Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

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Rating 2½


Directed by Gore Verbinski

Written by Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio, based on characters created by Ted Elliott, Terry Rossio, Stuart Beattie and Jay Wolpatt

Starring Johnny Depp (Captain Jack Sparrow), Orlando Bloom (Will Turner), Keira Knightley (Elizabeth Swann), Bill Nighy (Davy Jones), Jack Davenport (James Norrington), Jonathan Pryce (Weatherby Swann), Tom Hollander (Cutler Beckett), Stellan Skarsgård (Bootstrap Bill Turner), Lee Areberg (Pintel), Mackenzie Crook (Ragetti), Kevin McNally (Joshamee Gibbs) and Naomie Harris (Tia Dalma)

Lord Cutler Beckett arrests Will Turner and Elizabeth Swann in Port Royal, Jamaica, threatening execution to force Turner to hunt for the Pirate Captain Jack Sparrow and relieve him of his magic compass. The devious Sparrow and the crew of his ship the Black Pearl have been captured by cannibals on a tropical island. Following their escape they are pursued by Captain Davy Jones and the ghost ship the Flying Dutchman, as well as the legendary sea monster the Kraken.

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‘Dead Man’s Chest’ is the second film in the ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ franchise, produced by Walt Disney Pictures. It was directed by Gore Verbinski, whose previous films include ‘The Ring’, and was released in 2006. Its box office gross was a mind-boggling $1,066,179,725, against a production budget of $225 million, making it the fourth highest grossing film of all time (not taking into account inflation). It received mixed reviews and has a 53% fresh rating at Rotten Tomatoes from 212 reviews.

I enjoyed the first film ‘The Curse of the Black Pearl’, but I also found myself somewhat disappointed by it. I had the same reaction to ‘Dead Man’s Curse’. It’s expertly made, a master class of modern day effects-soaked action-adventure blockbusters, but it’s so bombastic and arrogant of its own hugeness that it lacks heart.

Orlando Bloom and Keira Knightley are unremittingly bland and charisma-free leads, but perhaps they need to be as an antidote to all the madcap mayhem being unleashed around them, much like Allan Jones (the father of the singer Jack Jones), who found himself playing the bland romantic lead in the anarchic Marx Brothers films ‘A Night at the Opera’ and ‘A Day at the Races’. Johnny Depp’s performance as Captain Jack Sparrow is little more than an impersonation of Keith Richards (who turns up in the third film, playing Captain Jack’s father), but is no less enjoyable for that and has played a big part in the success of the franchise.

At 150 minutes it is probably a little too long and it does become a bogged down and convoluted at times, but there is also a lot of humour and it is fun to watch. While I am often not especially impressed by CGI effects, the special effects here are superb. I particularly liked the Kraken.

‘Dead Man’s Chest’ was followed by ‘At World’s End’. A fourth instalment ‘On Stranger Tides’ has been announced, with Johnny Depp returning as Captain Jack Sparrow, although both Orlando Bloom and Keira Knightley (who, in 2008, was the second highest paid actress in Hollywood) have both stated that they do not intend to reprise their roles.

Review posted 8 January 2010


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Poppy Shakespeare

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Directed by Benjamin Ross

Written by Sarah William, from the novel by Clare Allan

Starring Naomie Harris, Anna Maxwell Martin and Michelle Dockery


“What the cast were actually suffering from, apart from award-winning overacting and loving themselves, was unclear. What the story was about and what we were supposed to glean from it was shrouded in the repetitive, glib, agitprop writing.”

When AA Gill, the noxiously opinionated television critic for the Sunday Times, gives a programme one of his all-too predictably condescending and negative reviews it is usually a sign that whatever he is criticising is probably worth watching. So it was with this one-off 90-minute drama offering from Channel 4.

Naomie Harris plays the title character, an out-of-work single-mother who finds herself sentenced to one month attending a psychiatric day centre - soon extended to eighteen months. She vehemently protests that she is “normal”, but is served with the threat of being sectioned under the Mental Health Act if she does not comply. ‘N’ (the always excellent Anna Maxwell Martin), a regular at the centre and a psychiatric patient for most of her life, is given the job of showing Poppy around and helping her to acclimatise. These two characters increasingly form a genuine friendship, but their lives are turned upside down in the process.

Based on the award-winning novel by Clare Allan, who has first-hand experience to draw from, ‘Poppy Shakespeare’ is a damning indictment of our mental health care policy and the Government’s obsession with targets and providing a public health service based on private business sector ideology. It plays as a kind of variation of Franz Kafka’s famous novel ‘The Trial’, posthumously published in 1925. Poppy is the victim of faceless bureaucracy and is pulled into a surreal dystopian world from which she cannot escape.

The story is given plenty of room to breathe and time to open out and develop at a leisurely but not stifling pace. As events become increasingly surreal, leaving us to ponder if this is the real world or simply a reflection of the delusional mindsets of the patients, so the story also takes an increasingly dark and troubling turn. The acting is universally excellent. Anna Maxwell Martin and especially Naomie Harris are outstanding.

The story is an incisive commentary on the woeful failings of New Labour to provide stability and an acceptable level of care within the public health sector, and I heartily give it my recommendation.



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