Depp owns this movie

Rating: Null/10 (4 August 2003)

I am a huge Johnnie Depp fan. As far back as _Edward Scissorhands_ and _Crybaby_ he was making risky career choices and carrying them off with his incredible talent. However, although I knew I would be going to see _Pirates of the Caribbean_ the day it opened, I had my doubts. After all, this is a movie based on a ride. Not based on a book, not even based on a true story, based on a theme park ride! And talented though he is, Depp has made some less than wonderful movies (_The Astronaut's Wife_ springs to mind). But I went anyway, because it has Johnnie Depp, not to mention Legolas and the Marquis de Sade. And the movie was wonderful. But it clearly would not have been so without Johnnie Depp. The other actors were fine, particularly Geoffrey Rush and Orlando Bloom. The script was sufficiently quirky that the film probably would have been fairly entertaining despite the overlong and repetitive battle scenes and the overdone jokes between the two sailors (not to mention the overdoner jokes between the two pirates). The special effects were good, the photography beautiful and the music excellent, but it nevertheless doesn't add up to anything more than a pretty good summer flick. Until you add Johnny Depp. His Crazed Queen of the Spanish Main is simply brilliant, and it turns POTC into the best flick of the summer and one of the best of the year. I hear they are already filming a sequel; I have my doubts about that too, having seen XMen 2, Matrix 2, Terminator 3... But then, none of those films had Johnnie Depp.