Booty: Duel!

Sometimes piratical things just fall into my lap, which is why Triple P has Friday Booty. What started out as a way to share hilariously random stuff like this has turned into an experiment in the absurd and wonderful connections between our modern world and the freebooters we love. That said, is everyone ready for dueling?

Yesterday the First Mate sent me a YouTube video from a new ad campaign from Captain Morgan Rum. The ads feature Marisa Miller (whose name is curiously trademarked, just as an aside) as the Captain’s First Mate. In this sequence we find her alone on a beach, her ancient galleon at anchor in the harbor behind her, going through a stack of casks that one has to assume are full of Captain Morgan (the rum; not the dude). To her seeming delight, another pirate shows up no doubt after her booty (the rum; not the… oh never mind) and the cutlasses start flying.

While I’m no expert, I did take fencing in college and my instructor – affectionately known to us as “Mr. P” – would have had a good laugh with that one. So much is wrong with it that it’s impossible to pick a place to start. Don’t get me wrong, I get the point; we’re not watching the fencing, are we?

All the same, and by way of comparison, go to this post to see real fencing in a piratical context. Or, just watch this clip from one of the best movies on swordsmanship ever made, Ridley Scott’s The Duellists. Harvey Kitel, who plays the driven Feroud, learned to fence for the movie in a very short time and is clearly a natural. He also illustrates one of Mr. P’s favorite injunctions to his students: “Get your hair out of your face; it’s another weakness your opponent can manipulate.” Are you listening, Marisa Miller ™?