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Captain Phillips Movie Review

Captain Phillips is a 2013 biographical thriller film directed by Paul Greengrass and starring Tom Hanks and Barkhad Abdi. It’s an effective and very well made, but somewhat forgettable movie.

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“I’m the captain now“

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Maersk Alabama, an unarmed US container ship, gets hijacked by Somali pirates, led by Abduwali Muse, en route to Kenya. The ship’s captain and Muse soon are at the mercy of uncontrollable forces. This movie was nominated for six Academy Awards, but I don’t quite know if its legacy sustained itself after 2013. It’s very much a typical, forgettable Paul Greengrass movie. He directed it so well, but he failed to imbue it with the larger themes necessary to make this story stick more with viewers.

The reason to see this movie first and foremost is for the performances. Tom Hanks was snubbed by the Academy, but he should have been nominated for his excellent turn here that is one of his best in this century. He elevated the underwritten protagonist effectively with his very moving performance. His final emotional outburst was particularly striking.

Another standout is of course Barkhad Abdi in the role of the Somali pirate leader. He was so memorable, so authentically cast and so strong that he ended up being nominated for an Oscar. He deserved it and he was great, but it’s a shame that he did not get a bigger career after this film.

Captain Phillips is at its best when it’s focusing on the dynamic between these two very different men. Those scenes worked like a charm and I wished that there were more of those as the other plot points and characters were underdeveloped. The movie failed to make any single supporting player feel well developed or important.

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The movie is so well shot, scored and executed in its thriller action set pieces. The movie is a biopic for sure, but it worked more so as an effective thriller that is so suspenseful at times. The attention to detail in its storytelling and filmmaking was great to witness, but the overall story is slight, the runtime overly extended and the middle act felt a bit tiresome in comparison to the much stronger and more memorable beginning and ending. Besides the acting and technical nods, the movie did not deserve those Oscar nominations.