Analysis of Pirates of the Caribbean: at the World's End

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Analysis of Pirates of the Caribbean: at the World’s End

   

Title: Present detailed reading of one film you have enjoyed. Explain its appeal to you and the pleasures it offers audience.

You may wish to consider some of the following: narrative devices and structure, film techniques, the appeal of characters or stars, identification with themes or issues, escapism.

Pirates of the Caribbean: At the world’s end is an action and adventure film which also includes some comedy elements. It appeals the mass audience by its narrative structure, great camerawork and soundtracks etc.

As it is a sequel to the to the last Pirates of the Caribbean film: dead man’s chest. Many conventions of narrative follow the prequel film. The enigmas have already been set in the previous film, and the audience may find the answer in this film, for example, where is the world’s end, while in the pirates3 it is presented as an endless dessert of white, which is connotation of loneliness and coldness. However, the leading character Jack does not appear at the start of the film. Instead, it starts with equilibrium of Lord Beckett’s execution of anyone association with piracy and the pirates sing a lament to raise their sprits. The storytelling follows the equilibrium, disruption and solution, with the end of every character finds his/her own position, but it also offers audience a complex treatment of theme. Betrayal, trust and selection of sides continue through the whole story. This may lead the audience to figure out who is fighting for whom. Actually, every character has their own goal and most of them are selfish. This also represents the characteristic of pirates. Because of this the main hero figure in the film, Jack, may not be so heroic as first appears. While he was in the locker, he suffers hallucinations, seeing multiple versions of himself with different characteristics. This adds the colour of the comedy and makes the film less dark. Interestingly, each of them represents a different facet of his personality. Alternatively, Jack could also be the ‘shape shifter’ as he is a character who cannot be trusted. The East Indian Company would be the villain and the ‘threshold guardian’ in Pirates3. Binary oppositions are seen as land and sea, life and death, betrayal and trust etc.

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There are also noticeable changes of the representations of characters. In the first Pirates of the Caribbean, Barbossa represents the villain whereas his figure becomes more positive in this film which can be seen from leading the crew to rescue Jack and fight in the whirlpool. There is significant change of Elizabeth’s representation. Unlike the representation of the beautiful princess who needs protection, she becomes a leader of all the pirates. This is shown through the impressive and cheerful encouragement to the crews, which is a representation of a female inspirational warrior. The representation of love is also significant. ...

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