PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: ON STRANGER TIDES (12A, 137 mins) 4/10(12A, 137 mins) 4/10
JOHNNY Depp’s impressive resume is littered with oddballs from the heartbreaking title role in Edward Scissorhands and iconic B-movie director Ed Wood to a creepily childlike Willy Wonka and the maddest Hatter ever to grace Alice’s Wonderland.
Yet of all these eye-catching roles, he is probably best known as salty seadog Jack Sparrow in the Pirates Of The Caribbean films.
Alas, if the third chapter of the series, At World’s End, was a water-logged bore, On Stranger Tides is moored in similar shallows.
The introduction of 3D, purely for financial rather than any obvious artistic reasons, doesn’t help the film either. This time around, Jack (Depp) joins forces with Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush) to locate the Fountain Of Youth: one of the world’s last undiscovered treasures.
The quest becomes infinitely more perilous when Jack is forced aboard the Queen Anne’s Revenge captained by legendary pirate Blackbeard (Ian McShane), who is also seeking the Fountain, aided by his sexy daughter, Angelica (Penelope Cruz).
Pirates Of The Caribbean: On Stranger Tides starts off so promisingly with a fast-paced extended sequence in London, which sees Jack escaping from the king’s men by riding on the roofs of moving horse-drawn carriages.
Once the film takes to the water, the plot springs leaks and simmering screen chemistry between Cruz and Depp surprisingly never catches light.
