For decades, Disney has tried to find a way to turn its theme park rides into feature film franchises of their own. The one time this strategy really worked was when director Gore Verbinski and screenwriters Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio took a beloved Disneyland ride and turned it into Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl. The film was such a massive success that it spawned four sequels. Even the Pirates of the Caribbean theme park rides have since been changed to bring them closer in line with the films that were inspired by them.
The quality of the sequels went in a downward direction, but that doesn’t diminish how incredible the first film was. And if you need more convincing, these are the reasons why you should stream Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl this month.
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Johnny Depp gives one of his most iconic performances
“This is the day you will always remember as the day you almost caught Captain Jack Sparrow.” On the script page, Captain Jack Sparrow was not as wildly flamboyant or over-the-top as he was when Johnny Depp was in character. By most accounts, Disney executives didn’t know what to make of Depp’s performance and they were afraid that he would ruin the movie. On the contrary, Depp made the movie by giving it a larger than life leading character who became the face of the franchise.
Unlike Depp’s later appearances in the sequels, the first film strikes a nice balance between Jack’s comedic aspects and his more serious desire for revenge against his former crew. Audiences and critics loved him in the role, and Depp earned an Oscar nomination for Best Actor. He didn’t win, but that was an impressive achievement in of itself, as comedic roles rarely get that honor.
The rest of the supporting cast is excellent
Depp didn’t carry this movie by himself. Geoffrey Rush was coming off successful films like Shine, Quills, and Shakespeare in Love when he was cast as the film’s villain, Captain Hector Barbossa, the man who betrayed Jack and took the ship known as the Black Pearl as his own. Barbossa has a very compelling motivation in the movie: He wants to be mortal again, and he’s willing to kill anyone just for the simple sensation of being able to feel anything.
Orlando Bloom sometimes gets a lot of flack for his portrayal of Will Turner, but he’s also perfect for the character. Will gets to be the film’s straightforward hero, while Jack is its antihero. Will also gives the movie its romantic lead opposite Keira Knightley’s Elizabeth Swann. Knightley has done a lot of period movies, and she seems right at home as Elizabeth. And while Elizabeth does need to be rescued from Barbossa, she’s also a competent heroine in her own right.
In one of her earliest movies, Zoe Saldana has a small role as Anamaria, a reluctant member of Jack’s crew who has a grudge against him. Saldana has said that she didn’t enjoy her time on the set and she didn’t reprise her role in any of the sequels. That’s unfortunate, because Anamaria is a fun character during her brief moments on screen.
The story is genuinely fun and exciting
One of the reasons the first film still towers above the sequel is that it never veers too far into farce. There are a lot of comedic moments, but they don’t undercut the life or death stakes for Elizabeth and Will, or the fierce rivalry between Jack and Barbossa.
But it’s also not so serious that we can’t enjoy a few laughs along the way, including a clever escape that Jack and Will pull off early in the film. Even the film’s deadliest scene — a brutal attack by undead pirates — still manages land inside a PG-13 rating without going too far.
The ‘curse’ of the Black Pearl was a great touch
It was screenwriters Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio who came up with the idea for the “curse” in the movie’s title. Because Captain Barbossa and his crew stole cursed Aztec gold, they were doomed to spend eternity as undead pirates. Their entire motivation was to find the last remaining gold coin and the blood of their former shipmate, Bill Turner, to break the curse and become human again.
The pirate curse is only visible during moonlight, which gave the film its visually stunning skeleton pirates. That twist helped separate this movie from previous pirate flicks that failed.
Pirates of the Caribbean’s music is unforgettable
Hans Zimmer is often credited for the rousing themes in Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, which were revisited in the sequels. Zimmer was a music producer on the film and he did score or co-score the remaining movies in the franchise. But it was Klaus Badelt who wrote the music for The Curse of the Black Pearl, and his recurring notes have been used to great effect ever since.
Watch Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl on Hulu.
