Pirates Prequel

[Rob Knotts]

I never got to see this in the theatre, but I did have the pleasure of seeing it on cable years before anybody would've expected Disney's themepark-movie trend.

The first Pirates of the Caribbean movie was by no means a carbon copy, but if any movie could be cited as the most obvious inspiration, Tommy Lee Jones' 1983 Nate and Hayes (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0085994/) is it.

Ironically, this movie had fallen into such obscurity that it seems it's only chance at a DVD release was to cash on the current popularity of the Pirates franchise.

[kpenguin]

mmmmm... is it good? Movies in obscurity are usually, though not always, of average enjoyability.

[Rob Knotts]

I'd have to call it a B-movie, but it's still very entertaining. One thing that seems to have kept it from being better known is that Jones' veteran pirate character (very similar to Depp's character), put him almost as a second fiddle to the younger stars Michael O'Keefe and Jenny Seagrove, and it was Jones' career that really flourished in the years that followed.

I've also heard rumours that the film benefitted from a better title (Savage Islands) and marketing in the U.K., but I've never been able to verify that.

PS: Like Jones and Depp, the characters played by O'keefe and Seagrove correspond very closely with those played by Bloom & Knightly, forming a very similar trio of main characters (although Seagrove's "damsel in distress" was very passive compared to Knightly's character).