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Jack the monkey

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The monkey, Jack (after Jack Sparrow), is a fictional Capuchin monkey in the movie Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl. He was Captain Barbossa's pet and sailed with him aboard the Black Pearl. Like the rest of the crew, Jack was cursed so that he couldn't die, and turned skeletal in the moonlight. Most likely he was named, mockingly, after Pearl's former master, Captain Jack Sparrow.

History

Template:Spoiler Jack was a crew member on the Black Pearl at the time they had the curse put on him, but other than that little is known about his life before the film.

For the first half of the movie, Jack does little but hold Barbossa's coin. However, later Jack helps more by stealing back an Aztec coin, and, pointing out which way Elizabeth goes. Jack also tries to keep Elizabeth from freeing her friends, but he fails and is thrown into the ocean. The curse is later broken.

In an Easter egg after the film, Jack is shown swimming into the cave, stealing an Aztec coin, and becoming cursed again.

Between the first and the second movies, a hurricane strikes the cave, and all the medallions are washed out to sea.[citation needed] In the second film, Gibbs says that the island was 'reclaimed by the sea' but does not mention a hurricane. Jack the monkey remains cursed. Later, Jack the monkey returns to the Black Pearl, now under the command of Captain Jack Sparrow once again. The monkey soon becomes something of a nuisance to Sparrow and the crew, being difficult to catch and impossible to kill. Captain Jack often shoots the monkey, claiming that it improves his aim and makes him (Sparrow) feel better.

Later in the film, the crew manage to capture Jack the monkey and use him to barter in a deal with Tia Dalma, after a rather memorable demonstration of the monkey's immortality by Jack shooting him and saying the words "Look, an undead monkey!" When the resurrected Barbossa is revealed at the end of the film, Jack the monkey once again sits atop his master's shoulder.

Template:Endspoiler

Trivia

  • Jack was played by Tara, a 10-year-old female monkey, and Levi, an 8-year-old male. The Skeletal monkey was added in post-production by Industrial Light and Magic.
  • Accordingly to commentary and special features on the DVD, the monkeys were sometimes difficult to work with as they were easily distracted. ("I want to stuff the monkey!" Keira Knightley jokingly exclaimed in the commentary.) Reportedly actor Geoffrey Rush, who played Barbossa, would patiently wait for the monkey to look in the direction it was supposed to, then deliver his lines. In some occasions, a water gun was used to grab the monkeys attention by squirting it a few times. It is said in the commentary that Geoffrey Rush got hit a few times by accident.
  • In the first movie Jack (the monkey) is seen smiling when Barbossa thanks him specifically after he returns the Aztec coin to him after Jack (the human) chases him. In the special features on the DVD it is revealed that the monkey did this purely by chance and it was not planned out in any way.
  • A similar incident in the first movie showed Barbossa and Jack the Monkey sharing similar confused looks while chasing The Dauntless in brief scene.
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