What Emmanuelle Movie Did You Just Watch?

[BillyG]

I honestly don't think I saw beyond Dead Man's Chest. Any time I see a picture of Davy Jones I want to rewatch it though. Just a top tier all time creature design and FX quality.

[Matt]

I honestly don't think I saw beyond Dead Man's Chest. Any time I see a picture of Davy Jones I want to rewatch it though. Just a top tier all time creature design and FX quality.

He holds up beautifully. I'm not sure if he could have been rendered better today, to be honest.

[Timothy225]

I'm long overdue for a rewatch of the POTC films, especially the initial trilogy. Must rectify that soon.

Matt, if you're into pirate stuff, and especially if you're writing a script, I strongly suggest checking out Black Sails. That show was amazing, and a right proper salute to the Golden Age of Piracy, with the addition of fictional pirates like Long John Silver pre-Treasure Island.

[Matt]

yep, we saw BLACK SAILS! It was great, especially from s2 onwards. That's on my list to rewatch after I polish off a few more movies.

[Martin]

I was wondering about Black Sails. It’s sadly behind a paywall for me. Ain’t gonna pay for another fucking channel.

[Anderson]

The only thing that kept me into Black Sails were the high quality tits. More pirates should fuck.

[Matt]

I got about halfway through ON STRANGER TIDES last night. Not bad but definitely a step down from the Verbinski films. The mermaid attack was exceptional, though.

[Timothy225]

yep, we saw BLACK SAILS! It was great, especially from s2 onwards. That's on my list to rewatch after I polish off a few more movies.

I'm in the mood for a rewatch as well. Probably because of Rob's epic tales from Sea of Thieves with Ari, Ceej and Lesley.

The only thing that kept me into Black Sails were the high quality tits. More pirates should fuck.

Yep, the ladies were quite fetching on that show. But I only had eyes for Clara Paget as Anne Bonny (wistful sigh). Milady was a redheaded killing machine and rocked a floppy hat like nobody's bidness.

[Martin]

DID SOMEONE MENTION HIGH QUALITY TITS?

[Timothy225]

Anderson set off the Martin Signal!

Yep, Martin, old buddy, old chum, there were plenty of bewbs on display. Heinies, too. And some Long Dong Silvers and male pirate poopers for the ladies. Throw in some boy-girl, boy-boy, girl-girl, hook ups and Black Sails had something for everyone in the family!

[Martin]

ALL ABOARD!!!

[Abraham Smashington]

Scream. Much better than part 4, except that

  Spoiler: ENDING SPOILERS DO NOT CLICK IF YOU DONT WANT TO BE SPOILED 

the chick that was in on it was THE WORST FUCKING ACTRESS so much like part 4 with Emma it soured it a abit

but I dug the angle it came from and the Rian Johnson shit was fucking hilarious. Legit was laughing out loud at that shit.

Not bad considering it's part 5 of a series that should have ended after part 2. The "elevated" horror shit was so annoying and I'm not sure if that was the point or not but I hate horror people that act like slasher shit is beneath them.

[Abraham Smashington]

I rewatched the first three PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN films over the past 10 days or so.

CURSE OF THE BLACK PEARL: Holds up great as a standalone film. The balance of action and humor is strong and never seems to creep into TOO MUCH territory. There's also a good balance between the 'real' and the 'fanciful', with the non-pirate characters being played fairly straight and competent vs the pirate characters who freely gallop headlong into fantasy.

One thing that really struck me: while Johnny Depp is the obvious star of the film with his Captain Jack Sparrow, Geoffrey Rush's Barbossa is the best character in the film. The glee with which Rush takes on this character is magnetic and bringing him back for the sequels was an incredibly smart move.

Another thing that struck me: I'm doing research on pirates for a script that I'm working on and, while most of the film is sheer fantasy, there's a lot of minor details that make it into the film that are actually totally accurate.

I loved how the real ships utilized in the film were used. Sure, there was a lot of CGI used, but the ship sets themselves were marvelous to behold. The Dauntless and Interceptor were particularly impressive, and the scene where Jack and Will steal the Interceptor was a highlight of the film for me.

Very fun movie. My favorite of the three films.

DEAD MAN'S CHEST: From what I've read, this film was done back to back with AT WORD'S END and, in the process, reconned CURSE into being the first of a trilogy. Whatever, DMC is really quite solid as a follow up to CotBP. I think you'd be fairly lost if you saw DMC without seeing CotBP though...there are simply too many characters and plotlines (Norrington, in particular) carried over from the first film to make DMC stand on its own.

The balance between action and humor still works for the most part but the film gets a little too goofy with Jack Sparrow at times. The whole bit where the cannibals are going to eat him feels completely extraneous and could have been shortened or, even better, excised entirely...the film is too long as it is.

Notable additions:
- Davy Jones. I remember much being said about the quality of the CGI work on this character. Watching him now, 15 or so years later, is still impressive. It's really quality work in terms of textures and movement. Much credit must be given to Bill Nighy for making the character REALLY work though; his line deliveries and overall demeanor are perfection.
- Tom Hollander. I've always liked this actor. Good guy, bad guy...it doesn't matter. The man is simply wonderful to watch and he has tremendous presence to him, especially when he does play a 'bad guy'. His character is a bit underwritten but he still finds great things to do off the page to make the character work.

