Review of Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales (2017) by Katarina B — 11 Aug 2017

Johnny Depp is back as the iconic pirate Jack Sparrow in the fifth installment of the infamous franchise. The fifth installment is called ''Pirates of the Caribbean: Salazar's Revenge''.

In this new adventure Sparrow faces his old nemesis captain Salazar (Javier Bardem). Salazar is a ghost that escapes the Devil's triangle with his crew. After his escape he starts searching for the author of all his pain, also known as Jack Sparrow. Sparrow's only hope for survival lies in the legendary Trident of Poseidon and to find them he must make an alliance with Henry Turner (Brenton Thwaites) and Carina Smyth (Kaya Scodelario). And yes, Henry is the son of Will Turner and Elizabeth Swann.

This time around the directors of the new installment are Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg. The first three films in the franchise were directed by Gore Verbinski and ''On Stranger Tides'' was directed by Rob Marshall. The two new directors are mostly known for the succesful ''Kon-Tiki''. But after that film, this one feels like a big disappointment.

This could be caused by the fact that the directors had a lot of characters that needed screentime to keep the movie going. The result of this was that Jack Sparrow, Henry Turner and Carina Smyth all got the part of the lead, which lead to a messy and hard to follow story. It's unclear which character needed to be the focus of the story. Add on that the fact that the actions of supporting character Captain Hector Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush) have as much effect on the story as the actions of the leads.

There are also a lot of unnecessary subplots. For example, the movie tries to start a romantic relation between the characters of Brenton Thwaites and Kaya Scodelario, but this feels more forced than natural. It feels like a mandatory part tot the story, while the movie could have worked just as well without the romance.

However, when these two characters are in conversation with Jack Sparrow, the movie becomes more interesting. The storylines of this duo are also tolerably developed, which creates moments where different emotions can be felt. Sadly, the interactions between these two characters don't come close to the interactions that happened between Orlando Bloom and Keira Knightley in the original trilogy. That relationship was more charming and sincere.

Also, after seeing so many horrific sea-creatures as the enemies, the ghosts don't really stand out as villains. Oscar-winner Javier Bardem never truly gets a moment to show his capabilities as an actor and create a memorable villain.

On the other hand, the action is done well. The most outstanding action piece is one the first scenes, where encounter Jack Sparrow for the first time in the movie. A whole building gets taken, by some horses, through the streets, while our anti-heroes try to escape an execution. Sadly, the action peaks to early in the film, making the other action scenes forgettabe.

''Pirates of the Caribbean'' was always widely known, probably mostly because of it's sense of humor and the character Jack Sparrow. Both are worked out poorly in this film. Depp remains a good actor, but his character Jack Sparrow feels more like a routine and checkpoint-list nowadays, instead of a true character. The way the film reminds us who he is, has been the same for five movies now, and it starts to tire. We get it. Sparrow is drunkard. The joke doesn't have to be repeated every five minutes.

In the end, ''Pirates of the Caribbean: Salazar's Revenge'' is a film that compared to the original, means nothing to the world. Even though new characters have somewhat compelling storylines, the most important character doesn't have that. De effects are not better than fourteen years ago. The villain was supposed to be most horrific of them all, but turned out more forgettable. However, the movie's not all bad. The action is done well and the first true action scene is memorable. But because of the many problems, the movie is sadly not as good as many hoped for.