I saw Pirates of the Caribbean 2 last weekend, I’d had high hopes going in and this was probably my mistake. This is the Empire Strikes Back of the Pirates trilogy but the beauty of Empire is that it’s quite a simple film with a easy to follow plot. Dead Mans Chest, in comparison, seems have had a plot retrofitted to it to give a poor excuse to get all the characters in the right place and join the end of the last film on to the start of the next via a checklist of set pieces and special effects. There’s none of the subtly of the first film where parts of the scenery suddenly become involved in the fight scenes, here the everything is introduced just before it’s used and discarded afterwards. It still has it’s bright spots, it’s a beautiful film to watch, Johnny Depp and Bill Nighy are outstanding in their roles, and the last hour is much better than the start even if the last ten minutes are effectively a trailer for the next movie. Worth going to see but it could really do with having a better plot and being half an hour shorter.
Failing to learn from my “high expectations” mistake I’m really looking forward to seeing Superman Returns this week, everything I’ve read says it should be fantastic. I only hope they’ve got enough content to justify the two and a half hour running time.
Finally, while the film of the year for 2006 is going to be Snakes on a Plane, we have a early contender for the honour in 2007: The Turtles are back. Woohoo.