Pirates of the Caribbean!!

So late last Thursday night I jumped into the car and headed to the movie theater, my blood pumping with excitement as I headed out to the midnight sneak preview of the movie I’ve been waiting for all year long – Pirate’s of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest. As I mentioned in my previous blog entry, I love going to sneak previews because of the great crowd that you get and the excitement and fun that makes it not just a night at the movies, but truly a memorable event. And Thursday night’s show did not disappoint.

The movie started at 12:01 AM, so I figured I’d get there about a 11:00 or so, so that I’d have plenty of time to get in line for a good seat. Well, obviously an hour early wasn’t quite good enough, because the theater was already packed when I got there. It was a great crowd, though. There were all kinds of people dressed up in pirate costumes, and one group singing “What Would You Do With A Drunken Sailor” out in front of the theater. They even had a girl with a fiddle accompanying them. And shortly before the movie started they came into the theater and sang for several choruses, getting the crowd clapping and singing along with them (I’m guessing they were actually seated in the other screen showing the movie, as they left after several minutes and I did not see them return). Somebody even had a car parked out front with a mast with small black sails on it attached to the roof, with a poster for the movie filling the rear window. It was just incredibly fun and exciting and everyone was cheering and clapping. If you’re ever able to attend a midnight showing like that, I say by all means do it. It is so worth it (especially when you have a boss who’s nice enough to let you come into work a couple hours late the next morning). :-)

As far as the movie itself goes, I absolutely loved it!! It was easily as good as the original, if not better – regardless of what all those naysayers might have to say to the contrary. And sadly I’m not just talking about the critics this time. They were actually fairly evenly split between loving the movie and finding it somewhat disappointing. No, I’m talking about your average moviegoers. I went online and read a fair number of comments from people on a couple of movie sites, and it was a little shocking how many negative comments were being made about the movie. This kind of upset me at first, but the more I thought about it, the more I could see why that was the case (and it has nothing to do with the movie deserving those comments, because it certainly did not). Part of the issue, I think, is that people who are unhappy with something are a lot more likely to be very vocal in their bitching about it than people who are happy with it. So it stands to reason (by my way of thinking, anyways) that the people who didn’t like the movie or were disappointed with the movie are going to rush online to make certain the entire world knows how horribly upset they are with it, whereas people who really liked the movie will probably tell all their friends how great it was, and leave it at that.

And of course, the sad truth of the matter is, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest is a movie that was pretty much guaranteed to get a fair amount of negative feedback regardless, for a couple of reasons. Firstly, it’s not only a sequel, but a sequel to a very popular and successful, much loved movie. And while so many people make a point of saying that the sequel is never as good as the original, so many of them seem to go to the theater expecting it to be better than the original, and then are upset if it isn’t. So there was a lot of pressure on the filmmakers to top the original with the sequel (and a lot of the complaints about the sequel go to the idea that the filmmakers tried TOO hard to make sure it was bigger and bolder and funnier and more exciting than the original, and that in trying too hard, they actually made it less of a film. I don’t know that I agree with that, but you'll have to make that call when you see the film). The other problem that this movie has is that it isn’t just a sequel, it’s the center film of a trilogy. And there’s very much a difference between a movie that happens to spawn two sequels, and a planned movie trilogy. For examples of this, you can look at Empire Strikes Back, The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, or The Matrix Reloaded (which, like Dead Man’s Chest, was a case where the second and third movies were filmed simultaneously). You can really see how the story structure and tone of these movies differs from movies like Spider-Man 2 or X2: X-Men United, which are simply sequels that managed to be successful enough to generate third movies in their series.

The problem you run into with movies of this type, and the reason that many people consider them each to be the weakest of the three films in their respective trilogies, is that the middle film (much like the 2nd act of a 3-act play) is all about transition. The first movie sets the stage, introducing the characters and the world they inhabit. This movie draws you into the world, developing the characters and letting you get to know them, getting you excited to learn more about them and discover what happens to them next. And of course the third film is your grand finale. It’s where the events of the previous two films reach their dramatic conclusion. The second film, then, is primarily there to take you from the first movie to the finale, and so you often don’t get a satisfying climax to that film (instead you get left desperately waiting for the final film to come out so you can see how it all ends – both The Two Towers and Dead Man’s Chest did this). And so it’s a lot harder to enjoy the movie just for itself.

Another issue with Dead Man’s Chest is that like Empire Strikes Back, a lot of people complained that it’s a much darker, more somber story than the original film (and it is – it remains to be seen if this darker style carries over into the third film, or if it returns to the more light-hearted nature of Curse of the Black Pearl). Now that’s not to say that it’s a grim, depressing movie. On the contrary, I’d say that there’s actually more humor in this one than in the previous (it’s funny as hell!). But the overall story is a darker, more serious one than we saw in the first movie. But unlike a lot of people, I didn’t find this to be a bad thing at all. I thought it made the movie that much more interesting (but I’m probably biased, as I tend to be much more drawn to darker films; it’s just my nature).

And while I’m on a tangent, I’d like to talk about movie critics, and people who seem to be overly-critical of movies (who I think spend too much time reading movie critics). The problem I see with a number of the comments I’ve read, and several of the more negative reviews I read clips of on imdb is that these people seem to be so focused on trying to find things wrong with the movie, and to find things to be critical of (which, at least in the case of the movie critics they can more or less justify as them doing their job), is that they don’t let themselves just relax and enjoy the movie. If you let yourself get drawn into the movie and absorbed with what’s going on, you’ll either not notice a lot of the nitpicky stuff that people complained about, or you’ll make a brief note of it and not give it much more thought because you’re too busy enjoying the movie! And let’s face it, if you’re determined to find something to be critical about, it’s pretty certain that you will. For example, numerous people complained that the movie was too long, and that the plot was too convoluted and it took too long to get to the main story (and I will admit, it does take a while for the main plotline to really start moving forward). But I’d bet money that if the main characters all met up in the first 10 minutes of the movie and were headed off together on their next adventure right from the word go, these same idiots would be bitching that the story was contrived and that bringing the characters all back together like that wasn’t believable, etc., etc., etc. There’s just no pleasing some people. However you do it, someone's not going to be happy about it.

