Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides brings everybody's favorite swashbuckler back to the big screen for his fourth crack at eternal life. This time around, Captain Jack Sparrow is hellbent on finding the Fountain of Youth.
After the previous two installments in the series, I must say that I feel some personal satisfaction to see Disney ditch Orlando Bloom and Keira Knightley. Their bickering, on-again-off-again relationship eventually overshadowed Johnny Depp and, along with some serious story issues, sucked all of the fun out of the last couple films. Now I'm not saying that On Stranger Tides is flawless, but it sure is nice to see Captain Jack take back the franchise that made him so popular.
With that, Disney has not totally ditched the idea of a more love interests. In this sequel, we get a romance between a missionary and a mermaid to mirror that of Will and Elizabeth's; even Captain Jack gets a few raised eyebrows as an ex-lover of his is brought back into the picture. At times, these romances feel a little out of place under the circumstances: we've never met most of these characters but suddenly we're supposed to feel for them just because their in love; but they never overshadow the plot, which is much easier to follow than some of the other films.
Having seen this movie in both dimensions, I can say that the 3D does not enhance the overall viewing and if it does at some point, the screen was too dark to make a difference.
Yes the plot is a bit silly, there are two awkward romances going at the same time, the 3D was a fail, and most of the scenes are dragged out for far too long, but you know what? I was consistantly entertained.
I agree on all points except that I thoroughly enjoyed the 3D offering. It was fun to feel placed right in the middle of sword duels and other action setpieces.
ReplyDeleteAs far as structure goes, the positives definitely outweighed the negatives. It was a good move to ditch the stale subplots and embrace what everybody came to see; Jack Sparrow in another quirky adventure.