"That's the secret? The grand adventure? You spent three days lying on the beach drinking rum!"

Normally I’d be prepared to abandon this film on a godforsaken spit o’ land, but then I’d be forgettin’ one thing mate: Captain Jack Sparrow.

Seriously, “Pirates of the Caribbean” isn’t a great film in most ways. For a swashbuckling film, not nearly enough buckle gets swashed, although what there is is good. Plot: pretty much non-existent. Script: Good enough, but generally only where Captain Jack Sparrow is involved.

It also has to be said that “Pirates of the Caribbean” starts, for an action-adventure-swashbuckler, in an exceptionally dull manner. The first three scenes made me wonder whether seeing this had been a mistake, pirates or not.

Then Captain Jack Sparrow entered.

Some background is in order. Captain Jack Sparrow is played by Johnny Depp, who, in real life, is a good friend of Keith Richards. Captain Jack Sparrow, is, in a stroke of genius, Johnny Depp doing his Keith Richards impersonation. This is bloody hilarious, and succeeds in making piracy look really, really cool. From this point on the film became worth watching, but only when Captain Jack Sparrow was involved.

That’s really all there is to say. See this film for Captain Jack Sparrow. Hell, I’ll see any sequels as long as Depp plays him. There are some other highlights to this film. These include: Aztecs, an undead Mackenzie Crook, Jack Davenport once again turning up as a posh English bloke, a big hat, rum, Royal Marines shouting “huzzah!”, and a monkey.

But Captain Jack Sparrow is better.