As my holiday gift to other upstart film critics, looking to shake things up with an oblique, pithy assessment of a film they probably haven't even seen, I submit the following public-domain reviews of Master & Commander: The Far Side of the World.

• See sick.
• Ship wreck.
• Naut good.
• More anchor, less stanker.
• Interminable naval gazing.
• Crowe's messed.
• Man over-bored.
• Shallow end.
• Crap-sized.
• Ketch it on cable.
• Shit's ahoy!
• Too many buoys.
• Sea suck.
• Unfathomable.
• Mizzenmast? More like Snoozin-fast!!
• Peter Weir should keel himself.
• You'll heave, ho.
• Headstay, mind wander.
• A hollow vessel full of bland seamen.
• Master & Commander teaches us we've been wrong all along. The world IS flat.