Captain Phillips

Captain Phillips is a biopic of merchant mariner Captain Richards Phillips who was kidnapped and held hostage by Somalian pirates back in 2009.  It’s an adaptation of the book A Captain’s Duty: Somali Pirates, Navy SEALs and Dangerous Days at Sea, which was written by the aforementioned Richard Phillips, and is directed by Paul Greengrass’s who is possibly most famous for his work on the original Bourne films.

The story is one that many will be familiar with but I will try and avoid spoilers as if you don’t know the story, it will certainly add to the tension, particularly at the end.   Captain Phillips’s (Tom Hanks) ship the Maersk Alabama is boarded by a group of Somali pirates led by Muse (Barkhad Abdi).  After their attempts to take over the ship fail they still manage to kidnap Phillips and escape on a lifeboat leaving him trapped with them as they desperately try and make it to the Somali coast where they can ransom him.  Meanwhile this has become a major incident back in America and a host of Navy vessels are sent out to attempt to bring Phillips back alive.

Hanks portrayal of Phillips is the linchpin of this film and it has to be picked out as one of the highpoints, in particular the incredibly emotional ending which proves beyond doubt that the man, who has now been acting for over three decades, can still reach deep inside himself and find an extra gear.  It’s a moment that will live long in the memory of anyone that see’s it and will surely be what people point towards when he is nominated for an Oscar.  Where the real surprise comes from however is Barkhad Abdi, in his first ever performance as the head pirate Muse.  To stand up to Tom Hanks in your on screen debut is hard enough but to then do so and manage to make this pirate a sympathetic character speaks volumes of a young man who we shall surely hear more from in the future.  Don’t be surprised if he finds himself into an Oscar nomination spot as well.

It’s this sympathy for the pirate characters that really makes this film stand out.  It would have been easy for Greengrass to strip them of any redeeming qualities and to paint them as pure evil, but instead he shows their journey right from the start, and suggests that these characters are not quite as in control of their destiny as you might believe.  An idea that is shown up in an excellent conversation between Hanks and Abdi’s characters when Hanks states that “there must be more than fishing and kidnapping people?” before Abdi shoots him down with the line “maybe in America Irish, maybe in America.”

Another interesting decision by Greengrass is that we never actually see the reaction to all of this back on mainland America, we only hear of it through references by other characters.  This means that, apart from a brief scene at the start, Captain Phillips’s family are regularly mentioned but never actually seen on camera.  It’s a decision that in the whole pays off, as the constant flicking back and forth between the ship and mainland America could have easily had a distancing effect and instead we feel like we are stuck with Phillips and Phillips alone, with no knowledge of what his family are thinking or doing.

This is one of the first films to have been released in the UK that is picking up that Oscar buzz that is so common at this time of year and upon viewing it, it is easy to see why.  I don’t think it’s unfair to say that it’s the best we’ve seen Hanks in quite a few years and in Barkhad Abdi Greengrass and co may have found a new star.  This entire film however stands together as a fantastic piece of work as everything from the main actors to the characters to the cinematography stands up to scrutiny and makes sure that this is just a fantastically well made piece of work.