If those numbers told the whole story, then I could end this review here and tell you this is the best movie we’ve seen in a long time. It isn’t. Nor, for my money, was it even the best movie of the summer (Superman Returns, for example, is a stronger, more genuinely entertaining film). But it certainly has enough going for it to make it worth your while.  

A noisy, boisterous sequel to the original film, which was surprisingly deft and clever, especially considering it was based on a Disney theme park ride, Dead Man’s Chest picks up soon after the events of the first film, with honorable blacksmith Will Turner (Orlando Bloom) looking to wed his young love, Elizabeth Swann (Keira Knightley). But their nuptials are interrupted by warrants for their arrest.

They are seized for aiding the scoundrel pirate, Capt Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp), and helping him escape the authorities. Their only hope of pardon is to track down Sparrow and obtain his compass and return it to the shady Lord Cutler Beckett (Tom Hollander). Meanwhile, Sparrow has problems of his own as we learn that he’s also the marked man of the infamous Davy Jones (Bill Nighy). The ghostly, squid-faced pirate, who leads a crew of cursed, deformed seamen (including Will’s long-lost father, Bootstrap Bill, played effectively by longtime character actor Stellan Skarsgaard), is looking to collect on a mysterious debt.

Dead Man’s Chest is startlingly plot-heavy and crammed full of gags, action set pieces and overall sheer mayhem.  Returning director Gore Verbinski and screenwriters Terry Rossio and Ted Elliott (both of whom also worked on the original, as well as Shrek and Aladdin) keep most of their wits about them and certainly still exhibit a kind of playfulness, personified by Depp’s still winning and highly amusing portrayal of the shifty Capt Jack, that should be celebrated.

But what’s lacking is much of the charm of their first film as well as some level of restraint. While their “go for broke” attitude serves them well in many respects, the film is decidedly too long (and arguably too dark) and as it begins to wear, one gets the feeling they threw every idea against the wall… and instead of seeing what stuck, they decided to keep it all.  

Nevertheless, there are several reasons to recommend the film, starting with the aforementioned Depp.  His wacky energy is near priceless and definitely worth the price of admission. That energy also rubs off on his co-stars, who all rise to the task of being his witting foils. Lastly, the production values of the film are outstanding and the effects work is sterling, especially the design of the villainous Davy Jones. The combination of Nighy’s delicious performance with the CGI-effects work of the ILM team is quite a thing to behold.

As I watched the film, I was convinced they pulled it off using a combination of prosthetics and make-ups, along with computer-generated images. I was shocked to later find out they essentially pulled a “Jar-Jar”: Nighy performed his character on set in a motion-capture body suit and the effects team at ILM later animated over him completely (a la the Jar-Jar Binks character in the Star Wars prequels, though done to much better effect here) to create the Davy Jones character. It’s an absolutely convincing job and one that just might deserve an Oscar when the time comes.

Overall, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest, rated PG-13 for intense sequences of adventure violence as well as frightening images, is worth seeing if you were a fan of the original film, but it does not match the sheer joy and entertainment value of that film’s charming derring-do and swashbuckling merriment.