REVIEW: Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales

   "It's a pirate's life", says you.  "Ay, it's a pirate's life.  Savvy?", says you again.  "Yep, It sure is a pirate's life", says you yet again.  "Stop trying to make fetch happen", says I.

   Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales is the fifth installment in the Disney franchise inspired by the theme park ride.  Johnny Depp returns to his iconic role as Captain Jack Sparrow; franchise veterans Geoffrey Rush, Kevin R. McNally, Orlando Bloom, and (briefly) Keira Knightley return as well, and they are joined by newcomers Javier Bardem, Brenton Thwaites, Kaya Scodelario, and David Wenham.   They come together in a movie which could, by rights, be called "Stale Writers Tell No Tales".  You may ask yourself, does it hold up to the earlier entries in the series?  And I would respond that it is disinclined to acquiesce to your expectations.

    That means no.

    I saw this last night and have had to mull over my feelings on the film, which I concede primarily feature disappointment and irritation.  I enjoyed the first three films in the series immensely - a fun, swashbuckling trilogy with brilliant characters, gorgeous locations, incredible fight choreography, a sharp and quotable script, and some interesting thematic considerations lurking just below the surface, to rise occasionally in an explosive burst much like the prow of the Flying Dutchman.  While keeping up with the characters' shifting allegiances and motivations could be, at times, tricky, it was a thoroughly rich trilogy.  It was followed some years later by a lackluster, perfunctory sequel, which while not a bad movie in and of itself, lacked the panache of the first three (but did include Ian McShane, for which it got quite a lot of credit).  Pirates 5 is very much akin to the latter movie, and while it attempts to head back in the direction of the original movies thematically, it fails utterly at charm, wit, or excitement.

    Have you ever had a relative - maybe an old drunk uncle - who you see only at infrequent family functions, but who you just *know* is going to make the same stale, unfunny jokes and embarrassing comments, delighted in his own wit?  That's rather what Jack Sparrow has become.  Johnny Depp has incredible talent, but he's in that group of actors, Will Ferrell, for example, who think that whatever idea pops into their head must be golden  - and the movie indulges them.  These are actors who, in conjunction with a skilled director and when properly reined in, can create wildly entertaining and memorable performances - very much as Depp did in the first three movies, working with Gore Verbinski.  However, his acting in these last two movies, especially this most recent, is horribly off.  Jack was formerly a wily, canny operative whose goofy mannerisms and bizarre behavior masked a complex schemer.  Lately, though, he's become nothing but a tired, repetitive drunk.  The character lacks all of the spark that he once had, and as the central figure in the movie, he drags the film down, making it stale and boring.

"It is not neither proper nor suitable, it is neither adequate nor acceptable, it is, in obvious fact, an abomination"

   It's Depp's fault to a point, but the script and the direction are absolutely lackluster.  There are a few perfunctory elements that are vintage Pirates - but we've seen them all before.  Multiple times.  While 5 is a better movie than 4 in the sense that this time at least the principal characters have clear motivations, it's all mechanical.  The movie takes way too long to build certain threads up, and disposes of others with an annoying nonchalance.   The script is full of telegraphed jokes and trite dialogue that is remarkably bland...most of the lines could be delivered by any character in the movie, they're that unspecific.  Even the 'easy' elements of Pirates movies - brilliant swordfighting, energetic action scenes, and dazzling locations - are all largely dismissed.  The film's climactic sequence is admittedly well done, but you have to sit through two hours of underwhelming rerun to get to it.  It's just not fun.

  The movie has two main plot thrusts which converge (of course) without gelling.  Brenton Thwaites plays Henry Turner, the son of Will Turner and Elizabeth Swann, seeking to overturn the curse of the Flying Dutchman under which Will fell at the end of the third movie.  And while seeing Bloom, Knightley, and the Dutchman again is one of the best elements of the movie, it's really just the set-up for Henry's actions in the movie, as the main instigator of the plot.  The other main thrust is Javier Bardem's Captain Salazar, captain of a cursed ship of ghostly henchmen with a mad-on for Jack Sparrow...not that we haven't seen that particular angle before.  While the visuals on Salazar and his crew are undeniably impressive, there's a profound lack of explanation for much of what's going on.  For example, it's not made entirely clear *why* Salazar is cursed, and the how is rather vague as well.  The audience is just supposed to go with it, but since we've seen this sort of thing before, it simply becomes a recycled plot device - same idea, different flavor.

"Do you fear death?  No?  How about a certain lingering redundancy?"

  Bardem is always an interesting actor to watch, and Salazar is certainly distinctive visually, but there is so much more they could have done with him.  Previous antagonists - Barbossa, Davy Jones, Lord Beckett, and to a much lesser extent, Blackbeard, were nuanced characters that you couldn't help but like; they each had their own unique foibles and humor.  Salazar's more of a one-note character - a remarkable visual propelled by a great actor, and at points quite terrifying, but hampered by a weak script.

   The rest of the cast is hampered as well.  Henry starts out strong, and is very much the child of Will and Elizabeth, but in the second half of the movie his character is all but absorbed into the background, and he's there simply to fill the 'Will Turner role'.  Scodelario's character, a brainy astronomer, fares somewhat better; while much of her dialogue in the movie is repetitive (I lost track of how many "I'm not a witch" conversations she had to endure), she's at least grounded and her motives are clear and consistent.  She's probably the best-written of the new characters.  David Wenham plays a British officer out to hunt pirates, or anyone else he can, but he's an incredibly vague character - we learn very little about him, and frankly, I didn't even catch his character's name.  Norrington, he was not.

    Barbossa is one of the bright spots of the movie, especially in the second half as we learn more about his past than we have to date, but even he spends a lot of the film serving as little more than a vehicle for the plot to advance.  However, when he's good, he's very good.  On the other hand, McNally, who is the only other actor besides Depp and Rush to appear in all five films, is completely devoid of personality.  Instead of the gravely-voiced wise but superstitious veteran who could impart lengthy tales of lore, he's reduced here to a generic lackey.  Similarly, Angus Barnett and Giles New return as Mullroy and Murtog, but I have to think these roles were meant for Pintel and Ragetti, who do not return.   Paul McCartney also has a cameo early in the movie, but it's very much a riff on the appearances by Keith Richards in the two preceding films.  Who knew Beatles songs were around in the 18th century?

"So tell me - what's become of me franchise?"

   I really wanted to like this movie, but ultimately I find myself quite let down.  I know I'm judging it in comparison to the series as a whole, but even on its own merits it's a bland, lifeless film.  I will say that the resolution works very well, not only for this movie as an individual entry, but for the series on the whole.  There are specific character plots tied off nicely with some solid closure, even if some of it is bittersweet, but also a thematic wrap-up involving the MacGuffin of the piece (the Trident of Poseidon) which is also a rather brilliant way to conclude.    While I would argue that there was no need for a fourth or fifth Pirates movie, I can say with certainty that at this point that the franchise needs to stop.  As a concluding entry, this movie does at least serve that role, and offers a clear and satisfying ending.  But as the rest of the movie shows, especially when coupled with the fourth film, they have nowhere else to go, because they keep sailing the same waters.

  Please let Jack Sparrow sail off to his horizon, Disney.   The story is done.  It's not that world has gotten smaller.  It's that there's less in it.

FINAL RATING: 3 PAWS (OUT OF 10)