Pirates of the Caribbean 3: At World's End
Second movie in a month and another premier, too.
More spoilers than in the Spiderman III review. I'm going through the whole movie here.
Don't expect much coherence since I'm still in a mad fangirl glee. *grin*
Overall I think this is better than the Dead Man's Chest but not as good as The Curse of the Black Pearl. I'm tempted to say it's because of Barbossa who pretty much stole any scene he was in. Even the ones with Jack because while Jack's antics are amusing to say the least, they were made all the more funnier when they were accompanied by Barbossa's "good gods, could he be any more insane" face.
Like, for example, there was the whole thing with telescopes. At one point Barbossa whips out a telescope and Jack, not wanting to be any less of a captain, does the same. Only Jack's telescope is a lot shorter than Barbossa's, and that apparently gives Jack a complex. The next time they need telescopes, Jack has made one ridiculously long out of many smaller ones. Barbossa's face is just... *cracks up*
Ok, that being said let's start from the beginning or at least thereabouts.
I usually hate spontaneous singing scenes but, on the other hand, I have a thing for dramatic music. The movie begins with a series of executions, and a little boy (who's also going to be hanged) starts to sing. Suddenly all the other prisoners sing too, and it should be ridiculously cheesy but damned it sounds nice. The soundtrack migh have been even better than in the previous movies.
Then we're in Singapore where Barbossa and Elizabeth are going to meet Sao Feng in his private spa. I suppose they (script writer(s)) tried to make Elizabeth amusing by loading him with weapons but again, it's Barbossa who's funnier.
It turns out that Will is a lousy thief but quite attaractive when wet.
After explosions, sword fighting, a tiny man with a big gun, sneaky Tia Dalma, a borrowed ship and crew etc., we set out to save Jack from Davy Jones' clutches. There's an absolutely beautiful scene where the stars reflect on water so that it looks the ship is sailing in a night sky. I loved that.
We get tons of clues of what's going to happen and even find out why Jones looks like an octopus. Calypso, a goddess of sea who's currently trapped in a human body (bets on who she is!), gave Jones the Flying Dutchman and a job to guide the people who die at the sea to the afterlife. Since Jones refused to do that, he and his crew got the tentacles and assorted fins. And as it happens, Calypso is also the woman who Jones' loved and who betrayed him.
Anyway, while the brave heroes fly off the edge of the world, Jack's going insane. His afterlife is sort of a hell, an eternal empty desert, and his only company are his multiple personalities (multiple Johnny Depps, yay!), the Black Pearl and crabs that look like pebbles. Useful crabs, because eventually they haul Jack and the Pearl to the shore where the others are waiting.
After Jack figures out what the maps mean (and damn was that a hilarious scene or what) they all end up back in the living world on the Pearl. Jack would rather run away with the Pearl but Barbossa and the others are having none of that. The great pirate council is gathering and since Jack's one of them, he's damn well better be there. The council needs to decide what to do with Beckett and his pesky East India Trading Company who are going after pirates. And they're finally succeeding because Beckett has Davy Jones' heart and thus power to order him around.
Sao Feng betrays them all to the Company but helps them with one condition: he gets Elizabeth. He does, and it's revealed that he wants her because he thinks she's Calypso. Just before his death Sao Feng makes Elizabeth the captain of his ship. Enter the Company and Norrington.
If you ask me, there was way too much backstabbing here. It was funny the first one or two times but then it just got old. Though I admit that Will having tea with Beckett was a thing of great beauty.
Back to Elizabeth. Norrington captures her with the rest of her new crew and takes them all to the Flying Dutchman. There Elizabeth meets Bill Turner who's going insane even more than Jack. Eventually, of course, Norrinton sets them free and is killed in the process.
Whyyyyyyyyyy? They made just a good job on him in the second movie and now we barely see him, and then he's killed as fast as... someone would snap her fingers (I can't snap my fingers [/confession]).
The pirate council includes nine captains, not surprisingly Jack and Barbossa, too. Elizabeth is also there, taking Sao Feng's place. As a mark of their status each of them has a coin. Well, they should have coins but as Gibbs says, they all used to be incredibly poor. Instead of coins they have all sorts of useless little things. Jack's is one of the trinkets woven into his hair and Barbossa's is, and this was one of the best things in the movie, Ragetti's wooden eye. Ragetti wears an eyepatch for the rest of the movie and looks much better.
