May issue of Movie Entertainment Magazine (Canada) heaps praise on Johnny Depp's Captain Jack Sparrow

In the May 2007 issue of Canada’s Movie Entertainment Magazine, critic Jay Stone writes this about Johnny Depp: “How we love Johnny Depp: his unkempt good looks, his aura of vaguely rehabilitated naughtiness, his determination to keep his name below the title, so you never really know what a ‘Johnny Depp’ movie might be. Director Tim Burton calls him a character actor in a leading man’s body. And how we love Jack Sparrow, unregenerate coward, egotistical scoundrel, amoral buccaneer determined to beat the devil with a combination of betrayal, speed and good luck . . . .”

Although “unregenerate coward” is perhaps not really an accurate description of Captain Jack, who behaves heroically on more than one occasion, most of Stone’s appreciation is close to the mark and great fun to read. He invites us to imagine the consequences of different casting: “Imagine how Brad Pitt, say, could have turned the role into an unregenerate hunk, or how the ‘sensitive’ sincerity of a Jake Gyllenhaal or a Heath Ledger could have spoiled all the knavish fun.” Concludes Stone, “No other actor could have done justice to the Jack Sparrow role.”

The Zone thanks Intodadepps for posting scans of the article on the News & Views forum; you can read all of Jay Stone’s article there. Mr. Stone is the national movie writer for CanWest News Service. –Part-Time Poet