Captain Phillips - REVIEW- SPOILERS

Captain Phillips is a shining example of film-making that will stand with some of the all-time greats in years to come. Standing as one of the best movies this year, Captain Phillips is sure to get some awards. The story details the first American cargo ship to be hijacked in almost 200 years, done so by Somali pirates on the horn of Africa. The true element to this story really engrosses you into the thick of it. Genuine fear will send your heart racing too sinking deep into your chest in a matter of seconds, then an incredibly powerful ending that tugs the heart strings. The ending is also completely improvised and made the Navy medic cry in the first take.

A movie with such a good script and storyline obviously needs a powerful cast behind it to really portray the characters effectively. Fortunately enough, Greengrass has selected quite the collection. In general, Tom Hanks is a top line actor who can fill seats but also give a top class performance, without compromising everyone else on screen. A group of people who look creep up from time to time in the movie world were very silent throughout, but the lines they were given made life difficult when they never met the pirates until the scene which really instilled a sense of fear into the whole of the boat crew. Then we have the Somali pirates who are dropped in at the deep end for their first
IMDB credit and I can see them doing fairly well for themselves in the future. A calm and collected Muse (Barkhad Abdi) bounces off of Captain Phillips on a regular basis and the confrontation is electric. Muse speaks the logic of Somalia of achieving something, and living happily while Phillips tries to reason with him and save everyone’s lives. This could be a connotation for what America should stand for and what they actually do but that’s just digging. A big name cast is very hard to work out to some decent standard, a mass of A-listers can end up looking like they are fighting for dominance on screen but utilizing a varied cast can always pose a better acted movie experience even when big actors draw people in, it shows an intention to make it about the story and not money.

"They're not here to fish"

All I can do is credit this film. I’ve been on large cruise ships and small vessels over the years and I understand how much room you have. Filming at sea on a giant cargo vessel is really difficult as you have to consider many variables. Keeping the footage relatively smooth is probably one of the harder parts but it utilizes this to look like a documentary and the second hardest is using space effectively. You’re at sea, it’s not easy to get expansive landscape shots when you’re drifting out in the ocean. To compensate and keep shots moving, helicopters are used fairly often to track the ships as they sail. From expansive padding too story footage - When hidden in the engine room, you almost feel like you’re hiding with the crew just by how it is all framed. A shot that grinds on me a little is the initial sighting of the pirates. The cliché shot is when the perspective shot of looking through a scope with a
slightly grainy effect added really doesn’t look that good. I would have preferred to have seen a fast paced collection of close ups to build up some more excitement.

The sound for the whole of the movie was good. The rumble of the engines and the ting from assault rifle rounds hitting the ship and pinging around are crystal clear. When the navy jump in the sound is very clear but in comparison to the pirates when they boarded the ship, it was really difficult to keep pace with what was being said, fortunately there are subtitles but these don’t always help when you have everyone shouting. Not much could be said about the soundtrack for the movie, the only thing really is that it wasn’t very striking, it didn’t ring in my mind repeatedly which was a shame but easily forgiven.
So finally we have my opinion on the film. An incredible movie which stands as one of the best this year. Rivalling Rush is hard to do but this movie is put together perfectly and with Tom Hanks final scene, it’s extremely moving. Overall, a 9/10 to equal Rush. A bit more focus on the soundtrack and a few little camera angles would have pushed it forward for me.

Sorry that it has been a while. With everything that is going on, I’ve lost a lot of motivation for anything regarding work or reviews. I just need to get back into the flow of things. I hope you enjoyed the post, if so, like it, Comment, subscribe to the Youtube channel or tweet me on twitter!