Author Michael Singer's book, BRING ME THAT HORIZON: THE MAKING OF PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN puts much of the films' DVD bonus material in print, then goes further to include numerous behind-the-scene stories and experiences in greater detail, all backed up by numerous photos, many of which are exclusive to this edition.

Rather than present the making of Disney's PIRATES trilogy in chronological order of film release, this large-format book tours the production process in six topical chapters, including a photographic forward by producer Jerry Bruckheimer who compiled his own volumes of still pictures from each movie.

Chapter 1, Hitting the High Seas, relates the genesis of PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: THE CURSE OF THE BLACK PEARL, and how it both picked up where Disney classics like TREASURE ISLAND left off, while forging new and live-action film history for the studio.  PIRATES the film quickly became PIRATES the social phenomenon, as the public appetite and enthusiasm for swashbuckling swag and swagger exploded, thanks largely to Johnny Depp's Oscar-nominated performance as Captain Jack Sparrow. After the pirate film genre languished in cinematic obscurity, scuttled after several modern era films failed to capture audience imagination or critical interest, the odds that THE CURSE OF THE BLACK PEARL would succeed even moderately were long.  But director Gore Verbinski with writers Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio discovered movie treasure. This chapter relates the PIRATES phenomenon created by Jack Sparrow's unforgettable entrance into film history, appealing to a wide range of audience ages and demographics. The film's global success then raised the question: how can the filmmakers possibly top it?  The answer: forge ahead just as boldly as their captain hero and produce two PIRATES sequels back-to-back! Over 200 days of main unit filming ensued across worldwide locations, to culminate in the staggering box office success of DEAD MAN'S CHEST in 2006 — now followed up and capped off by another haul of box office gold in PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: AT WORLD'S END this summer.

The book's second chapter, A Pirate's Life for Them, relates the historic legacy of pirates, in the Caribbean and elsewhere, including Edward Teach, Calico Jack Rackham, Anne Bonny, Mary Read and Jean Lafitte.  These actual figures in time inspired authors like Lord Byron, Gilbert and Sullivan, and of course Robert Louis Stevenson who created the iconic pirate tale, Treasure Island.  Michael Singer weaves these threads of actual fact and popular fiction together, including the impact that previous pirate films starring the likes of Errol Flynn, Tyrone Power and Burt Lancaster, to show how these swashbuckling people and characters strongly influenced the creative team in making his storytelling choices for his film series.

Yet just as important to the spirit of PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN is the inspiration provided by the ever-popular theme park attraction of the same name, created by Walt Disney at Disneyland.  Perhaps most profoundly impacted by the Yo Ho-ing ride in Anaheim was PIRATES star Johnny Depp, who relates a tale of how he's loved the attraction since he was a boy.   Singer timelines the creation of the Pirates ride, from its lengthy creative process with Walt Disney and his Imagineers, its 1967 completion just after Disney's death, and how the film's writers used the overall spirit of fun and thrills in the ride to inspire the onscreen adventures of Jack Sparrow. Depp's reverence for the Pirates ride and its creators came full circle when the crew invited to the set veteran Imagineer X Atencio, who wrote the show script and theme song for the attraction which started this new adventure on film.

This volume's third chapter, An Amazing Cast of Characters, visits all of the main and supporting deck hands populating all three PIRATES films, and offers enjoyable mini-biographies of the actors who bring their pirate alter egos to life onscreen.  Readers will learn how and why performers were cast in their respective roles, while relating individual stories of how these actors greatly shaped their characters' journeys through the trilogy storylines.  While there have been countless similar stories already published about the PIRATES stars Depp, Orlando Bloom and Keira Knightley, Singer's book pays welcome and overdue tribute to remainder of the team, including Kevin McNally, Jack Davenport, Lee Arenberg, Mackenzie Crook and their cohorts.

At 83 pages (nearly half the publication's page count), Creating the Pirate World is the longest and most comprehensive of Singer's book, an epic examination of every aspect and department involved in filming the PIRATES trilogy.  The author gives readers deep and detailed insights into PIRATES' production design, creating nearly all the ships, sets, props, costumes from scratch when not using actual, existing pieces like Jack Sparrow's pistol actually dating back to the 18th century.

