Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl (2003) on Netflix
PG-1320032h 23mActionAdventureFantasy
Jack Sparrow sails into Port Royal in search of a ship. When the Black Pearl's crew attacks the town and takes Elizabeth Swann, blacksmith Will Turner frees Jack to go after her.
- Netflix4.0/5
- IMDb8.1/101,346,141 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes79%
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Plot summary
Early in the 18th century, Elizabeth Swann, the daughter of Governor Weatherby Swann, is aboard HMS Dauntless when the ship comes upon a wreck and the crew pulls a boy, Will Turner, from the water. While he is unconscious she takes a gold medallion from around his neck. Eight years on, Will works as a blacksmith in Port Royal, Jamaica. Norrington proposes marriage to Elizabeth, and Jack Sparrow comes ashore looking for a ship. The Black Pearl attacks Port Royal that night; its crew, hunting the medallion, carries Elizabeth away to Captain Barbossa. Will frees Jack, and the pair steal HMS Interceptor and sail to Tortuga to find a crew and give chase.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl (2003)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Johnny Depp based his Jack Sparrow performance on Keith Richards after researching 18th-century pirates, surprising the cast and crew at the first read-through. Disney executives asked whether the character was drunk or gay, and Michael Eisner proclaimed, "He's ruining the film!"
- After The Country Bears flopped in 2002, Disney chief Michael Eisner tried to shut down production of Pirates of the Caribbean, but director Gore Verbinski told his concept artists to keep working, and Eisner was astonished by what had been created when he visited.
- Stuart Beattie, who drafted early versions of the script, created the character Jack Sparrow with Hugh Jackman in mind, but Jackman was not well known outside his native Australia, so Johnny Depp was cast instead.
- Michael Eisner added the subtitle The Curse of the Black Pearl in case the film warranted sequels; Verbinski protested, since the cursed treasure is the Aztec gold, not the ship. Eisner refused to back down, and the subtitle was kept so small on posters it was barely visible.
- Screenwriter Terry Rossio said Disney was hit with at least six plagiarism lawsuits over the first Pirates film, for supposedly stealing elements of the Monkey Island video game and the novel On Stranger Tides.
- Alan Silvestri was hired to score the film but left before recording anything, citing creative differences with producer Jerry Bruckheimer; Hans Zimmer's team took over, though Zimmer declined the bulk of the work because he was busy scoring The Last Samurai.
- The Curse of the Black Pearl was the first film released under the Walt Disney Pictures banner to be rated PG-13 by the MPAA, for action/adventure violence.
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