Captain Red (Walter Matthau) runs a hardy pirate ship with the able assistance of Frog, a dashing young French sailor.Featuring a peg leg, cannibalism, a mutiny... this has everything that a pirate film should have. Fans of the Johnny Depp films may like this -- many of the scenes look like the exact same sets were used.Written and directed by Roman Polanski and unlike anything else he has down. I could draw a line to "MacBeth" because of the period costumes, but that is the biggest connection i can force. Roman Polanski conceived this film several years before he actually made it. He had hoped to cast Jack Nicholson as Captain Red, and himself as The Frog. I think I would have enjoyed that more.

Walter Matthau played many villains in his career, but his performance of the greasy, dirty, thoroughly charismatic Thomas Bartholemew Red is one of the best. Pulling out all stops (presumably with the blessings of director Roman Polanski) Matthau acted as the personification of guile and greed. He is seen floating on a raft at the beginning with his one loyal crewman "Frog" (Chris Campion), and are rescued by a Spanish galleon that they learn is carrying a treasure (a golden throne) and the daughter of a Spanish Governor. Matthau gets started stirring up the crew's discontent, in order to take over the galleon. But despite his stratagems, it is not easy - due to the countermeasures of Don Alfonso De la Torres (Damien Thomas), who is as ruthless in his way as Matthau is.This film would be memorable for just one moment I never forgot - to stir up the crew to mutiny, Red and Frog "find" a dead rat in the crew's food. The rat is brought to the attention of Torres. Instead of stammering apologies, Torres asks the pertinent question if any other rats were found in the food or on the ship. The crew thinks about it, and have to admit none were. So there is only this rat. Torres looks at the rat, and points out it looks like it isn't' even the type of rat found on boats at sea. It looks like a land rat - in which case, the rat was planted. So who found it? Red and Frog are brought forward. Torres does not beat them. He takes his sword, and cuts the dead rat in half. He gives half to each man, and tells to eat it. With some self-control, both men finish their half of the rat!Later was another scene regarding camera angles and bathtub shots. Roy Kinnear was playing a seventeenth century fence, who is useful to Matthau and the other pirates, but universally disliked (he gets his cut from the treasures, but he never puts his own life on the line regarding getting the treasures). Kinnear is taking a bath when Captain Red is announced. He knows that Red particularly dislikes him. A moment later Red is standing before the naked Kinnear in his steaming tub. While a disgusted Kinnear watches (we see Red from the back) the pirate urinates into Kinnear's bathtub.Any film with two sequences like that is unforgettable and entertaining.

To say this is Polanski's worst movie isn't to say it's the worst movie ever. But it IS pretty bad. First off, Walter Matthau is badly miscast in a role that would seem perfect for him: a crotchety old Cockney pirate. Actually, the Cockney part is the biggest failure of Matthau's performance; his accent is terrible. And Cris Campion, who looks a little like FEARLESS VAMPIRE KILLERS-era Polanski, and even does a reasonable job of mimicking Polanski's performance in that film, he just can't hold his own next to Matthau. And since Matthau's performance is nothing outstanding (and again, that horrible Cockney accent... ugh!), there's nothing exciting to look at. Polanski gives us beautiful scenery, filling every frame with his well-known eye for minute details, and of course there is plenty of his absurd humor to go around. But Polanski forgets to tell a story. There is almost no plot, and while the film is amusing enough in spots, it simply rambles for far too long; it should be about 30 minutes shorter. All in all, I think Polanski is an under-appreciated director. Even those films of his that are generally considered misfires or even out-and-out failures, I tend to admire greatly. Something about his vision speaks to me, and that is something I find even in this film. But unfortunately there may be a little too much of that here, and not enough plot. In my favorite of his films -- THE TENANT, CUL-DE-SAC, THE FEARLESS VAMPIRE KILLERS, and ROSEMARY'S BABY -- he was able to balance his penchant for bizarre (often verging on scatological) humor and absurdist worldview with a strong, entertaining story (as in ROSEMARY'S BABY, where the story is of the utmost importance in terms of impact), and/or compelling performances (as in CUL-DE-SAC, where the cast is about 80% of the film's impact). Polanski's casting isn't as inspired here, and the frankly dull series of events that try to pass themselves off as a plot here are too haphazardly interesting to be totally convincing. Polanski's attempt to recapture the spirit of THE FEARLESS VAMPIRE KILLERS is unfortunately uninspired. Think how much better it might have been if Polanski had made the film in 1976 as he'd intended, with Jack Nicholson in the lead and himself in the Cris Campion role. But then I guess we wouldn't have THE TENANT, which is one of my favorite movies.

This is the story about the pirate captain Thomas Bartholomew Red, played by Walther Matthau, and his struggle to get a famous aztec treasure from the hands of the Spanish nation. Escaping from a desert island with his faithful french sailor "the Frog", his soul purpose in life becomes that of getting his hands on the treasure, a throne of solid gold. Walther Matthau plays extraordinarily well in his role as the great captain, with Cris Campion as the faithful right hand. This movie is extremely underrated, the fact that Pirates of the Caribbean is actually rated higher, is an outrage. The Disney tale of ghosts and magic is just a fairytale. Pirates on the other hand, gives us a view of the fight between the classes, aristocrats versus the common laborer, all based in the pirate age of the caribbean.This movie gets a 8/10 from me.