Piet Pirate and the Sword of Silver Tooth (2008)

Directed by: Bart van Leemputten | 80 minutes | family, adventure | Actors: Peter Vandevelde, Dirk Bosschaert, Anke Helsen, Dirk van Vooren, Peter Faber, Florent Veldeman, Charlotte Dommershausen, Felix Meyer, Ellen van Gelder, Bas Swerts, Sterre Hubrechtsen

In the top three of most popular professions among preschoolers – and then very traditionally among boys – is undoubtedly ‘pirate’. Fortunately, the youngest inhabitants of our country do not yet realize what kind of villains real pirates are, but they still have a vision of this career choice, in which a pirate is more or less a superhero à la Spider-Man or Batman. One of the reasons for the increasing popularity of pirates is of course ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’, but many preschoolers will only have learned something about this indirectly. No, Piet Piraat can be seen as the one who sparked the interest in rough sea life among young children. On television since 2001, and three feature films later… ‘Piet Piraat’ is still popular.

In ‘Piet Pirate and the Sword of Silver Tooth’, Piet Pirate discovers that he is not in the encyclopedia of pirates. That’s because he’s never found a treasure. He feels very sad about this, but there are bigger problems: the food supply is running out, which ensures that Berend Bokkenpap’s kibbled porridge doesn’t taste like anything anymore. Fortunately, Steven Stil discovers an island, even an uninhabited island! The three shipmates go ashore with their captain to look for food. That is exciting, because can you imagine there are cannibals? Meanwhile, the viewer has long known that the island is not uninhabited, there are even seven people and a dog! After a shipwreck, pirate Eksteroog was washed ashore with his sidekick Reus and the ship’s cook’s five children. He holds the kids’ dog, Smikkel, captive so that they do what he says, which is to search for the treasure of his arch-rival Silvertooth. When Piet Piraat and his crew meet the children, they soon decide to help the children.

Much of the film is set on the island, so the setting is quite simple. A bit of sand, a few trees and some half-baked huts, that’s all it is. The scenes on the water are also not very convincing, but only the parents or older brothers and sisters who are dragged in see that. The target audience will also not care that Peter Faber is painted as a Jack Sparrow look-a-like and that the humor mainly consists of letting wind and licking the filthy feet of Faber’s character Eksteroog. The cast performs well, the kids are cute, and the songs will thump you along after a chorus. It’s nice that the songs are sung from two points of view: from the five children and from the crew of De Scheve Schuit. For the little ones, the film is just a little too exciting (it is suggested that there are cannibals, there is a skeleton and a dark cave, the parents of the children are dead, aren’t they?). But for the older and/or tougher kids, ‘Piet Pirate and the Sword of Silver Tooth’ is just a fun adventure film.