Pirates Of The Caribbean & A Jamaican Police Crime
Though the series has lost some of its luster over the years, Disney’s Pirates Of The Caribbean saga can fairly be called one of the most influential franchises of the 21st century.
When Pirates Of The Caribbean: The Curse Of The Black Pearl debuted in 2003, it was one of the boldest and most adventurous films we’d seen in years. It brought Johnny Depp’s career to shocking new heights (let’s not forget, he was nominated for an Oscar for his first turn as Jack Sparrow), and put pirate themes at the forefront of fiction and entertainment.
Not only have we seen three subsequent Pirates Of The Caribbean movies, but other pirate narratives have popped up over the years as well. In much the same way Game Of Thrones seems to have led to a streak of violent historical fictions (think Vikings and Marco Polo), Pirates Of The Caribbean can likely be said to have influenced the rise of Black Sails on Starz. Though it’s designed as a prequel to Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island and is presented with far less humor and goofiness than Pirates Of The Caribbean, the show capitalizes on the same sense of swashbuckling adventure that Johnny Depp first awakened in society.
Video game developers have also taken advantage of this intrigue in the aftermath of Pirates Of The Caribbean. Numerous games have touched on these themes, though Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed series probably has the most noteworthy title. Assassin’s Creed: Black Flag was pretty much entirely about pirating adventures on the high seas, and arguably brought this brand of fiction to life in a way no other game has managed to do. However, it’s not the only example. It’s a popular game, sure, but the presence of a pirate-themed game among Gala Casino’s jackpots is more indicative of the widespread interest in pirate themes. There, slot machines and other games take on a range of different themes, often related to the most popular films or shows of the day. Yet even 13 years after the initial Pirates Of The Caribbean release, Pirate Plunder—a game featuring pirate-related symbols on its slot reel—is among the featured titles.
All this is to say that Pirates Of The Caribbean, despite suffering some from a dwindling reputation, made a serious dent in entertainment and pop culture. Each of the following films has performed worse with critics, down to the point where the most recent effort, 2011’s Pirates Of The Caribbean: On Stranger Tides scored positive reviews with only 32 percent of critics. However, that hasn’t seemed to halt interest in the movies or in pirate fiction in general. And sure enough, a fifth installment is on the way.
Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales is due out in 2017, and with six years having passed since the fourth film, it already feels like more of a reboot than a sequel. It may be that this series has gotten a little too silly to get back on the solid footing that made the first effort so captivating, but so many years later it could also be a nice opportunity for a fresh start. The project will also benefit from the introduction of Javier Bardem as a new villain (Captain Salazar), as well as the return of Orlando Bloom’s Will Turner character, who was central to the first few films.
It’s certainly an intriguing project, though the most interesting thing about it, particularly from a Jamaican point of view, may actually be its title. Sure, “Dead Men Tell No Tales” sounds like an ominous phrase that’s right in line with the style of Pirates Of The Caribbean, but the truth is the title already holds some significance in the Caribbean. It could merely be a coincidence, but BBC produced a documentary called Jamaica: Dead Men Tell No Tales. Crafted as an indictment of the nation’s police force, the documentary examined a spattering of killings and violent offenses by police officers between 1999 and 2001. It also touched on the issue that police were seldom, if ever, punished for such crimes.
Now, again, it could merely be a coincidence. As it happens, “Dead Men Tell No Tales” is also the name of a Motorhead song. It could easily be intended as an original title for the film as well. However, it’s worth noting that there is a sort of underlying theme of policing, in some capacity, in the Pirates Of The Caribbean series. What Johnny Depp’s Jack Sparrow character has always desired above all else is freedom. He even explains in the first film that he’s so hellbent on regaining his beloved ship, the Black Pearl, because “what a ship really is, is freedom.” Yet wherever he goes on the high seas, he is chased, battled, and threatened with death and imprisonment (granted, often with good cause). And according to CinemaBlend, we’ll see more of the same this time around. The new Captain Salazar character leads a determined mission to hunt down and kill every pirate on the seas, including Jack.
That’s far from a direct adaptation of the BBC documentary, but the idea of rampant, unpunished, and targeted crime links the two in an interesting way. Unfortunately, this upcoming fifth Pirates Of The Caribbean film did not come back to the Caribbean for filming, as some of its predecessors did. But to see it even loosely based on ideas from actual Caribbean history would be interesting indeed.
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