Firstly, it made a hugely entertaining and very successful film out of pirates.
Then theres the sheer Saturday afternoon fun of it.
And then theres the casting.
Johnny Depp often gets the plaudits here, and he is in his element as Captain Jack Sparrow.
by a brilliant, scenery-chewing Geoffrey Rush, the ever-strong Jonathan Pryce and an underrated turn by Jack Davenport.
Orlando Bloom and Keira Knightley arent particularly special here, but they inhabit their roles well enough.
Things would never be this good for the franchise again.
On our 52 test display, weve not seen many films that are better.
Likewise, the audio is also outstanding, delivering terrific punch and a wonderfully wide soundstage.
Theres no lack of things to mooch through.
That said, the omission of the commentary tracks from the US release is a sad oversight.
But there are all sorts of problems.
Once again though, the disc is strong, and the presentation of the film is just excellent.
Even the shorter feature dealing with pre-production has enough nuggets to warrant giving it a spin.
And its where I had the most fun withAt Worlds End.
There are lots of them again, although once more, no commentary.
Across the board the discs are very strong, giving a ruthless workout to any half-decent home cinema rig.
Disney is working on the fourth.
Lets just hope the lessons of the last two have been learnt!
The Films:
Rating:
2 out of 5
