Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End Concludes Trilogy With a Bang

Wednesday night, I sat with my eyes glued to the television screen as the fate of Charlie Pace, one of my most beloved characters on LOST, hung in the balance. Twenty-four hours later, I stared at a much larger screen as another Lord of the Rings alumnus undertook a dangerous mission. There was even swimming involved. Yet another bond between Dom Monaghan and Orlando Bloom. If I hadn't already seen On a Clear Day, I could rent that tomorrow and make it a trilogy of harrowing viewing experiences featuring water and young former Middle-earth residents. But Orlando is the order of the day. Orlando, Keira, Geoffrey... oh, and a fellow by the name of Johnny Depp. Yes, the Black Pearl set sail for its third - and likely final - adventure in Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, and I was on deck to watch the voyage.

At World's End gets off to a grimly grotesque beginning with lengthy lines of imprisoned pirates being led to a row of gallowses as stodgy British officials stand by. The condemned are surprisingly resigned, offering no resistance, but one lad, still in possession of a hauntingly high choirboy voice, steps up to his spot singing the traditional pirate anthem, and soon all the others have joined in, a gesture of solidarity that sparks an uprising, a last stand of the pirates from around the world against the evils of the East India Trading Company, as led by the sadistically sinister Lord Cutler Beckett (Tom Hollander).

The dreariness of the opening gives way to a swashbuckling swordfight involving our old friends Elizabeth Swann (Keira Knightley) and Will Turner (Bloom) and the recently re-animated Captain Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush). A ship and crew is what they're after, since all three want to sail off in search of Captain Jack Sparrow (Depp), whose last encounter with Elizabeth resulted in his death and banishment into Davy Jones' Locker, which for him is a trippy sort of purgatory in which he finds himself commanding a crew of insubordinate clones of himself in one of the film's funniest scenes.

Eventually, of course, Jack is reunited with his comrades, at which point it's off to the pirate council along with eight other key representatives of various geographical ranges. And then things really start to get tricky. There's a whole new cast of characters to keep track of - or not, since it really is the carryover characters we're interested in. The oft-thwarted romance between Elizabeth and Will takes a bit of a backseat for a while in favor of the tragic tale of Davy Jones (Bill Nighy) and Calypso (Naomie Harris), the sea goddess whose powers the pirates are hoping to release by coming together as one. Because she's so temperamental, there's no guarantee she will agree to ransack Beckett's boats, but it looks like she's their best shot.

With all the characters often motivated by different things, this third installment feels a bit muddled, just as the second did. But the constant action, rousing score, barrage of effects and solid cast make it entertaining, if still not quite as brilliant as Curse of the Black Pearl. It's considerably darker than that first film, and not nearly as hilarious as the trailers suggest, though there are plenty of knee-slapping moments throughout the movie, most involving Jack's faithful crewmembers Pintel (Lee Arenberg) and Ragetti (Mackenzie Crook), the feisty monkey Jack, the strangely elegant Barbossa or Captain Sparrow himself, still weaving drunkenly through his scenes with slurred speech and upper mouth constantly engaged in rabbit-like twitching. There's nothing really to compare with Jack's grand entrance in the first film or his wheel-running antics in the second, but the ship full of Sparrows is wildly amusing, and the extra Jacks continue to pop up over the course of the rest of the movie, along with, on a couple of occasions, Jack's dear old dad, played by Keith Richards in a nice little homage to the inspiration behind our favorite drunken captain.

Beckett remains a consistently creepy presence, seeming far more inherently evil than the swindling but charming Barbossa; Elizabeth's father (Jonathan Pryce) and her former fiance (Jack Davenport) both have fairly brief but crucial roles to play in the plot. Nighy and Harris still have exceptionally annoying voices - or is that just me? The film ends in what feels like a conclusive place for each of our heroes, with some of Jack's funniest lines coming in the last few minutes. Elizabeth and Will, having battled their own demons all along, arrive at an interesting point before we leave them, not quite as ecstatically happily ever after as they could be, perhaps, but in a way that feels satisfying. Incidentally, it's worth it to sit through the credits, since once again patient moviegoers are rewarded with a scene at the end...

I'd rate this at about the same level as the second movie, delivering the sort of zest that fans are seeking but never quite capturing the charm, wit and plotting of the original. But three hours on the high seas with Johnny Depp is always a welcome way to spend an evening, and if they do decide to go for a fourth installment, you can be sure I'll be on board for that as well.