But this third voyage of the Pirates, which has taken a record 202m worldwide in six days, felt like the longest film ever made. I know The Lord of the Rings and the Harry Potters go on a bit, but at least the makers have the excuse that they were adapting exceedingly long books. Pirates, however, started out as a five-minute boat ride at Disneyland.
Yet it's 2hr 48min long, and every scene seems to last forever. Take the bit where Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp) is stranded on the desert island that is Davy Jones' locker and natters manically away to dozens of hallucinatory versions of himself: I don't know about Jack, but it lasted an eternity for me. And what about the gathering of the pirate lords?
Take away the exotic costumes, the quite funny nine-pieces-of-eight joke and the mass brawl, and it was as tedious and protracted as a Bromley council meeting. Even the climactic sea-fight, with the pirates and Davy Jones' whelky, undead critters battling on the edge of a giant, raging whirlpool, went on about an aeon too long. This is supposed to be a children's film and children have short attention spans, I thought, as I wriggled about like a bored 11-year-old and resorted to the kids' tricks of a trip to the loo and a return to the popcorn counter to ease the monotony.
But here's an odd thing: my son, who is 11, sat rapt, eyes riveted to the screen, all the way through. I think he might be ready for that six-hour War and Peace.
News RSS