Sunday 29 May 2011

Stop blowing holes in your plots

I'm looking at you, Pirates of the Caribbean team. On Stranger Tides was a great film, and worked well even without reference to the previous three. The silliness works well, to a point, but there's only so much my disbelief can be suspended before at least part of it has to drop. Here are the top five groan-worthy moments:

  1. Does coal really catch fire that quickly?
  2. I'm not convinced by that combination of king, palace, interior and location relative to the rest of London.
  3. We have other prisons, you know, not just the Tower of London. If you're going to always go for the most popular local references, why not go the whole hog and drive them there in an anachronistic red bus?
  4. Why would a pirate ship be so badly looked after? And holes in the sails? Your main character is pretty much entirely motivated by his love for a ship, and the freedom it represents to a pirate. Are we really supposed to believe that Blackbeard, with all the resources at his command, would put up with his ship having sails like fishnet stockings?
  5. If you stand on a small tree, loop a rope around a thicker tree, and pull on the rope, the first thing that moves will not be the big tree.
There was so much else that was done well in this film, it seems a shame to not put just that little more thought into it, and not set good actors out in very leaky vessels.

2 comments:

  1. 4. He "says" he loves his ship; but treats it really badly. Come on; don't you know anything about men?

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  2. http://thatguywiththeglasses.com/videolinks/thatguywiththeglasses/bum-reviews/31031-pirates-of-the-caribbean-4

    You may also enjoy this...

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