Since the world did not end as scheduled, it's back to the theatre to me, following the inexorable summons of nature, much the same way that the noble salmon swims upstream through various and sundry obstacles as part of the eventual culmination of its lifespan.
So to review: I am a salmon. Or something like that.
This week brings yet another "Pirates of the Caribbean" movie. Wow. I can understand how someone might want to make this movie, the same way that you might want to tell your sister's husband that you think he's a complete asshole and that his buzzcut makes him look like a date rapist, but in both of those cases I would assume that everyone has a kind of mental filter that stops them from actually going through with such tempting but ill-conceived ideas.
Live and learn.
Pirates of the Caribbean: A Meaningless Subtitle.
Directed by: Not Gore Verbinski.
Starring: Not Orlando Bloom, Not Keira Knightley, Not Jonathon Pryce, Not Jack Davenport, Not Bill Nighy, Not Tom Hollander, Not Lee Arenberg, Not Mackenzie Crook, Not Naomi Harris, Not Stellan Skarsgard. But still Damian O’Hare, of all people. Oh, and the mascara guy, of course.
Basics:
Do you really need me to tell you what this movie is about? What are these movies always about? It’s always everyone chasing a magic something or other.
In the first movie, everyone wanted a ship, or an amulet, or whatever was in Keira Knightley’s corset. In the second movie everyone wanted “the chest”, which, amazingly, was not another reference to Keira Knightley’s goods. And the third movie was about...what, a heart, I think? I didn't pay enough attention.
This time it’s the Fountain of Youth. Although why Johnny Depp would be keen on that when he hasn't visibly aged in at least fifteen years is anyone's guess.
The Good:
Clearly these movies have a certain je ne sais quoi about them, as evidenced by the fact that no one has yet tried to knock them off. You would have thought that with the success of the original film in 2003 that some two dollar an hour hack would have pushed a similar but inferior swashbuckling action comedy onto a producer with a room temperature IQ, but that doesn't seem to have happened.
So instead it's here; big stunts, big performances, whacky humor, and that incredibly catchy Hans Zimmer score, and yes, in fairness, there is still a bit of new car smell to the whole thing, on account of the surprising dearth of imitators.
Since only a handful of the original cast members return, newly conscripted actors and characters must fill out the cast, giving us Ian McShane, who looks an awful lot like a Halloween mask of himself, and Penelope Cruz, who uses the word "chalices" a lot, invariably causing you to think about her rack (and she says it at least twice more than is explicitly necessary). Though technically antagonists, they’re our best written characters, and their ambiguous relationship is surprisingly complex.
And then there are the mermaids. Yes, mermaids. Let me ask you, you remember those other Disney mermaid movies? Well, this is NOT like that! No more night swimming for me, ever. What's that, beautiful half-French half-Spanish mermaid girl played by an actress named Astrid? You want me to come swim with you? Well, last week I would have kicked a nun down some stairs for an offer like that, but now I say fuck you devil woman, you swim one foot closer to me and I will club your scaly ass with an oar!
See, one of the things that made that original 2003 flick great was that it was a PG-rated Disney movie that still adopted certain horror movie sensibilities, and did so very effectively. Only now, in the third bleeding sequel, has anyone managed to reproduce that effect with this mermaid scene, which is beautifully shot, is accompanied by a rich Hans Zimmer-score, and is scary enough to probably make me piss my pants next time I watch "Splash", not that that's likely to happen anytime soon.
The Bad:
Sigh.
Look, if you're one of those people who really, really likes these movies, then you'll like this. It's not really a good movie, but it's good enough that most people won't care.
What am I going to say that will dissuade you? And for that matter, why would I want to dissuade you? Go, run, prance and frolic in the fields, know a greater joy than an embittered curmudgeon like me can possibly know! Go!
Alright, now that they're gone, the rest of us can talk turkey; this movie's got fucking problems. This movie is like that friend you have who's really nice and well-intentioned but can't hold down a job or stay in an apartment and keeps going back to that guy who doesn't treat her right and let me tell you girl the good Lord know I stuck by you through thick and thin but you gotta wise up now and get on the right path because the day be comin' when...we're getting off topic.
This whole franchise is built around Johnny Depp, but his character really, really, really cannot carry a movie on his own, much less four movies. Captain Jack wasn't the main character of the original "Pirates", he was the whacky sidekick. Making him into the main character is like filling a swimming pool with cement; you can't really ever succeed, because even if you do it, a swimming pool full of cement is not a swimming pool full of cement, it's a sidewalk.
No one in "Pirates 4" can ever just do anything, they've gotta talk about it first, and then they've gotta drop some exposition, and then they have to make some sort of clandestine agreement, and then they have to do three or four other things, and then they have to switch sides at least once, and then they have to pretty much discard the reason they wanted to do the first thing but still go ahead and do it anyway.
Imagine if I was out of milk, so first I went to a friend of mine and we talked for a bit about the nature of milk and how it comes from cows and how the best cows in the world come from Wisconsin, and then I need to go chat up someone else so that I can get the shoes I need to go to the store to buy the milk, but first I have to do something for her so that she'll give me the shoes and then even after I have the shoes she's following me because she wants milk too and now I need to get my keys but first I have to have a chase scene across the clothelines and fences of my neighbor's back yard and then I drop the keys into the bed of a truck and then we have to chase the truck in a taxi and then we get the keys but we don't need them anymore because the taxi already took us to the store but then the store is being robbed and WILL SOMEONE JUST GET ME SOME MILK ALREADY?
Which might not be so bad if this weren't the fourth time in eight years that that or something very much like it had happened.
The Ugly:
For a franchise about pirates, there's surprisingly little piracy in these movies. Does Johnny Depp ever actually rob ships? I've pirated more shit with this computer in the last hour than his character has in four movies. I don't know why but this really bothers me.
Being a pirate in this movie seems to consist mostly of chasing Indiana Jones-style treasure while intermittently acting like an asshole in an amusing way. I guess "Assholes of the Caribbean" is a less marketable title, but I'd still see it.
Bottom Line:
Going in, I was of the opinion that there’s no reason for this movie to have been made. Coming out, I was forced to agree with myself.
Look, “Pirates 4” is really not a bad movie. But it’s certainly not a good movie either. Huge fans will be happy. No one else should bother showing up. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go install mermaid-repelling screens in all of my drains. I'm pretty sure they can't swim up through the plumbing, but "pretty sure" just doesn't cut it for me.
Trailer Park
Real Steel:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T75j9CoBVzE&feature=relmfu
My desire to play Rock-Em Sock-Em Robots with Hugh Jackman exceeds what anyone would probably consider a healthy level. But my desire to watch other people play Rock-Em Sock-Em Robots with Hugh Jackman is next to nil.
Harry Potter and the Towering Box Office-Part 2:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_kDb-pRCds
We’re not going to have to watch ghostly Daniel Radcliffe and Emma Watson make out again, are we? Because I’m still not done feeling uncomfortable after the last movie.
Next Week: I get a hangover. No, that's not right. I get a hangover twice? Still not quite right. I see "The Hangover 2"? Maybe I should go back to the first way.
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