Pirates of the Caribbean:Dead Man's Chest

While the first feature related Jack Sparrow's redemption over his ship, Dead Man's Chest is here to go back more in time to tell us how he became The Black Pearl's captain in the first place.

Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp) has a debt to pay Davy Jones (Bill Nighy), as the latter has risen The Black Pearl from depths of ocean for the former to be head of. But after 13 years of ownership, the deal is for Jack to serve Jones' crew. We know what happened after the ship came into our poor hero's hands, with Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush) snipping him off of his own possession. Just when Jack's about to enjoy his period of ruling, comes a reminder of the due. Jack is aware of it. He doesn't even care if he loses his treasured hat. A greater danger is after him. He senses something's tailing him from afar. And it's getting closer more than ever now. To save his ass, he hatches a plan to steal the Dead Man's Chest, which contains the heart of Davy Jones. It will make one king of the seas.

Meanwhile, at Port Royal, arriving with the similar intention is Lord Cutler Beckett, who has an unmentioned past of sorts with the protagonist. The key to the chest is the compass, as it shows what one's heart desires most for. By leveraging upon Will Turner (Orlando Bloom) and Elizabeth Swann (Keira Knightley) who helped the man go Scott-free last time around, we get a classic treasure hunting adventure story which suits the premise of pirates very, very well! There's only one nameless marque of freedom; who is it going to belong to?

Now, as the plot tries to reconvene Will Turner and Jack Sparrow, leading to the latter using the former as a scapegoat, this is where it starts to feel forced. From then on, it begins to meander with Davy Jones requesting for 99 more men for exchange, Jack's visit to Tortuga and so on. You can tell that the writers are coercing the ends to meet. The sequence where Will and Jack converge in a tribal island is an obvious deviation from the plot, but it is one of the best segments in the entire picture! Jack Sparrow with multiple eyes makeup getting sandwiched between fruits in a pole, ship crew stuck in bone cages swinging it from one end to another with an orchestra piece running in the background and the Pelegostos horde chasing Jack to death are uproarious moments! Also, the scene where Will turns up at the same shore as the trio are at concurrently is super coincidental!

The main issue with the film is its mildly heavy exposition through dialogues. Although much alike the previous movie, the storytelling intonations here are intriguing, one does not remember what actually transpired through the verbal narration alone. It isn't as memorably effective as visual storytelling is. Writing wise, you can see that there are fantastic story ideas to be explored. Davy Jones' past with his lover, Jack's past with Davy Jones, or even out of this motion picture, the many, many adventures of Jack Sparrow in this universe! Just imagine how even more expansive, powerful, dimensional, classic and rich this world would be if visual storytelling is employed! We only get sentences to describe events occurred to the characters, and that's it. For example, Commodore Norrington telling what happened to him in a flash is so forgettable and comes across unconvincing that he is a drunkard now. This also screws up the believability of his motivation as it appeared out of nowhere. There's even a scene where Ragetti (Mackenzie Crook) explains to Pintel (Lee Arenberg) about the clash of wants between Jack, Will and Norrington (Jack Davenport). He wasn't present at the location the argument took place. How is it possible for him to know anything about the duel at all? On a side note, Elizabeth clearly looks like a woman on plain sight. How couldn't have the crew noticed it?

Again, Johnny Depp as Captain Jack Sparrow is the same old affinity-bound sneaky bastard! If you think you've seen him doing all, think again. The way he introduces himself onscreen by shooting off a crow from the coffin, uses the coffin as a boat and skeleton leg as a row, hides behind barrels and gets shocked twice by Mr. Gibbs (Kevin McNally), meditates while Elizabeth digs sand for the chest, describes a heart as 'thump-thump', navigates a protractor on map and seasons himself with paprika will make you wish the show never ends! It's the little nuances of reactions that makes this character completely real & existing.

Production design is assertively mind-blowing in this sequel! The mountains are epic and the grand scale of ships like The Flying Dutchman are simply astonishing! Prosthetics, makeups, computer graphics and practical effects coalesce into seamless designs of cursed pirates with sea lives impregnated to their features! One of the characters who's in-tact to the ship's backgrounds and detaches himself at will is a remarkable notion! Davy Jones is definitely in the history books for being one of Industrial Light and Magic's all-time best works to be displayed on silver screens. Creativity is definitely far out of the box for this one, that's for sure! Matching chamber aesthetics and piano sets are jaw-droppingly beautiful! Also not to forget is the gargantuan monster, Kraken! Swollen faces of his victims are scary! His attacks on ships and suction cups along tentacles glazing across cannon shooters are CGI golds! Beating heart, Flying Dutchman being submerged into waters and carbuncle black spot are real! Scene transitions are crazy smooth, be it from night to daytime, or pebbles to islands!

The theme functions without a glitch in this universe. The characters, as you know, none are trustable. Pirate blood runs in all of them. One even abandons his own snail head which needs to crawl back to him! The parrot who asks the captain to walk the plank is the same too! Immortal monkey is still immortal for stealing one of the Aztec gold coins at the end credits of the preceding instalment. These are really good comical situations! Swashbuckling here is way better, with the roundhouse cart wheel fight taking the cake of whole! Sacrificing rums is still the most hurting occasion. Now that we know Mr. Gibbs resigned from Royal Navy, we still don't know why exactly. Tia Dalma is a fine addition to the eccentric space we have here. Finally, both Turners get to meet each other and Will's motivation becomes of to save his dad from misery.

Dice wagering game with Davy Jones to know where he keeps the key and the retrieval process after that are full of tensions! As per writers' intent, Jack couldn't use the compass because he is interested with Elizabeth. Therefore, his most wanted desire is fuzzy, torn between locating the chest or the lady. But, this is not something that's vividly established at the start of the celluloid. Both characters are separated far apart, so the reasoning that his heart wants her the most doesn't persuade the audiences. It is only later do we see the growing interests between the two. Elizabeth locking him away is the outright logical solution there is, as the Kraken is after him, not anything else.

With Kraken swallowing our hero after spitting slime on him, Davy Jones in full wrath and none of the characters' goals actually being achieved, you know a sequel is confirmed. In fact, back-to-back shootings were conducted to achieve a third film in the series. Captain Barbossa's reentry, as hinted slightly earlier in the film, is a crowd-cheering pleaser! Journey to the world's end, here we come!