Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (2011)

Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (2011), the fantasy swashbuckler film directed by Rob Marshall, marks a change in leadership for the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise. For this installment, Jerry Bruckheimer produces while Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio write, drawing inspiration from Tim Powers’ novel On Stranger Tides and connecting to previous films At World’s End (2007) and the first three Pirates movies. Set in 1750, the film follows a man who claims to have sailed with Ponce de León 200 years earlier and searches for the Fountain of Youth. Captain Jack Sparrow, still reeling from losing his ship to Hector Barbossa and obtaining Sao Feng’s map to the Fountain, must save his first mate Joshamee Gibbs from execution in London before getting captured himself. King George II wants Jack to lead an expedition to find the mythical fountain before it falls into Spanish hands.

Barbossa, now with a wooden leg and without the Pearl, joins the expedition as a privateer. Jack escapes, causing Barbossa to later enlist Gibbs, who commits Jack’s map to memory before destroying it. Together, they embark on the HMS Providence. Captain Teague, Jack’s father, informs Sparrow that the Profane Ritual is necessary for utilizing the Fountain’s powers. Jack also learns of another individual claiming to be him and recruiting a crew. This imposter turns out to be Angelica, Jack’s former lover and daughter of Blackbeard. She forces Jack onto the Queen Anne’s Revenge under her father’s command. Among the crew are zombified officers and Philip Swift, a missionary who was taken captive. Blackbeard practices voodoo magic as a brujo and seeks out the Fountain in order to avoid a prophesied death caused by someone with one leg.