget mainstream fare.

The film opens with the discovery of an unconscious young boy floating in the Caribbean Sea being rescued by a British naval vessel. Aboard this ship is the new Governor of Port Royal, Weatherby Swann (Jonathan Pryce, What a Girl Wants, Ronin), and his young daughter Elizabeth who are cruising the pirate-infested waters on their way to his new post. Leading them is young Captain Norrington (Jack Davenport, The Talented Mr. Ripley), a man obsessed with ridding the high seas of the pirate menace. It is young Elizabeth that learns the name of their new passenger, Will Turner, while also discovering an intricate necklace of pirate gold hanging from his neck. Infatuated with the myths and ideology of piracy, she takes the necklace as a souvenir, reconciling this theft to herself under the pretense that its discovery by Norrington might lead to young Will’s execution or imprisonment for piracy.

Ten years later, Weatherby has done a grand job of making Port Royal one of the most renowned townships in the British Empire. Much of the credit for that goes to Norrington who’s undaunting pursuit of the privateer menace in the Caribbean has lead to its near extinction and his own promotion to Admiral. Elizabeth (Keira Knightley, Bend It Like Beckham) has also grown, becoming a self-assured and beautiful young woman. While her father wants her to marry the esteemed Admiral, her heart still finds itself attracted to that roguish life of a sailor, the golden necklace hidden in her nightstand a constant reminder of the exciting life that can be discovered on the open sea.

Will (Orlando Bloom, Legolas in the Lord of the Rings trilogy) has also matured in the last ten years, apprenticing to be a black smith while also becoming fastidiously adept in sword play. He’s also found his attraction to Elizabeth grow day-by-day into something approaching full-fledged love. Yet he knows he can never say anything to her or anyone else about it as her father would never allow his daughter to enter into a marriage with a lowly – no matter how talented he may be – blacksmith.

All of their lives are thrown into disarray when the mysteriously foppish Captain Jack Sparrow (Depp, Chocolat, What’s Eating Gilbert Grape) suddenly arrives in Port Royal. Intent on stealing the H.M.S. Interceptor – the fastest ship in the British fleet – through a strange set of circumstances he instead ends up saving Elizabeth’s life, only to find himself arrested mere moments after doing so for piracy. But his arrival is only the first straw, as the force really breaking the camel’s back is the sudden attack on the township by the renowned pirate ship the Black Pearl.

Led by the nefarious Captain Barbossa (Rush, Frida, Shine), the buccaneers of the Black Pearl have a devilish secret: they’re cursed to live out the rest of eternity as living skeletons. Years a go, they found themselves in possession of a supposedly cursed chest of Aztec gold. Not believing in curses they spent their booty with abandon, wining, dining and whoring all across the Caribbean. Now, a decade later, the full extent of the curse upon them and each piece of gold mournfully calling, they have managed to find all the pieces of the Aztec treasure save one. Once returned to the chest, their curse will cease and they can return to the life of the living and revel in the pleasures of the flesh.

That one piece just so happens to be the very gold medallion hanging from Elizabeth’s neck. As they also need her blood to cancel out the curse, Barbossa and his crew take the young lady hostage. Will is incensed, especially when he discovers that Jack Sparrow knows important information about the Black Pearl that Norrington and Gov. Swann are refusing to hear. Intent on rescuing Elizabeth, he rescues the pirate from prison and helps him steal the Interceptor. But Sparrow has his own reasons for wanting to see Barbossa and his men at the end of a rope. While rescuing the pretty lady would be a nice side attraction, revenge is the one thing that rests at the top of his agenda when it comes to the Black Pearl.

For a movie based on a theme park attraction, Pirates of the Caribbean is remarkably complex – even more so then I’ve stated here – and full of inventive twists and turns. Elliott and Rossio’s script is truly one-of-a-kind, taking the standard mechanics of a pirate epic and breathing fresh life into them. There is a grand, old-fashioned sense of matinee serial wonderment in their writing that is quite invigorating, the movie coming alive time and time again thanks to their rich and hearty dialogue.

Casting Depp as Sparrow, though, was the real coup. A great actor, he completely submerges himself in the irreverently engaging sea dog. Walking through the movie as if he’s always just this side of a drunken stupor, it is what is behind his heavily eyeliner-smudged irises that is most remarkable. The glint of passion and energy, the flash of energy and emotion, all if it is there just under the surface in Depp’s performance. While his body gives out the aura of an idiot savant, behind those eyes lurks the machinations of man who’s seen more than one dark day, yet somehow managed to find his way out of it, probably with a wink and a smile as his only weapons. No matter how bad it gets, there is a bizarre optimism to the pirate captain that is totally engaging making for Sparrow to be – not only the life of the party – but the life of the movie as well.

Bloom is a little less successful as the straightforward Will, but he’s still good enough in the role get by. And, even if he’s a little bit of a wet noodle, the actor is just so darn sexy that it’s hard to be too hard on him. More successful are veteran Rush and semi-newcomer Knightley. Barbossa is the type of role actors like Rush just jump in and devour. Somehow, the Oscar-winning thespian manages to not go over-the-top as the murderous captain, even making the treacherous crook almost worthy of sympathy, Meanwhile, the truly beautiful Knightley seems to be having as much fun in the film as Depp. It helps that Elliott and Rossio have given her many of the best lines and she throws them off with serendipitous abandon. If Bend It Like Beckham put her on the map as an actress to watch, then Pirates of the Caribbean cements those feelings, catapulting the young actress up a rank or two.

Seamlessly, Verbinski manages to weave the movie’s complex special effects and CGI computer elements into the live action with apparent ease. The Black Pearl’s crew of skeletons – revealed only by the touch of moonlight – is breathtaking. At one point, two actors engage in one of the great sword duels put on film (supervised by the great Robert Anderson, who in a 50-year-plus career has been the sword master behind Errol Flynn, Tyrone Power, Gregory Peck, Antonio Banderas and many, many others). Weaving in and out of shafts of moonlight, their bodies piece-by-piece morph into their skeletal counterparts, flesh and bone hanging off willy-nilly for a split second only to be once more replaced by their muscled counterpart. It’s an amazing stunt of visual trickery, and Verbinski and his talented team pull it of brilliantly.

Not all of it works, though. The movie is way overlong dragging more than a time or two before it finally gets revved up for it’s final 30-minute climax. There is also an unnecessary and unexciting coda that really serves no other purpose than to bring two of the leads into a passionate embrace, not adding anything of interest that hasn’t already been suitably said mere moments earlier. Also, Pryce’s Swann is an embarrassingly annoying fop of a character, his constant prancing and mincing about the screen enough to make my want to hurl my diet Coke at someone.

But those are minor foibles. Overall, Pirates of the Caribbean is a grand ride in true, old-fashioned glory. Even without the impressive technical effects and inspired computer enhancement, this is the type of seafaring epic that would have found mass appeal during the day when pirate films like The Crimson Pirate and Captain Blood were well in vogue. If Disney insists in turning their amusement park rides into films, then I just hope they all can turn out half as well as this one. It’s a pirate’s life for me as this really is one fun time at the movies.

Rating: 3 out of 4

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