Cole's Take on CAPTAIN PHILLIPS

Cole's Rating: ★★ ½

Jesse's Rating: ★★★ ½

Director: Paul Greengrass

Year: 2013

Cast: Tom Hanks, Barkhad Abdi

Genre: Action/Adventure/Biography
MPAA Rating: PG-13

I often hear the phrase, “don’t judge a book by its cover”. It’s a metaphoric statement to be sure, but in the case of film, this can translate to “don’t judge a movie by it’s title, year, cast, director, or what have you”. It’s too broad a statement to ring true, so when people asked why I wasn’t going to like the new Tom Hanks movie, Captain Phillips, (because I told them that I predicted it to not be that great of a movie) for me to explain to them that I was judging it before seeing it was futile. Their response was “you can’t judge a book by its cover”. Yet as I write before you, the readers, today, I find myself recycling the words I said weeks ago, before the film’s release. “The trailer says it all. It probably masks a good performance by Tom Hanks, but the plot is too fleshed out in the description. My money says that it doesn’t have much more to offer than what it purports, which isn’t immensely spectacular, so therefore, I don’t believe it will be that great of a film.”

Captain Phillips chronicles the week (or so) long journey of Captain Phillips, from the superficial conversation about the small troubles back at home with his wife and kids to a hostage situation with Somali pirates on a freighter ship in the middle of the ocean. If you’ve seen the trailer, I’m telling you nothing new, and that’s this movie’s major flaw.

 
Director Paul Greengrass is quite fond of his shaky camerawork. I’d stick my neck out and say that it gave me a major headache in his previous The Bourne Ultimatum, but here, I found it quite effective. It matched the pure terror of the situation, and best of all, it felt documentary-like. Along with the effortless way in which Hanks plays your ordinary guy, the first thirty or forty minutes is captivating, legitimate stuff. Then after the initial entry, the movie takes a plot turn that we all knew was coming. The Somali pirates start to press hard, and then the film successfully turns into an exhilarating motion picture. With steady, controlled handle of the cast and knowledge of the plot, Greengrass keeps ahold of the reigns for a good chunk of time, making this scary, exciting, and worthwhile. 

But then after it hits the hour and twenty minutes (or something like that, this movie is long) mark, it starts to deflate like a balloon, sucking all life, vitality, and exuberance out of it slowly until the only thing it’s got dragging the weight is Hanks. Considering all this, my first comment when the movie was over was “They should just give Hanks the Oscar right now.” And I meant every word of it. Mr. Hanks is one of the most talented actors in the industry, without question. He possesses the so coveted ability that is creating an invisible emotional connection with the audience, and his films all benefit because of it. From scene one, the thing that struck me first was believability. Hanks paints the images on his face and in his words more vividly than nearly any artist could on paper. 

What’s unfortunate is that he couldn’t totally save it. What can I say? The script just ran out of ideas, becoming more tedious and tedious as it went. I found myself yearning to walk out of the theater after some time because I knew how it was going to end, and after the repeated continuation of scenes inside the lifeboat, I had had enough. I knew what was coming (it’s got Hollywood written all over it, hint hint), and I wanted it to either end with a bang or end sooner. To my misfortune, it didn’t. The expected and necessary peak of the climax never quite came.

 
Considering that it harbors a cast that truly hits it home here (including the newbie Somali actors that protruded in a casting call to secure a well-deserved spot in the cast), it’s a crying shame that I was let down by Captain Phillips. Keeping that in mind, I will say this, though: it’s probably the best two and a half star rating that I’ve ever given a movie. It’s moving enough, it’s well-shot enough, and it’s enjoyable enough. But it’s just not good enough.

-Written by Cole Pollyea

Click HERE For Jesse's Review