The Pirates! Band of Misfits The Pirates! Band of Misfits
2012 ‘The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists!’ Directed by Peter Lord, Jeff Newitt
Synopsis
It's A Plunderful Life
In The Pirates! Band of Misfits, Hugh Grant stars in his first animated role as the luxuriantly bearded Pirate Captain – a boundlessly enthusiastic, if somewhat less-than-successful, terror of the High Seas. With a rag-tag crew at his side (Martin Freeman, Brendan Gleeson, Russell Tovey, and Ashley Jensen), and seemingly blind to the impossible odds stacked against him, the Captain has one dream: to beat his bitter rivals Black Bellamy (Jeremy Piven) and Cutlass Liz (Salma Hayek) to the much coveted Pirate Of The Year Award. It’s a quest that takes our heroes from the shores of exotic Blood Island to the foggy streets of Victorian London. Along the way they battle a diabolical queen (Imelda Staunton) and team up with a haplessly smitten young scientist (David Tennant), but never lose sight of what a pirate loves best: adventure!
Cast
Popular reviews
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Hey, it's called The Pirates, in an Adventure with Scientists! Did the creationist crowd object?
Anyway never mind, this is a brilliant, anarchic, possibly treasonous family comedy. Multiple viewings will be required to catch all the sight gags such is the volume of detail in every frame. The voice cast are tremendous, but Hugh Grant takes the film cutting a dashing swash as the Pirate Captain. Apparently five years in the making, Pixar are really going to have to bring thier A game with Brave not to see Aardman swipe the shiny best animated film swag at next year's Oscars.
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IT'S CALLED THE PIRATES! IN AN ADVENTURE WITH SCIENTISTS GODDAMMIT!!
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I know it is close to treason for an Englishman to admit but ... I don’t really care for Aardman’s feature films. Their pun-tastic comedy and silent era style slapstick always seems better suited to more shortform stories and The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists does little to dissuade me from this belief. Reviewing an Aardman feature requires the obligatory mentions of the stunning stop-frame animation that is packed with character and little details. It also goes without saying that the film is full of the familiar warm, and very British, wit, puns and in-jokes.
Even Hugh Grant makes for a surprisingly good, if clueless, pirate and a likeable lead. His ragtag crew and competition are equally memorable and…
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I really must say that I favor Aardman's short films to their feature films. The shorts with Wallace and Gromit are simply great, just the right amount of gags in the right amount of time. On the other hand, Wallace & Gromit in The Curse of the Were-Rabbit barely managed to keep it up all the way through, and that's probably just because I love Gromit.
Here we have the same problem, it's an animated feature film which is supposed to be highly paced and with laughs all around. Unfortunately it doesn't fire on more than one cannon at a time, if that. For instance, the speech cards presented by Mr. Bobo are funny the first two times, after that the…
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Warm and charming, Aardman simply create great films. A cast of hugely like able characters and a few more adult jokes thrown in for us older folk, meaning that anyone can enjoy it. Excellent family viewing.
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The director has done something marvellous here. Made both a Hugh Grant and an Aardman film not totally fucking shite.
A fun, smiley film.
Went into this thinking I was gonna be walking a plank, ended up knee deep in grog and booty.
Recent reviews
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I couldn't get through this movie, the level of humor in it seemed targeted at 5 year olds, and I found no charm in it at all.
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Visuals: The stop motion animation is really quite stunning in this. THe best part about the film.
9/10Acting: Great bunch of talented voice actors. Their voices lends allot to the fun.
8/10Story: I think kids would get much more out of this action/adventure comedy than I would. Even with a rather short running time, I found myself waiting for the next scene.
6/10Concept: Pirates, put together with a story I feel like I have seen before.
6/10Personal: Fun enough for me. But nothing I really loved.
6.5/10Re-Watchability: I would give this another go, at some point. I am sure there are allot of jokes I missed out on.
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Although not the best animated film of 2012 it is easily the funniest.
One thing I have against it though is there is no heavy emotional moments like there are in other animated films such as Toy Story and ParaNorman. The Pirates just stays in the same light-hearted, silly tone for 90 minutes which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it does hold the film back.
It mainly focuses on smart comedy and succeeds. Most of the jokes are tailored for adults than instead of kids and if you're a fan of British humor you should definitely check this out.
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So misleading from U.S. marketing. What a drag.
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I was craving for a nicely done old school stop motion animation. I recommend it to every film fan, regardless of age.
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Pirates in an Adventure with Scientists (presumably renamed to make it easier to market on the US) is entertaining in the tradition of the Aardman animations. Clever, wittytype, fun. My 6-year-old daughter has watched it twice in 2 days... Probably not up there with the best of Wallace and Grommit, but still a long way ahead of a lot if other contemporary children's films.
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Going back yet again. I've bought it this time. It's too much fun to forget about. Perhaps having recently enjoyed reading all 5 of the adventures published by Gideon Defoe has something to do with it. There are so many laughs in this movie, often stupid jokes sure but they tickle me where I guffaw and I'm not ashamed to say it. Almost certain to feature on my Top 15 of 2012. Actually if amount of time spent enjoying myself watching it was the major consideration it would be number 1.
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Something that’s going to be highly subjective for people is the humor in the film. This is a film with a very British, very dry sense of humor. It’s not going for the belly laughs very often; it’s more likely to go for the “Hey, wait a minute” moments. I appreciate dry humor, and so I was enjoying this, but it’s an acquired taste and won’t be to everybody’s liking. And rather importantly, as this is a film primarily aimed at children, most children are probably not going to be laughing much. Even so, it still has a lot to recommend it.The animation is some truly great clay animation, flowing smoothly and naturally and it’s always bright and colorful. The film is a lot of fun simply to look at. And the humor, if one is in the right mindset to appreciate it, is fast and frequent, though often subtle. Read full review.
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Great sound track