Barbossa wants the council to free Calypso who is, in fact, Tia Dalma, currently captured in the Black Pearl. The other captains think he's gone batshit crazy because Calypso is no gentle flower but a furious force of nature. As Jack points out, there's no hell like a woman scorned and since Calypso was captured by the first pirate council, do they really think she'll be nice to them. No, and so the captains argue and Jack wants them to name the king of pirates, the only pirate who can unite them and declare a war against the East India Trading Company. Keith Richards makes a cameo as a pirate who holds the pirates' rule book and, as is revealed a bit later, is Jack's father. Because pirates only vote for themselves, the chances of naming the king look slim. Until Jack votes for Elizabeth who, with two votes, becomes the new pirate king.
She declares a war while Barbossa sneakily collects all the coins. The pirate fleet prepares to face the Company, and in the final meeting of the two sides, Elizabeth trades Jack to Will (while Jones' stands in a bucket. No, really, that was hilarious).
Before the battle begins Barbossa frees Calypso: he needed only to burn the coins and say the right words. The little bump in the road is that the words should be said like to a lover. Barbossa doesn't do it, so it's up to Ragetti to whisper to Tia Dalma's ear. And then she becomes a gigantic woman before changing into a bunch of crabs that jump into the sea. The worst scene of the movie while it could've been made of win and awesome.
When the goddess of sea is free, the weather changes quickly to worse. The Pearl goes against the Flying Dutchman in a whirlpool. Jack manages to escape from Jones' jail and goes after his heart. The heart is still in the box and only by stabbing it can the captain of the Dutchman be killed. But getting rid of Jones isn't Jack's goal: he wants to become the next immortal captain of the Dutchman himself. That can be done if Jones is killed and Jack gives his own heart in return. A cheap price for eternity, he thinks.
Jack and Jones fight above the deck and finally Jack gets the heart. Meanwhile, Barbossa has married Will and Elizabeth in the midst of the battle. *laughs* Sounds happy, doesn't it?
Only Jones' kills Will a bit after that.
Really kills.
Kills to death when Jack threatens Jones' heart.
But not permanently because Jack, who deep inside isn't a complete bastard, and Elizabeth use Will's dead hand to stab Jones' heart. The tentacle captain sinks into the sea.
Jack and Elizabeth escape from the Dutchman just before it, too, sinks and the last we see of dead Will, his father prepares to carve his heart out. Because the Flying Dutchman must always have a captain.
Things aren't looking too good for the pirates until the Dutchman emerges again from the waves, steered by a technically dead Will who has a scar on his chest to prove what happened. The Dutchman and the Pearl destroy Beckett's ship and everything sounds happy again. Right?
Well, no. The captain of the Dutchman gets only one day on a dry land every ten years. The rest of the time his duty is to help the souls to the afterlife. But as Will says to his father (who doesn't look like a fish anymore and decides to stay wth Will), everything depends on how he spends that one day. Like, for example, shagging his new bride. The last (almost) we see of Elizabeth she stands alone on a beach and watches how the Dutchman disappears.
The last we see of Jack, he's planning to go after the fountain of youth. Barbossa wants to do the same thing. The little problem is that while Barbossa stole Jack's ship, Jack stole the map that shows the way to the fountain.
You really should stay after the end credit because there's a short scene that kind of wraps the Will/Elizabeth stuff together. Some ten years later Elizabeth (who hasn't aged a day, stupid Disney) and her son are standing on a hill. Below them is a sea and from there appears the Ducthman with Will (who actually should look just as young as he does since he doesn't get any older after his death).
...ok, that was the whole movie in a nutshell. The only bit I didn't talk about much was the Davy Jones and Calypso's subplot. Jones' accepted the soul guide deal only because he wanted to have an eternal life with Calypso. Who, true to her unpredictable nature, didn't show up after Jones' first ten years as a captain. Jones became a bitter, bitter man and told the first pirate council how to capture the goddess. Calypso didn't know that until Barbossa told her just before freeing her, and I suspect that Jones' own afterlife isn't too happy. Never anger the goddess of the sea!
I'm not sure what I think of the possibility of a sequel. Apparently there's been some talk of spin-off movies and while I think they'll stretch the idea too much, it couls also be good. Or at least fun if they'll go with the Jack, Barbossa and the fountain of youth plot.
