Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (2006)

Originally Written

Saturday, December 9, 2006

Dead Man's Chest is the highly anticipated follow-up to the box office success of Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl. While Dead Man's Chest broke barriers and set itself apart as one of the most successful films in history, it still left much to be desired and in terms of quality of story, unable to compete with the original. This time around I have a new impression about the film, things that I really didn't notice before became blatantly clear. If you're able to turn off your brain and enjoy a little silliness Dead Man's Chest is a fun film to watch, but it's a boat that's beginning to draw in water and if certain holes aren't patched, look out for a quickly sinking series.

Dead Man's Chest picks up shortly after the original film. Elizabeth Swan and William Turner are about to be married but are interrupted by their arrest for the crimes of assisting in the escape of a pirate, more specifically Jack Sparrow. Will strikes up a deal with Lord Cutler Beckett for the release of himself and Elizabeth on the terms that he procures a certain item from Sparrow and returns with it...a compass. Will sets out to find Sparrow, and meanwhile Elizabeth is planning an escape of her own, she obtains the necessary papers from Beckett, with some persuasion of course, and sets out to find Will.

Meanwhile Sparrow is dealing with his own demons when the ghost of Bootstrap Bill Turner comes to Jack one night and informs him that Davy Jones plans to collect on their agreement, which entailed Jack becoming Captain of the Black Pearl for ten years in exchange for his soul at the end of that time. This sends Jack into an unusual panic as time begins to run out for him. Now the only chance he has to escape his fate is to discover the chest of Davy Jones which contains his beating heart, only then will Jack have something to bargain with.

My first time around with this film I noted my major disappointment with the storyline of the film, which still stands. The chemistry between the three main characters is horrible compared to the first film and that is mainly due to the fact that through most of this adventure they're all on there own. I also took issue with the villain, Davy Jones. This time around I actually rather enjoyed the character and his henchmen, they were all incredibly lifelike and very entertaining. More than anything they really helped to accomplish in bringing a little grit and darkness to the film which most of the time was too campy, where The Curse of the Black Pearl was dark, exciting, and well-written. Dead Man's Chest tries to be too humorous too much of the time, turning a once action/adventure series into a comedy slapstick.

Something that really bothered me the second time around was the Krackin, who was the enormous squid-like creature sent out by Davy Jones to destroy ships. The CGI on this creature was horrendous, there were a few scenes where the creature looked somewhat real and believable, but for the most part it was clear as day the difference between this creatures' CGI and the rest of the film, at times it's so bad it's laughable. If you’re going to spend so much time an effort on something that becomes a critical piece in the film do it right! Davy Jones and his crew looked great; I don't know what happened here.

In then end, Dead Man's Chest is an entertaining film, but if you expect the caliber of the previous outing then you'll be disappointed. They seemed to have spent more time on unbelievable and overblown action scenes, CGI villains, and making the film more of a comedy than focusing on a story that matched the quality of The Curse of the Black Pearl. They also end the film on a cliffhanger which I found entirely annoying, I don't like to wait a year or longer to find out how the second half of an already two and a half hour long story is going to end! While ultimately die hard fans will love it, a lot of people won't like it at all, and I understand both. The truth is the first is much better, and I now understand why the lovely Keira Knightley isn't interested in hanging around for a possible 4th. Overall, I still had fun with it and taken by itself it's a fun film, but the fact that it has to live up to the unbelievable standards of the original will seriously hurt it in the minds of most viewers.

8/10