Love the reappearance of Barbossa at the end. I remember that getting cheers in the movie theater back in the day.

I enjoyed the film overall even if it did feel overlong and veer into TOO MUCH territory a few times. It's my second favorite of the three films.

AT WORLD'S END: Essentially part 2 of DMC. I enjoyed it overall but holy hell is it overlong. Also, the action/humor balance is way off in too many places. It's a kitchen sink movie with too many set pieces and side characters to really feel cohesive.

Some thoughts on it:
- Turning Barbossa into a main character was smart. He absolutely carries the film for me, getting through every sequence that starts too sink under its own weight.
- Chow Yun Fat is great. I wish his character had survived the film as I'd love to see him in more adventures.
- Davy Jones and Tom Hollander continue to be great from the prior film. Again, Hollander feels underwritten here but he makes the most of it.

Again, though...it's all too much. By the time I got to the Black Pearl and the Flying Dutchman in the maelstrom, I was kinda done. There's just so much going on and then they add in Will and Elizabeth getting married by Barbossa just to add another bit of whimsy. Much credit to Rush for making all of that work but again, it's just too much.

A scene to relish: Tom Hollander in slow motion walking the deck of the Endeavor as it all blows up around him. That was one of the single best shots/sequences of the entire franchise to the point that I rewound it a couple of times just to admire it.

Good, not great.

Now, on to the other two films. I've never seen them before so it'll be interesting to see how they fare with the fairly complete trilogy. Do they have merit? Do they gel with the first three films? I'll find out.

Agree with all of this. And yeah, that scene is amazing.

The behind the scenes shit is awesome.

[Matt]

I watched the remaining two PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN films.

ON STRANGER TIDES: Not bad! Not great but still entertaining enough. I liked that it was a truly standalone adventure, kinda like a non-SPECTRE James Bond entry. A viewer could go into this one without knowing the prior films and enjoy it well enough and not feel too lost.

Some specific thoughts:
- While it didn't feel as 'large' as the prior three films, it apparently had the biggest budget. Not sure where it all went but it doesn't look like all of it ended up on the big screen.
- Ian McShane was great as Blackbeard but he felt underwritten. I'd like to have seen more of him and I'd like to have gotten some sort of origin story to the powers of his cutlass.
- Penelope Cruz was a lot of fun. I don't like that they beached her at the end, though...that just seemed kinda wrong and cruel, especially considering her overall story arc.
- While the film itself didn't really stand out, the mermaid attack in the middle of the film was extremely well done and is one of the better overall sequences in the entire franchise.
- Barbossa is, again, the MVP. I liked that he had a wooden leg in this....it gave him some nice menace.

It's a solid entry. I had low expectations and they were exceeded.

DEAD MEN TELL NO TALES: I'd heard a lot of bad-mouthing on this one, mainly for the fact that Sparrow was played as a buffoon. While I think that's a valid complaint (and he did get rather grating at times), I still enjoyed the film more than I was expecting to.

While this one also works fairly well as a standalone film, the inclusion of Will and Elizabeth would be confusing to anyone who was not familiar with the original three films. Personally, it was fun seeing Orlando Bloom again. I was rather surprised when Keira Knightly made a cameo at the end as I thought she was REALLY done with this film series, but it made for a nice scene.

Some thoughts:
- Javier Bardem made for a decent bad guy in this and liked the slo-mo look of his movements.
- There are many really, really awesome shots in this film that would make for excellent desktop wallpapers. At the same time, some of the special effects shots at the climax (involving the divided ocean) felt poorly done. Not sure if they needed another pass through the computer or what but a lot of those shots, especially when they're hanging on the anchor, felt like bad rear projection.
- Jack is used primarily for laughs here. Some of it worked, a lot of it didn't. While I wish he'd been more competent, he didn't ruin the film for me.
- Barbossa was, once again, the MVP. Once it was revealed that Carina was his daughter, I knew his number was going to be up. At least he got to go out with a pretty great exchange with his daughter.
- The ending with Will and Elizabeth was pretty great. I bet that went over huge in the movie theaters.

This was the weakest entry of the five, mainly due to Jack, but I still enjoyed it.

Overall, I at least 'liked' all five films in the franchise. It's definitely the law of diminishing returns but there's plenty of good stuff present in every film to at least derive entertainment value. If I were to rank them, that's easy...I'd just go in release order.

[Abraham Smashington]

I own all of these yet have never made it past the third one. In fact, I've never even watched the third one all the way through. I really need to give this whole series a go but it's hard since Lesley isn't a fan. Now that she's a full fledged pirate in Sea of Thieves I'm going to appeal to that side of her to see if we can give this series another chance. I still LEGIT love the first movie, and everything about Davy Jones in the second one, but even by that point Sparrow was getting on my nerves.