Link isn't working, sumi.

Saw Pirates this weekend. Long and disappointing. By the time Jack and Davy Jones were fencing on a yard-arm in the middle of a maelstrom I realized that (a) that sounds cooler in theory than in actual swordfighting interest and (b) there hadn't really been any swordfights up until then. Some general melee but nothing like the cool blacksmith fight in the first one, or the uber-choreographed waterwheel fight in 2.

It felt like they'd lost the thread of what was most interesting about the story, and the characters' motivations were so muddled and conflicty. It made the characters seem incoherent instead of complex.

I had liked the second movie a lot, but this one was far less fun, far less interesting. Keith Richards was perfect though. Liked that. Chow Yun Fat was wasted. Everybody should go watch A Better Tomorrow and see why he's so esteemed.

Keira Knightly failed to convince me of her action hero bona fides. All the plot turns were potentially interesting, but in the end felt like plot turns instead of character developments.

Just got back from the Bloated Gay Pirate Movie and I gotta agree with David and others. There were moments I liked and character notes that were nice, but it was too much special effects and not enough character development. I think I'll just file it away with the Matrix sequels and just love the original forever.

I corrected the link -- I hope it works now!

Wow. I liked PotC3. Much better than 2--the couple who came with us wanted to know if they should bother to see it. Told them, only if they wanted to see a few cool stunts which didn't really fit into the story anyway.

As for 3...it wasn't as funny and surprising as the first one, but I liked the twists and turns, and didn't feel the length at all. I liked the ending, in which no one really got what they wanted, although there was some light for the leads. I was disappointed at the offscreen death of Admiral (?) Swan, but liked Elizabeth's despair. I also bought her random ascent through the ranks of pirates basically because she gave good shriek. Orlando Bloom took a few acting classes since the release of the first one too. I would definitely have liked more Chow Yun Fat, but that's pretty much my default state of being. There is never enough of him.

Oddly, the saddest part for me, the part where the deaths seemed most human was when they killed the Endeavour. Suddenly it felt like carnage. Not quite sure how that got me, and the rest were just what happens in movies like that.

Monkey was great.

Scanning back for other PotC comments I noticed bon had said:

As if the parkour sequence in James Bond were at the end-- two hours in you're thinking come on, get to the big finish!

Honestly, if they'd put the parkour sequence in instead of the whole Bond falls in love thing, I'd have been much happier. I mean, as it was I wanted the big finish something awful, and what we were given wasn't the slightest bit interesting to me. Parkour would have been a huge upgrade.

I was once again thwarted in my intent to see Waitress, as the 4:30 and 7:30 screenings were sold out. Well, I would have been like ticket holder #498 in a 500 seat theater at the later one, so I opted out. But it does make me hopeful about the movie sticking around a few weeks.

Good to know that the movie has success. I wasn't bowled away by it, but I came out liking all the characters.

Waitress ended up 5th in the weekend's box office tally.

Waitress ended up 5th in the weekend's box office tally.

Wow, definitely showing all the signs of being a sleeper hit, especially given the blockbuster behemoths currently playing. Such a damn shame Adrienne Shelly isn't here to enjoy her success.