Morgan Adams and her slave, William Shaw, are on a quest to recover the three portions of a treasure map. Unfortunately, the final portion is held by her murderous uncle, Dawg. Her crew is skeptical of her leadership abilities, so she must complete her quest before they mutiny against her. This is made yet more difficult by the efforts of the British crown to end her pirate raids.
It takes a two-hour act of will to keep facing the screen during this moribund movie.
– Desson Thomson,
Washington Post,
1 Jan 2000
fresh:
If the sight of half-naked, tattooed sailors firing cannons at each other shivers your timbers, climb aboard. Even passable pirate movies don't sail by every day.
– Susan Wloszczyna,
USA Today,
1 Jan 2000
rotten:
t's not possible to believe that Ms. Davis is the highly respected captain of a pirate ship, and it's not even fun to try.
– Janet Maslin,
New York Times,
20 May 2003
rotten:
In this $90m revisionist swashbuckler, we get Geena Davis doing the all-action honours, and a hotchpotch script that seems to think pirate movies are so funny in themselves the need for more humour is superfluous.
– Trevor Johnston,
Time Out,
9 Feb 2006
rotten:
What seemed like a dubious proposition on paper plays even more dubiously onscreen, as "Cutthroat Island" strenuously but vainly attempts to revive the thrills of old-fashioned pirate pictures.