“Ho-hum, ho-hum, I’d rather have a bottle of rum” than watch this snoozefest! Director Rob Marshall (Chicago) has fashioned something better than Pirates 2 and 3, but that’s not a high bar. There’s one action scene that is half-exciting (Jack Sparrow’s (Johnny Depp) escape from the London palace) but the rest seems to drag, which is a problem for an action flick. The plot’s not as convoluted as the prior 2 installments, but it still doesn’t make sense …

E.g. if the profane ritual at the Fountain of Youth extends the life of the beneficiary by the number of years left in the victim, how does that help both Angelica (Penelope Cruz) and Blackbeard, who were both fatally poisoned? Or why does Angelica want to sacrifice herself for Blackbeard anyway, given how he treats her? Or why does the mermaid, when freed, find the chalices and give them to Jack Sparrow?

The cast are all dialing it in, from Johnny Depp’s mincing Sparrow, to Penelope Cruz’s cliched fiery Latina, to Ian McShane’s least menacing Blackbeard ever.

It was a pleasant surprise that director Gore Verbinski was able to make a half-decent popcorn flick based on, of all things, a Disney theme park ride (Pirates of the Carribean: The Curse of the Black Pearl (2003)), but things have really gone downhill from there. Not worth seeing, unless you have nothing better to do, e.g. you’ve already seen all 16 seasons combined of Buffy and X-Files on Netflix streaming …

½ (out of 5)