Drink Up Me Hearties! Its A Success!

Rating: 10/10 (24 May 2007)

Many people disliked Dead Man's Chest, not me as I personally found it even better than the original, but a lot of people did complain it was overlong, confusing and not interesting. The initially negative reviews of At World's End had however, started to take its toll on me, I began to fear I was letting myself in for a huge letdown. What an absolute relief it is to say that At World's End is not only a great successor to the past two Pirates movie, but also a movie that I might eventually be able to consider the best in the series! Its an action packed, story stuffed, character motivated piece of cinema, it won't win Oscars (well apart from for Effects) but it know that. The biggest misunderstanding people have about the Pirates series is that it is aware its not the most amazing series ever. Its a series designed for pure popcorn entertainment. It doesn't bother being artsy fartsy, it just tells a damn good story with plenty of swash-buckle and comedy as well. Its a mixture of genres that makes this series work, and At World's End manages to masterfully pull it off again. Although I shall confess that the movie is a lot darker than the previous two entries, a fact made noticeably by the surprisingly nasty opening. Anyway At World's End is a truly brilliant movie, and the first great Blockbuster of the Summer so far.
The characters of this movie have really developed now. And the cast itself have become so perfect in the roles. Johnny Depp once again is absolutely brilliant, he is the best pirate there has ever been in a movie. I suppose one moan from Dead Man's Chest is that Sparrow was often used purely for comedic effect. He was still absolutely brilliant, but he became a bit of a clown. Here he is much more as he was in Curse of the Black Pearl. He's clearly a genius, he's still absolutely barking mad, but the man is as clever and witty as ever. In Dead Man's Chest he showed this talent rarely, here he shows it all the time. Some of the best sequences of this movie have to be the ones in Davey Jones Locker, I won't spoil the sequence for anyone but that scene is hilarious and so odd it was amazing. One person who surprised me most in this movie was Keira Knightly, I've always found her passable in these movies, but never amazing. Here she does absolutely brilliant, I suppose its her character who has been on the biggest journey since the original movie. Her character is now fifty times better, her scenes towards the end are very well acted. Orlando Bloom has improved, his character seems wasted at some points in the movie, but towards the end I also realised how well he was actually doing. I was glad to see Geoffrey Rush back as Captain Barbossa, so many people have overlooked him in the original movie. Here he is almost as brilliant as Johnny Depp. Bill Nighy continues to be a menacing villain as Davey Jones, except here he has some genuine character moments that worked well. Oh hell the cast were perfect, no one lets the side down at all. The inclusion of Chow Yun Fat is a brilliant one, but my moan is that Jack Davenport features too little as Norrington. A shame as his character was perfect in Dead Man's Chest.
The action sequences also impress mightily in this movie. The end action sequence will blow you away, its hinted at in the trailer, but you will never understand how amazing it is until you watch it. I won't go on too much about that since its best you see it for yourself. Instead I will talk about the opening sequence, yes it is reminiscent of the Jabba the Hutt sequence from Return of the Jedi, but its well done. For sequence not featuring Jack Sparrow it still stands out as one of the highlights in the movie. Some people might moan there is a lack of action until the finale, but its this lack of action that still manages to impress. The talkey sequences the critics have complained about are never, ever dull. The Davey Jones Locker sequence is priceless, Beckett's mission to exterminate the pirates is engaging, all the back stabbings entertain, and everything just pieces together nicely. Its been well planned out and the movie shows this. The plot concludes perfectly here, there is a little bit after the credits that adds another layer to it, its not necessary to stay and watch it but I would recommend it. So any negatives then? Well one might argue that the movie is a bit long at nearly three hours, others might moan about the dialogue not being the most incredible stuff in the entire world. My response to people who moan about stuff like that is that they would never have liked the movie anyway if they went in looking for flaws like that. This movie has flaws, but the epics scale, the humour and the action overshadow the flaws. This is a perfect ending for an almost perfect series. I'm certain we'll be seeing Pirates of the Caribbean 4 some time in the future, but if they did end it here then they will have gone out with a huge bang rather than a whimper like a lot of other series.