Good CGI effects, that's it

Rating: 4/10 (12 October 2016)

This is everything I hate about Hollywood blockbusters: pretentious, overly staged, clichéd, predictable, full of lame humour and, the worst sin of all, entirely overlong. Truly, this film doesn't know when to quit, and at two and a half hours the joke quickly wears thin. When you're making a lightweight action flick, the last thing you want to do is be repetitive: the lean pacing of a film like RAMBO showed how to do it just right. This almost plot less amalgamation of natives, pirates, ships, swordplay, sea monsters, and zombie pirates is wearying beyond belief, a self-indulgent show piece conceived entirely as a money spinner and nothing else.
Everyone raves over Johnny Depp in these films, but I'm afraid to say I can't stand the sight of Captain Jack. I suppose I'm the only one who thinks this drugged up, spaced out loser is entirely inappropriate in a kid's film – a Disney film to boot. The rest of the cast fare no better, with Orlando Bloom a charisma-free zone and Keira Knightley entirely bland. The huge supporting cast are entirely wasted, with nothing roles for the returning Jack Davenport, Tom Hollander, Mackenzie Crook, and Jonathan Pryce. Stellan Skarsgard pops up as a barnacle-encrusted pirate but he doesn't make much of an impression, either.
So why on earth did I watch this? For one reason alone: the special effects. I'd heard that the CGI in this really was special, so I was eager to see what multi-millions of dollars in computer effects could achieve. I wasn't disappointed. The entire movie is chock full of effects work, but they're most notable when it comes to the monsters. A giant kraken looks the part and is a definitely highlight, and the mud-men-zombies are also highly effective. Best of all, though, is Bill Nighy's character of Davy Jones, a guy who looks like a human Cthulhu. The squid effects used to animate Nighy are exceptional and among the best I've seen on film. Okay, so the script is daft, the spectacle excessive, repetitive and frequently against the laws of physics, but in terms of sheer CGI genius, this will take some beating.