The question on the tip of my tongue as I walked into the cinema to see the third installment of Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End was undoubtedly, "What happens to Captain Jack?" After his run in with a giant octopus-like creature also known as The Craken by the conclusion of Part II, I was worried that my favorite leading man with dreadlocks, fancy scarfs and kohl eyeliner would be a goner. We find in the third and perhaps final film of the now trilogy that Captain Jack was banished to Davy Jones' Locker, a deserted place full of white sand and stone crabs and too many CGI effects, where Jack's mind has unraveled into a hallucinatory world made of every woman's ultimate fantasy: a dozen or so Captain Jack clones in all their narcissistic glory. Director Gore Verbinski doesn't disappoint by bringing back the devilish buccaneer played by Johnny Depp as the self-obsessed anti-hero, holding the film together as he sashays from battle to bilge, never injured and always preoccupied with the location of the nearest bottle of booze.
Off to the rescue we find the slightly expanded, star-studded cast of motley crew members, including the resurrected Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush), teaming up with dazed and frustrated lovers Will Turner (Orlando Bloom) and Elizabeth Swann (Keira Knightley). Will is still nursing his wounds believing that Elizabeth has fallen for Captain Jack, but she hasn't revealed her guilty secret: that she's to blame for sending Jack to his doom. The well-being of piracy is threatened everywhere by the Crown's East India Trading Company, that has taken control of the Flying Dutchman with tentacle-faced Davy Jones (Bill Nighy) at the helm, yet alas his heart remains in the box held hostage by the real villain Lord Beckett (Tom Hollander). Joining the cast once again is the voodoo priestess played by Naomie Harris, whose character is developed, yet her speech is still difficult to decipher.
The film encorporates an Oriental flavor as Singapore-based pirate Sao Feng, played by Chow Yun Fat, takes a key role in battling the tyranny of the Crown. The lawless pirates attempt some chance for democracy by gathering the Pirate Brethren Court, strangely electing Elizabeth Swann as pirate king, letting us know who wears the trousers in this film. There's a long-awaited, but sadly disappointing, cameo by Keith Richards who proves that he actually has more talent as a musician than an actor. It doesn't ruin Johnny Depp's inspiration for the Jack Sparrow character drawn from the ancient rocker, however, and Rolling Stones guitarist reportedly proclaimed at the film's World Premiere in Los Angeles, "I've been plundering and pillaging for years."
georgie
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I took my sister to see the last one, and we had a blast.
Hey you know AdGuy always gets the last word! ;)