Review

Review Date: 27-May-07
Spoiler Rating: Low
Juju Judgment: Junk

Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End (2007)

As somebody says in "Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End," it's all about perspective. How right he is. I walked into the first "Pirates" sequel feeling warm and eager towards the budding franchise and walked out appalled and insulted at how bad it was. I approached the second sequel feeling hostile and dissociated towards the (supposedly) finished franchise and found it much more bearable. "At World's End" is just as incoherent, drawn-out, and pointless as the last one, but it won't offend if one doesn't expect anything from it. With the proper lack of caring, one might even enjoy one or two of its 168 minutes.

Take the opening scene, which almost did me the disservice of raising my hopes. A grim but defiant tone is set at a gallows where droves of people, including children, are being hanged by the East India Company for having any connection with pirates. Those poor beleaguered rapscallions! Their day is almost done. And so we're set up to cheer for the doughty lads who ply the high seas and never waste time on bathing. I couldn't remember what all the characters were doing when last we met, but no matter. Suffice to say that former innocents Will Turner (Orlando Bloom) and Elizabeth Swann (Keira Knightley) are still woefully estranged and teamed with formerly dead brigand Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush) to rescue the recently dead Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp) from Davy Jones' locker. This goes down in a droll scene involving crabs and Jack's egocentric hallucinations, after which the plot meanders here and there with everyone striking deals and all prows heading towards a smackdown.

The movie tries to maintain some focus by developing the East India Company's admiral (Tom Hollander) as a nasty villain, but other aspects of the show are more worthy of consideration. Like the question of whether Bloom could look any hotter. (Doubt it.) Or why Disney bothered to recruit fine actors such as Stellan Skarsgård and Chow Yun-Fat if it didn't mean to use them. (Artistic integrity??) Or an appreciation of Knightley's wardrobe, which trades corsets for androgynous Chinese ensembles. (Highly fetching.) Or relief that Jack is not as much of a buffoon as last time. For its excessive length, the movie features few big special effects, notwithstanding the part when the sorceress played by Naomie Harris enlarges until she's fit to star in the Jolly Green Giant's wet dreams. (It is just as lame as it sounds.)

Several people in this flick remove vital organs from their bodies, and like the perspective comment, this could be taken as self-referential insight. If you check your brain at the box office, these pirates might not put you completely at wit's end.

Copyright © 2007 The Jujube (M. I. Kim). All rights reserved.