Film: CAPTAIN PHILLIPS
Rating: PG-13
Release Date: October 11, 2013
Starring: Tom Hanks
Director: Paul Greengrass
Studio: Columbia Pictures
Genre: Forrest Gump Gets His Ass Hijacked By AK-47-Toting Pirates
Recommendation: 4 out of 5 “Yo-Ho-Yo-Ho-A-Pirate’s-Life-For-Me”
Crazy but true stories don’t get much crazier than the high-seas, heart pounder Hollywood’s churned out called Captain Phillips, about the first American cargo ship to be hijacked by pirates in over 200 years.
Starring Tom Hanks at his blue-collar Everyman-best, Captain Phillips sets sail in 2009. Hanks plays the commanding officer of a huge US container ship, the MV Maersk Alabama, who finds himself off the coast of Somalia blasted by the bang-bang of machine guns and boarded by pirates toting assault rifles. The booty-chasing ‘bucs have their butts set on shanghai-ing the Alabama and taking its 20-dude crew as ransom. Hanks and company blast the buccaneers with water cannons to keep ‘em at bay, only to be overrun. While fourteen of his crew plays hide-and-seek with the bandits, Hanks is held hostage at gunpoint. The ‘Bama crew deactivates and disables the ship’s systems so the pirates cannot pilot the ship. Hijacked to a lifeboat, Hanks spends four days getting punched, cold-cocked and bitch-slapped, while on-the-sly he’s playing mind games and mental chess with his clueless captors until the Navy SEALS arrive.
Directed by Paul Greengrass (Oscar nominated in ’07 for the gut-wrenching 9/11 thriller United 93), Captain Phillips is a desperate hours, docu-drama where the outcome hinges less on super heroic he-men in gore soaked gun battles and more on the brains and balls of one ordinary man.