Pirate Booty

Whatever charm the film builds in its first hour is almost completely lost in endless chase scenes involving computer-generated skeletons. Really, did the entire movie have to go back to the same pirate island and stash of Cortez's gold twice? Was it really necessary to build a two-hour-plus movie around some forgettable crime some forgettable pirates led by hackneyed Captain Barbossa (scenery-chewing Geoffrey Rush) had committed sometime in the past and were now determined to undo?

Pulliam and India admitted they were stumped why the film's climactic scenes required Orlando Bloom's blood to be spilled on a piece of jewelry. Not only did it make little sense, it simply wasn't interesting, not while a far more compelling tale had been developing about an uptight commodore, penniless but hunky blacksmith and a booty-licious pirate all vying for a young heroine.

Emily Piraino

Angela Pulliam and India

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But surely Disney wasn't about to subject its underage target audience to something so titillating. No, for the small ones, there's only one appropriate entertainment, Hollywood types seem to think -- and that's unadulterated mayhem!

"I wouldn't let a kid see this," Pulliam said in some astonishment afterward. Though there was a cartoonish flavor to the pirates-as-walking-dead battle scenes, there was also plenty of good old carnage.

And some of it was just pointless. Barbossa and his comrades, see, are under a curse that makes them undead. Under the light of the moon, their true skeletal nature is revealed. Eventually, one of our heroes also falls under the curse and becomes a walking cadaver. A sword battle then ensues between Barbossa and this hero that must have seemed like a special effects tour-de-force to Disney filmmakers -- but did any of them stop to ask themselves why two creatures that couldn't be killed would fight each other?

Pulliam just shook her head remembering the endless scenes of thrust and parry. The skeletons, she said, just didn't work for her.

"I've looked that way before," Pulliam cracked. "It wasn't really very impressive."