The second film in a saga is like the movies’ equivalent of a middle child. It has to take the series in a new direction, must build on the characters introduced earlier and requires keeping the audiences salivating for number three. Many part-twos fail by appearing like filler until the next one hits the theaters. “Pirates Of The Carribean: Dead Man’s Chest” does not have those problems. Neither a redux of the first film, nor a place holder for the final film, “Pirates” is an exhilarating, hilarious swashbuckler with smart performances, eye-popping photography and award-worthy make-up and special effects.
Lovers Will Turner (Orlando Bloom) and Elizabeth Swann (Keira Knightly) are arrested on their wedding day by an opportunistic Lord (Tom Hollander, “Pride And Prejudice”). A fortune hunter, Lord Beckett extorts Swann and Turner with their lives in order to win an enchanted compass held by Captain Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp) on his ship, The Black Pearl.
Jack has his own problems. Years before, he had sold his soul to the legendary Davy Jones (Bill Nighy, “Shaun of the Dead” and “Love, Actually”) to become a captain and now the half-man, half-squid has returned to claim the spirited rascal and drag him to the ocean floor.
With a beast that does his bidding, Davy Jones rules the waters. His Achilles heal is his heart, that he had removed and buried. The man who possesses Davy Jones’ heart controls the beast and hence the seas. To find the heart, one must seize the compass that Jack holds.
Our three heroes build a crew out of local scoundrels and drunkards to seek Davy Jones’s heart. But danger awaits them.
Director Gore Verbinski (“The Ring”) proves once again to be a master action filmmaker. This saga was a vast undertaking and one that could have easily failed, but Verbinski’s imagination carried the first film to blockbuster status, and now he’s struck underwater gold once again. The battles rival the Indiana Jones flicks, particularly a sword fight on a giant waterwheel. His overhead shots, jump cuts, mixing of colors and lighting against the backdrops of the Caribbean blue seas and confection sugar sands, his juxtaposing of comedy, suspense and action are all stellar. He brings out the best in Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio’s playful script.
This film pays homage to past blockbusters and the famed Disney ride upon which the saga is based. A floating dress in the water harks back to James Cameron’s “Titanic” while powder-keg rigged bait will remind viewers of the seminal summer blockbuster “Jaws.” Besides a returning cameo from the dog from the Disneyland ride that holds the keys to a locked prison cell, the film sets fortune-teller Tia Dalma’s lair in the Blue Bayou, with an identical shack to those on the ride and even fireflies that appear to be just light bulbs swinging on string.
The cast has great fun with the filmic melodramas; particularly Jack Davenport (BBC’s “Coupling”) as Elizabeth’s spurned ex-fiancée from the previous film, returning as a drunken loser. Depp, who won his first Oscar nod as Jack, plays the flamboyant captain a bit further over the top this time, but he never goes so far that the audiences will be bored by him.
The effects team and the make-up crew display true ingenuity, particular with Davy Jones’s crew. Barnacle-ridden faces, shell-encased decapitated heads that transform into sand crabs, crustacean-peppered faces, and hammerhead shark men would delight any marine biologist. Davy Jones himself is a magnificent organic creature with puppeteer-manipulated tentacles that can play the piano, a creepy breathing siphon, and a clammy circulatory system for a neck that contracts and expands.
A true blockbuster “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest” deserves a treasure chest of riches for expanding on its delightful precursor without becoming a clone of it. For added enjoyment, audiences should stay past the end credits for a final joke. I also recommend not checking out the internet movie database (IMDB.com) credits page for “Pirates” until you’ve seen the film. The website reveals a cameo appearance I would have preferred to be a surprise. Grade: A- |
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