I have to agree with one reviewer I read, who noted that while it did take a while to get to the main plot of the movie, having the various main characters each on their own little adventures all tied loosely into the titular dead man’s chest, and then finally bringing them all together later in the movie actually was nice because it DID keep the movie away from your standard Hollywood sequel idea of bringing all the characters back together to share in another adventure as they all quest together for a shared goal. To those people who found the story hard to follow or keep up with, or thought it was too convoluted and complex, all I can say is that you have my deepest sympathies, because you’re obviously a dumbass. I loved the story; I loved that it was complex and involved, and took a while to bring all the characters back together. I love that they brought back the two bumbling comic-relief pirates from the first movie instead of simply creating new characters to be the comic relief. I do have to admit that bringing back Commodore Norrington was probably unnecessary and a bit excessive as far as bringing old characters back goes, but at the same time I like his role in the movie (especially how it plays out at the end).

So now that we’re back on track discussing the movie, let’s jump into it and really go into what I loved about the movie (and what I didn’t love so much – while I’ll give the movie 10 out of 10 without hesitation, there were indeed a few minor complaints that I can agree can be made about the movie). For starters, the movie is funny as hell. Johnny Depp is once again brilliant as Captain Jack Sparrow, and is funnier than ever in this movie (some people complained he was trying to hard to be funny and it didn’t work as well as it did in the first movie – I say lighten up). He is once again the rogue and knave who’s pretty much out for himself and would sell out his own mother if it would get him out of a jam (and despite this, you can’t help but just love the guy). The mute pirate’s parrot is back once again to provide a few good laughs, and our hapless duo of Pintel and Ragetti (the goofball pirates) are as hapless as ever (although I do have to say they’re not quite as funny as they were in the first film; I was still really happy to see them return, though). Also back from the first movie is Barbossa’s undead monkey for a few humorous little scenes (for those of you who missed it, if you watch Curse of the Black Pearl all the way through to the very end of the credits, there’s an additional scene where the monkey goes back to the cursed chest of Aztec gold and takes one of the gold pieces, causing him to return to being undead).

The performances are all wonderful. Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom, and Keira Knightley all do a wonderful job. Naomie Harris is very fun to watch as the voodoo priestess/fortune-teller, and I was really impressed with Stellan Skarsgard as Will Turner’s father Bootstrap Bill (but he’s just a wonderful actor in general, so that wasn’t much of a surprise). And then there’s Davy Jones, played to perfection by Bill Nighy (who played the villainous Viktor in Underworld/Underworld: Evolution, and who was splendid as Slartibartfast in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy). He is a very different villain from Captain Barbossa from the first movie, who was a very fun, charismatic sort of swashbuckling pirate villain. Davy Jones is much more the sinister, more darker villain. While not as fun a villain to watch as Barbossa, he still made a great villain, who really fit the darker nature of the story in the second film, and I think Bill Nighy did a great job with him. Also fantastic was the CGI to bring his character to life, with his crab claw and octopus tentacles around his head, he just looked incredibly cool!

This, sadly, brings us to the point where I have to discuss the big thing that disappointed me about the movie, and that was the CGI. For starters, the Kraken, while very well animated, was for some reason a little disappointing. I can’t even put my finger on exactly what about it I didn’t like, but whatever it was, when the movie was over I was just a little disappointed in how it came across (and I will admit they could have cut out a few of the tentacle-filled scenes – but I completely disagree with the people I read online who compared it to the overly long CGI battle scenes in King Kong, because I don’t think it was anywhere close to being as bad).

The biggest disappointment in the CGI department, though, would have to be with the crew of the Flying Dutchmen. In the trailers you see them rising out of the water, with the hammerhead shark character big and bold at the front of the screen, and so you’re expecting all these really cool aquatic animal/humanoid characters – and the shark head guy does indeed look really cool. But other than him and Davy Jones, most of the rest of the crew are just this hodgepodge of barnacles and corals and such, all kind of wedged together into a person. There’s almost no personality to them, and very few of them really stand out (although the scene where the one pirate’s head turns into a hermit crab is pretty damned cool). Which was a shame, because I think there was a lot of potential there for some visually impressive, memorable characters. Instead, most of them very much just blend into the background.

But that would have to be my only major complaint (and hardly a major one at that). The fight scenes are fantastic and just fun to watch (you just have to love swashbuckling movies for great sword fights). There’s wonderful comedy throughout, and many great performances. The story, while yes, being convoluted and drawn out and darker than the first film, was still very engaging and completely drew me into the movie so that the 150 minute runtime didn’t bother me at all. And there’s a fantastic jaw-dropping ending (which, of course, some people managed not to like – go figure) that had me, at least, desperately eager to see the third movie. I give this movie an unquestionable five out of five stars, and I know for a fact I will be seeing it at the theater at least once (if not two or three times) more. I absolutely loved it, I cannot recommend it highly enough!! And if you see it and disagree with me, feel free to post a comment and I’ll be happy to tell you that you’re wrong. ;-P

Oh, one final word for anyone who hasn’t see the movie yet or saw it and liked it enough to go see it again – just like in the first movie, there’s a brief little scene at the very end of the end credits that’s pretty cute and worth hanging around to see.