Yo Ho, Yo Ho!
Dead Man's Chest a Real Treasure

While expectations on Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl were low (many assumed it was a Disney film aimed at toddlers), the buzz on its sequel could not have been higher. Filled with action, comedy, and more than a few surprises, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest exceeded expectations and box office records.

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
Captain Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp, right) meets up with his old shipmate "Bootstrap" Bill Turner (Stellan Skarsgård) in Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest. (Disney, 2006)
Directed by: Gore Verbinski
Written by: Ted Elliott & Terry Rossio
Starring: Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom, Keira Knightley, Jack Davenport, Bill Nighy, and Stellan Skarsgård

Rated PG-13 (for intense sequences of adventure violence, including frightening images)
Running time: 150 min.

FilmGuru's Rating : 9 out of 10.

Johnny Depp returns as the infamous Captain Jack Sparrow, a pirate whose grand adventure nearly ended at the gallows in the first film. Thanks to an intervention by Will Turner (Orlando Bloom), Jack's life was spared. But it appears no good deed goes unpunished.

At the beginning of Dead Man's Chest, Will and his fiancee Elizabeth (Keira Knightley) are arrested for helping an enemy of the crown escape justice. When Will negotiates a bargain with Lord Beckett (Tom Hollander) for Elizabeth's freedom, he sets off for the high seas in search of Jack and the renowned "broken" compass he possesses. With help from her father, Elizabeth escapes jail and sets off in hopes that she can help Will and Jack escape the trap set for them.

What emerges is a film filled with familiar themes. In the first installment of Pirate of the Caribbean, the story centered around a cursed ship called The Black Pearl which was manned by undead pirates that took skeletal form under the light of the moon. Dead Man's Chest offers a similar plot with the legendary Flying Dutchman filling in for the Pearl and a host of cursed sailors turned sea monsters as her crew.

Captaining the Flying Dutchman is none other than the legendary Davy Jones (Bill Nighy), whose tentacled visage is reminiscent of H. P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu. As fate would have it, one of Davy Jones's prisoners is "Bootstrap" Bill (Stellan Skarsgård), Will's father. Bootstrap comes to warn Jack that payment for a bargain made long ago is coming due. The only thing that Jack can use as leverage for a deal is locked away in a hidden chest, and Davy Jones has the key.

Much of the supporting cast from The Curse of the Black Pearl returns, including Gibbs (Kevin McNally), Cotton (David Bailie), Governor Swann (Jonathan Pryce). Pirates Pintel and Ragetti (Lee Arenberg and Mackenzie Crook, respectively) who delighted audiences as comic relief, this time ally themselves with Jack and his crew.

Despite the repetition in themes, Dead Man's Chest manages to broaden the scope of the first film. With adventures on land and sea, audiences are given a number of settings in the world of Captain Jack Sparrow: from Port Royal to Tortuga (seen in the first film) to the swampy Pantano River where the mysterious Caribbean soothsayer Tia Dalma (Naomie Harris) dwells. The heroes even find themselves on a Caribbean island populated by cannibals.

Entwined in the adventure of retrieving Davy Jones's chest is a story of love and temptation, pitting Elizabeth's former fiance Norrington (Jack Davenport), her current fiance Will, and Jack all against each other. This unnecessary entanglement comes to a head at the end of the film, but (like so much of the plot) refuses to be resolved.

Clocking in at two and half hours, many might think Dead Man's Chest is too long. The truth is, it's not long enough. The story ends on a cliff hanger, destined to be continued in next year's release Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End.

Like The Empire Strikes Back, the film ends on a down note with the heroes regrouping after a titanic loss. For me, this abrupt (but perfectly logical) end point struck a sour note. It's not that I hate cliff hangers, although my need for instant gratification sometimes gets the best of me. I didn't like it because it seemed to come out of nowhere. I had the feeling that I had been cheated out of a proper conclusion to the story. Despite the abrupt conclusion, the film's end brings with it a surprise cameo suggesting the next film will take a new and exciting direction.