MacGyver of the Caribbean

He's chained to a chair.  The henchmen have gone to fetch their leader, so he has a bare minute to assess the tools at hand.  A balcony, a window, a table sumptously laid for a meal.  A chandelier.

The food distracts: it's been too long since his last meal.  He edges the heavy chair forward, reaching.  An oozing cream-puff bounces off a plate, but it's too late, they're coming, and he kicks it upward, hiding attempted theft in plain sight, pierced on the chandelier.  The room fills with soldiers, numbers impossible to fight, but his quick mind has identified a chance, and all he needs is some way to get out of these chains...

It's scenes like these which are the core of the Pirates of the Caribbean series for me.  Jack Sparrow is the Captain of Chaos Theory, capable of seeing potential connections at a glance, and engineering the escape device as readily as any blond-headed inventor.  If only he would use his powers for good, instead of for rum.

Overall, On Stranger Tides is a fun outing.  I gather the story has been borrowed from a book of the same name, and knowing nothing about the book I suspect that it spends a little more time than the movie on the thoughts and feelings of a stalwart missionary.  Perhaps his motivation was left on the cutting-room floor, leaving a major plot point as "she's too pretty to be evil".  But otherwise recommended.