More spoilers than in the Spiderman III review. I'm going through the whole movie here.
Don't expect much coherence since I'm still in a mad fangirl glee. *grin*
Overall I think this is better than the Dead Man's Chest but not as good as The Curse of the Black Pearl. I'm tempted to say it's because of Barbossa who pretty much stole any scene he was in. Even the ones with Jack because while Jack's antics are amusing to say the least, they were made all the more funnier when they were accompanied by Barbossa's "good gods, could he be any more insane" face.
Like, for example, there was the whole thing with telescopes. At one point Barbossa whips out a telescope and Jack, not wanting to be any less of a captain, does the same. Only Jack's telescope is a lot shorter than Barbossa's, and that apparently gives Jack a complex. The next time they need telescopes, Jack has made one ridiculously long out of many smaller ones. Barbossa's face is just... *cracks up*
Ok, that being said let's start from the beginning or at least thereabouts.
I usually hate spontaneous singing scenes but, on the other hand, I have a thing for dramatic music. The movie begins with a series of executions, and a little boy (who's also going to be hanged) starts to sing. Suddenly all the other prisoners sing too, and it should be ridiculously cheesy but damned it sounds nice. The soundtrack migh have been even better than in the previous movies.
Then we're in Singapore where Barbossa and Elizabeth are going to meet Sao Feng in his private spa. I suppose they (script writer(s)) tried to make Elizabeth amusing by loading him with weapons but again, it's Barbossa who's funnier.
It turns out that Will is a lousy thief but quite attaractive when wet.
After explosions, sword fighting, a tiny man with a big gun, sneaky Tia Dalma, a borrowed ship and crew etc., we set out to save Jack from Davy Jones' clutches. There's an absolutely beautiful scene where the stars reflect on water so that it looks the ship is sailing in a night sky. I loved that.
We get tons of clues of what's going to happen and even find out why Jones looks like an octopus. Calypso, a goddess of sea who's currently trapped in a human body (bets on who she is!), gave Jones the Flying Dutchman and a job to guide the people who die at the sea to the afterlife. Since Jones refused to do that, he and his crew got the tentacles and assorted fins. And as it happens, Calypso is also the woman who Jones' loved and who betrayed him.
Anyway, while the brave heroes fly off the edge of the world, Jack's going insane. His afterlife is sort of a hell, an eternal empty desert, and his only company are his multiple personalities (multiple Johnny Depps, yay!), the Black Pearl and crabs that look like pebbles. Useful crabs, because eventually they haul Jack and the Pearl to the shore where the others are waiting.
After Jack figures out what the maps mean (and damn was that a hilarious scene or what) they all end up back in the living world on the Pearl. Jack would rather run away with the Pearl but Barbossa and the others are having none of that. The great pirate council is gathering and since Jack's one of them, he's damn well better be there. The council needs to decide what to do with Beckett and his pesky East India Trading Company who are going after pirates. And they're finally succeeding because Beckett has Davy Jones' heart and thus power to order him around.
Sao Feng betrays them all to the Company but helps them with one condition: he gets Elizabeth. He does, and it's revealed that he wants her because he thinks she's Calypso. Just before his death Sao Feng makes Elizabeth the captain of his ship. Enter the Company and Norrington.
If you ask me, there was way too much backstabbing here. It was funny the first one or two times but then it just got old. Though I admit that Will having tea with Beckett was a thing of great beauty.
Back to Elizabeth. Norrington captures her with the rest of her new crew and takes them all to the Flying Dutchman. There Elizabeth meets Bill Turner who's going insane even more than Jack. Eventually, of course, Norrinton sets them free and is killed in the process.
Whyyyyyyyyyy? They made just a good job on him in the second movie and now we barely see him, and then he's killed as fast as... someone would snap her fingers (I can't snap my fingers [/confession]).
The pirate council includes nine captains, not surprisingly Jack and Barbossa, too. Elizabeth is also there, taking Sao Feng's place. As a mark of their status each of them has a coin. Well, they should have coins but as Gibbs says, they all used to be incredibly poor. Instead of coins they have all sorts of useless little things. Jack's is one of the trinkets woven into his hair and Barbossa's is, and this was one of the best things in the movie, Ragetti's wooden eye. Ragetti wears an eyepatch for the rest of the movie and looks much better.