Sub-chapters provide a wealth of behind-the-scenes photos and reportage of how the production altered and adapted their techniques when filming the back-to-back sequels.  For instance, ship masters created a vastly improved and more maneuverable Black Pearl for DEAD MAN'S CHEST and AT WORLD'S END than the shell of a ship used in CURSE OF THE BLACK PEARL.  You'll see how designers and builders turned the Flying Dutchman into a nightmarish nautical lifeform of its own, and recreated the Blue Bayou swamp found in the Disneyland ride into Tia Dalma's dark and mysterious hideaway by flooding a soundstage.

Singer delivers many previously-unseen photographs of the Singapore, Shipwreck City sets built for AT WORLD'S END, which cleverly employed many old school filmmaking tricks and techniques to create endless vistas within a confined soundstage while shaving millions of dollars off the double-production's astronomical budget.

Readers will discover real treasure in exclusive shots and stories revealing how Verbinski and crew filmed the complex cannon battle in the middle of the Maelstrom for the finale of AT WORLD'S END, for which any DVD making-of extras are a good six months away.  An enjoyable cinematic irony unfolds as the PIRATES crew spent years avoiding and battling unfavorable weather conditions in order to put three films on screen, only to move production indoors where they then had to recreate hurricane-strength wind, rain and rolling seas in the Southern California desert.

No production department gets short changed in this epic chapter, including location scouts who battled modern technology and the lack of it to find suitable coves and islands to play the Caribbean tropics, Far East seas and frozen arctic expanses — not to mention the nightmarish netherworld of Davy Jones' Locker.  Well earned salutations are paid to the daring and occasionally dizzied stunt team, who devised a safe but spectacular ways to swordfight atop crumbling churches and tumbling waterwheels. 

The digital magicians at George Lucas' ILM division also get plenty of in-depth attention with plenty of photos demonstrating their groundbreaking innovations used to film the PIRATES films.   Singer not only provides readers with a thorough primer on various bluescreen scenes and techniques, but enhances discussions of the CG effects used to create the digital decomposition of Captain Barbossa and his cursed BLACK PEARL crew of living skeletons.

Better still, throughout the book Singer strives to relate the human and dramatic side to such eye-popping special effects, as with the interview of Bill Nighy on the imaginative challenges he faces creating the tentacled nightmare of the deep, Davy Jones.  ILM devised the IMoCap special effects technique to capture Nighy's on-set performance with his fellow actors, then used stunning computer graphics to visually enhance his work instead of replacing it.  Nighy's story demonstrates the humor involved acting while dressed in a gray pajamas while Depp and Bloom were bedecked in their pirate finest, but the phenomenal success of the results prove this creative team effort worked better than all could imagine.

In the end, these films being more than the sum of their seemingly countless parts is one of the major themes confirmed time and again in this book.  THE CURSE OF THE BLACK PEARL was a surprise smash hit beyond the wildest dreams of Bruckheimer, Verbinski, Elliott, Rossio and the studio.  Yet not content to simply repeat their first success, the PIRATES crew reached far beyond a logical estimation of their grasp to produce to follow-up sequels simultaneously, more than doubling the time, effort, and innovation required to film the original chapter in the trilogy.

As Singer emphasizes in his brief but heartfelt afterword, relating Johnny Depp's final day of filming as Captain Jack Sparrow, the entire filmmaking troupe became an extended family of pirates themselves: setting themselves an uncharted course of travel to exotic lands, facing the fury of both nature and studio budget demands, and devoting up to five years of their lives in a common adventure on the high seas.   Studio heads tell no tales so it is unknown whether more PIRATES films are on the horizon, but read this richly written and lavishly illustrated book on the making of three extraordinary landmarks in modern cinema, and you'll see why all hands would gladly sign up for another journey to the Caribbean at the next tide.

Michael Singer's BRING ME THAT HORIZON: THE MAKING OF THE PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN is a worthy and valuable companion piece to THE ART OF PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN, earning a deserved slot in fans' library collections.  Packed with 176 pages of rare and often exclusive photos and artwork which take you from first concepts to final scenes on location, this volume offers an enthusiastic approach to documenting the lengthy, difficult trip endured to produce one of film's most popular and successful series — a trend which still continues in theaters as AT WORLD'S END sails toward box office gold.  For the making-of material on this latest chapter, the book earns its purchase price alone, since no other documentary in any form will match it until AT WORLD'S END arrives with video bonus features on DVD.   Author Michael Singer lives up to his book's title, and delivers to readers a bountiful sea of entertaining features and photos, as far as an eye-patched pirate can see.

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