Even the last film, 2017’s Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales, which was already mired in Depp’s controversial private life, grossed $800 million worldwide. When the film was released in 2003, it was the first Disney film to carry a PG-13 rating.Īnd yet somehow, Pirates of the Caribbean has become one of the most dependably bankable franchises in Hollywood. While in production, Disney executives were nervous about Johnny Depp’s fey portrayal of the lead pirate, Captain Jack Sparrow, and the dark tone being conjured by director Gore Verbinski. And pirate movies, of any kind, were seen as box office kryptonite, especially since the last big budget endeavor, 1995’s Cutthroat Island, bankrupted its studio and made the Guinness Book of World Records for the biggest flop. It was already off to a wobbly start with Brian De Palma’s Mission to Mars and, er, The Country Bears. The film was born out of an initiative, started by former Disney CEO Michael Eisner, to mine the company’s many theme park attractions for potential movie franchises.
Pirates of the Caribbean was never supposed to work.