Barbossa wants the council to free Calypso who is, in fact, Tia Dalma, currently captured in the Black Pearl. The other captains think he's gone batshit crazy because Calypso is no gentle flower but a furious force of nature. As Jack points out, there's no hell like a woman scorned and since Calypso was captured by the first pirate council, do they really think she'll be nice to them. No, and so the captains argue and Jack wants them to name the king of pirates, the only pirate who can unite them and declare a war against the East India Trading Company. Keith Richards makes a cameo as a pirate who holds the pirates' rule book and, as is revealed a bit later, is Jack's father. Because pirates only vote for themselves, the chances of naming the king look slim. Until Jack votes for Elizabeth who, with two votes, becomes the new pirate king.
She declares a war while Barbossa sneakily collects all the coins. The pirate fleet prepares to face the Company, and in the final meeting of the two sides, Elizabeth trades Jack to Will (while Jones' stands in a bucket. No, really, that was hilarious).
Before the battle begins Barbossa frees Calypso: he needed only to burn the coins and say the right words. The little bump in the road is that the words should be said like to a lover. Barbossa doesn't do it, so it's up to Ragetti to whisper to Tia Dalma's ear. And then she becomes a gigantic woman before changing into a bunch of crabs that jump into the sea. The worst scene of the movie while it could've been made of win and awesome.
When the goddess of sea is free, the weather changes quickly to worse. The Pearl goes against the Flying Dutchman in a whirlpool. Jack manages to escape from Jones' jail and goes after his heart. The heart is still in the box and only by stabbing it can the captain of the Dutchman be killed. But getting rid of Jones isn't Jack's goal: he wants to become the next immortal captain of the Dutchman himself. That can be done if Jones is killed and Jack gives his own heart in return. A cheap price for eternity, he thinks.
Jack and Jones fight above the deck and finally Jack gets the heart. Meanwhile, Barbossa has married Will and Elizabeth in the midst of the battle. *laughs* Sounds happy, doesn't it?
Only Jones' kills Will a bit after that.
Really kills.
Kills to death when Jack threatens Jones' heart.
But not permanently because Jack, who deep inside isn't a complete bastard, and Elizabeth use Will's dead hand to stab Jones' heart. The tentacle captain sinks into the sea.
Jack and Elizabeth escape from the Dutchman just before it, too, sinks and the last we see of dead Will, his father prepares to carve his heart out. Because the Flying Dutchman must always have a captain.
Things aren't looking too good for the pirates until the Dutchman emerges again from the waves, steered by a technically dead Will who has a scar on his chest to prove what happened. The Dutchman and the Pearl destroy Beckett's ship and everything sounds happy again. Right?
Well, no. The captain of the Dutchman gets only one day on a dry land every ten years. The rest of the time his duty is to help the souls to the afterlife. But as Will says to his father (who doesn't look like a fish anymore and decides to stay wth Will), everything depends on how he spends that one day. Like, for example, shagging his new bride. The last (almost) we see of Elizabeth she stands alone on a beach and watches how the Dutchman disappears.
The last we see of Jack, he's planning to go after the fountain of youth. Barbossa wants to do the same thing. The little problem is that while Barbossa stole Jack's ship, Jack stole the map that shows the way to the fountain.
You really should stay after the end credit because there's a short scene that kind of wraps the Will/Elizabeth stuff together. Some ten years later Elizabeth (who hasn't aged a day, stupid Disney) and her son are standing on a hill. Below them is a sea and from there appears the Ducthman with Will (who actually should look just as young as he does since he doesn't get any older after his death).
...ok, that was the whole movie in a nutshell. The only bit I didn't talk about much was the Davy Jones and Calypso's subplot. Jones' accepted the soul guide deal only because he wanted to have an eternal life with Calypso. Who, true to her unpredictable nature, didn't show up after Jones' first ten years as a captain. Jones became a bitter, bitter man and told the first pirate council how to capture the goddess. Calypso didn't know that until Barbossa told her just before freeing her, and I suspect that Jones' own afterlife isn't too happy. Never anger the goddess of the sea!
I'm not sure what I think of the possibility of a sequel. Apparently there's been some talk of spin-off movies and while I think they'll stretch the idea too much, it couls also be good. Or at least fun if they'll go with the Jack, Barbossa and the fountain of youth plot.