07.08.06
Movie: Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest
![[image]](http://verywide.net/blog/wp-content/images/misc_others/pirates2-dmc.jpg "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest")
Action/Adventure; 2006; Rated “PG-13†for intense sequences of adventure violence, including frightening images; 2h 30m. Recommended.
The line for Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest was long for the Midnight showing, the theaters it was showing in were packed by a diverse (though mostly young) crowd, many decked out in some form of pirate attire, and no wonder — we are talking about the return of the cheeky and inimitable Captain Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp), along with that much tried couple, Will Turner (Orlando Bloom) and Elizabeth Swann (Keira Knightley). It looked to be a hit in the making, and in my opinion it deserves to be, other reviews be damned to the briny depths after a long keelhauling, yarrr.
Look, I’m not about to tell you that PotC: DMC, Pirates 2 for short, is brilliant or better than the first in the series. Nor am I going to say that it’s perfect, if we are speaking in terms of hardcore movie criticism. But that’s just it: Pirates 2, like its predecessor, is not intended to be a hardcore movie-lover’s movie. Depp, Bloom and Knightley do not fail to satisfy us even though they are not given much development, because the movie is a romp, a ride, a reason to whoop and have fun on a summer day. There’s no reason for an in-depth critique. Just watch some of your favorite actors do their thing in the fantasy world of pirates and relax! The plot is straightforward enough (not “unfocused”, as some have accused it of being), the action is fairly non-stop and its sequences are well-choreographed, and the eye-candy, as many have noted, is as abundant as pieces of candy corn on Halloween.
Pirates 2 introduces a lot of in-jokes and references to the Disney ride. References and in-jokes as they are, people unfamilar with the ride will not “get” them. But, then again, viewers don’t really need to; the references and in-jokes are not essential to “understanding” the movie, whatever that could mean. Like the ride, the movie rolls along through its scenes with the precision one finds in a good ride. It is, to an extent, formulaic that way. But so are a lot of better-known dances, and folks usually don’t complain that the steps are, in themselves, lacking. Folks complain when the dancers are lacking talent or panache or straightforward skill. So, let this be said. The actors in Pirates 2 do not improvise or introduce anything new to the formula of the movie, but they are good at their roles and deliver the steps without stumbles or faux pas. Their goal is to entertain, and that they do. After laughing and cheering throughout, the audience we sat in applauded at the end of the movie (which is, I daresay, quite a cliffhanger). We applauded as well, and left the theater feeling like we’d been adequately entertained. We’d had fun.
