good, but not A+++ gee wow great methinks

Rating: 7/10 (19 August 2003)

That this made the IMDB Top250 i think says more about the other films this summer than this one... i expect it will drop out after a while; people are so relieved to see something worth their 5 pounds/bucks/whatever they go a little nuts over this one ;)
very minor spoilers ahead
Johny Depp *is* great and the reason i went, sadly Bloom appears to be not a great actor (but maybe it's the script not giving him much else to do) and nor is Knightley (her big line, about corsets, fell flat where i was). There's lots to like though, some quirky dialogue, sometimes much funnier than expected (only when delivered by Depp though, reading the quotes on IMDB well... i guess Depp deserves even more credit for this film).
Summary: long film felt an hour, so can't be bad. Would have loved some more marooned-island-drink and less moonlight-skeleton-fight, and a more memorable ending... it wasn't very memorable generally really, all i can think of now (same day) is two turtles strapped together. But it felt good and made me + nippers laugh, so 7 or 8 out of 10. (I wonder how good this *could* have been with a better *story*! It's not very original to ask for more plot and less special effects, sorry).