Money down the Drain

Rating: 3/10 (17 September 2006)

Pirates of the Caribbean, The Curse of the Black Pearl - The movie is as aimless as the tittle. Pirates attack a settlement known as Port Royal and capture the town's governor's daughter, Elizabeth Swann (Keira Knightley), as they believe that she is the one who can remove a curse set upon them. They lug her aboard the Black Pearl, their ominous sailing ship. In a prison in a battered garrison in Port Royal, William Turner (Orlando Bloom) makes arrangements to free Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp), A captive, and some-what idiotic pirate, in exchange for his aid to rescue Miss Elizabeth Swann, the woman who William is madly in love with. Along the way, there are many sword fights, but as this movie is a pirate one, viewers will expect a major death. Sadly there are none. Most of the time it miraculously stops or those cursed pirates never die, because they're practically undead. Many of the fights are absolutely retarded and pointless, with no purpose what so ever, except just to allow this movie to be classified under a pirate theme. The director, Gore Verbinski, made a horrific effort to add suspense, and about the only scary thing in the film is a cursed monkey!
The characters, although interesting at first impression, soon get boring and ridiculous! Jack Sparrow has a major speech impediment, always looks like he's drunk 24/7 and seems to have hands that don't look connected to his wrists! His opening scene where viewers first catch a gimps of Jack was quite comical, but his later acts were plain, foolish. It's impossible to believe that such a pirate could even be conceived! The actor Johnny Depp played a magnificent part, but it's Disney's lack in concept to produce a more credible character, which unfortunately destroyed the feel of a real pirate film. The character William Turner was an even bigger let down. His jokes are dry to the bone, at best they my cause a chuckle. His character's desires are typical of what modern movies are about. All of this was made worst with the selection of actor to play the role. Orlando Bloom's parts in the film were particularly weak and lacking in emphasis, as you felt that Jack Sparrow was more important then the less adventurous blacksmith Will.
The few good things about, The Pirates of the Caribbean, The Curse of the Black Pearl are the tunes and the CGI effects. These are the only factors that keep the viewer from going to sleep! The music is on the dot, particularly when you see beautiful long shots of the surroundings. You'll get butterflies in you stomach, similar to the Lord of the Rings trilogy, when you witness the sight of the Computer Generated Images! Since the cursed pirates can only take the undead form in certain conditions, the lighting, and shadow effects make these images top-notch.
This film is better of to just have CGI pirates walking around, raiding random ships, then to have poorly thought of characters, residing in the picture. There is too much that has been added to the film, and the mambo-jumbo comedy, action, thriller, love story, adventure theme is just a missive cliché of genres. The attempt made by Disney to have a classical family movie was a disastrous shamble! Millions of dollars have been wasted, down drain on actors who don't even suit the characters. I strongly recommend no one see this monstrous movie, as viewers would also be throwing away their money down the drain.