On Stranger Tides

[akashiver]

So the new Pirates of the Carribean movie was... adequate.

It had a plot, at least. And beautiful locations. And Al Swearengen as Blackbeard.

It also had Johhny Depp as Captain Jack Sparrow, though Depp's peformance felt... forced.

"Forced" is how I'd sum up the movie, actually. It lacked the wild, lighthearted goofiness of the original. Instead it seemed like a very studied attempt to give the audience what it wants, from Captain Jack (with a strained-looking Depp trying to recapture the mannerisms of his former performance) to Adventure (with the blaring soundtrack desperately trying to convince us that This! Is! Thrilling!).

Cruz was working hard, but she and Depp had no chemistry. The only person who really seemed to cut loose and have fun was Geoffrey Rush, who clearly knew he had no reason to be in this movie.

Judging from my fellow-audience members' reaction, the movie's comic timing needed work. There were some great lines that the audience just didn't laugh at.  I'm guessing the humor was either flying above their heads, or that it was being delivered too quickly, or that the scene was sending the wrong cues. There were a few pratfalls that got laughs, but overall I'd say the audience was... amused by the film. Not enthralled, and not ROTFL.

The film is loosely based on the Tim Powers novel On Stranger Tides. I haven't read the novel, but what I've heard about the plot suggests that its PotC adaptation both helped and hurt the movie. On one hand, it provided a Story, with some interesting mythological twists. On the other hand, the filmmakers were not about to let On Stranger Tides be its own beast. They wanted it to be a Pirates movie, and this led to a lot of yes, forcing the story into the pattern the filmmakers wanted.

That pattern doesn't quite work. There are too many characters working at cross-purposes, and their stories weren't developed enough for me to care about them. This was particularly evident in the climax, which felt "busy" rather than "exciting" to me.

But it wasn't a Bad Film. It was just an "eh..." film with some good lines and moments.

 

Comments

[lyceum-arabica.livejournal.com]

I found myself wishing I'd just read the script instead. If you closed your eyes and read Cruz's lines back to yourself, you could imagine her playing a self-sufficient, intelligent, capable female... none of the lines were inherently subservient or self-deprecating. But, as I guess all great actors and actresses can bend a script to theirs or the director's will, she managed to deliver every one with the whiny off-balanced inflection of the first-act tough girl who falls apart as soon as the villain grabs her by the upper arm. That's why it felt like there was no chemistry to me... it seemed a weird step for sparrow to find helplessness and naive incompetence attractive? Plus they made her up to look half his age, which was a bit unsettling.

I think I may just resign myself to never watching anything but Dr. Who and a carefully chosen subset of anime. All hail Dr. River Song...