Surprise, matey! 'Pirates' is better than you'd think

The swashbuckling subgenre known as the pirate movie has proven singularly resistant to revival. Think back to Renny Harlan's artillery and explosion-heavy "Cutthroat Island" and Roman Polanski's bizarre and jokey "Pirates."

MOVIE REVIEW

PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: CURSE OF THE BLACK PEARL

DIRECTOR: Gore Verbinski

CAST: Johnny Depp, Geoffrey Rush, Orlando Bloom, Keira Knightley

RUNNING TIME: 135 minutes

RATING: PG-13 for action/adventure violence

WHERE:

GRADE: B

Given its heredity (inspired by the Disneyland ride and produced by Jerry Bruckheimer, who is responsible for some of the sloppiest and noisiest action blockbusters of the past two decades), the high-spirited, comic swashbuckler "Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl" is a slight but disarmingly entertaining surprise.

Johnny Depp, buried under kerchief, blousy shirt and the makeup of a heavy metal fashion victim, stars as Jack Sparrow, a black pirate made over as a lovable rogue. Less Douglas Fairbanks than an aquatic Artful Dodger gone to seed, he's a high-seas con man with a heart of tarnished stolen gold.

Depp keeps the film delightfully off balance with his unpredictable comic weave, bobbing and swaying like a punch-drunk fighter while navigating the solidity of dry land and mumbling his lines like a schizophrenic outpatient. He seems to have stumbled in from his own private movie but fearlessly makes his home in this tale of an Aztec curse that turns a vicious crew of plunderers into the walking dead and a haunted ship that floats in a haze of mist and smoke.


Capt. Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp, left) and Will Turner (Orlando Bloom) join forces to rescue the governor's daughter and Sparrow's ship.

Even Geoffrey Rush, who "arghs" and "mateys" his way through the film like an old Hollywood ham as Sparrow's demonic nemesis, can't wrestle the screen from Depp.

Keira Knightley trades in her sports bras and baggy jerseys from "Bend It Like Beckham" for corsets and low-cut gowns to play the headstrong daughter of the blueblood governor (Jonathan Pryce), and Orlando Bloom ("Lord of the Rings") acquits himself nicely as a swordmaker who turns dashing outlaw to rescue the object of his desire from the pirate scourge. The romantic leads match Depp in enthusiasm.

The unexpectedly light touch of director Gore Verbinski ("The Ring") gives the film a playful tone without sinking it into self parody. He's so deft that it's almost shocking when the pirates cut a swath through Her Majesty's Navy (offscreen, of course, to preserve that essential PG-13 rating), while the contrived happy ending and dubious moral (pirates can be good people too) almost swamps the high-spirited lark.

Those rough waters aside, Verbinski puts a Jackie Chan flourish of high energy and gymnastic action on the swashbuckling stunts and swordplay and keeps this lark sailing along so swiftly and smoothly that you hardly notice the 135-minute running time until the ride is over.

Sean Axmaker is a movie reviewer and free-lance film writer based in Seattle. He can be reached via e-mail at seanax@hotmail.com.