And thus, I have been remarkably successful over the years at declaring whether or not a movie is crap. And so it was with Captain Phillips.
Truth in advertising: This review was mostly written after I saw the movie, so you're just going to have to allow me the same suspension of disbelief that you bring to, say, a garden variety Tom Hanks thriller, and accept that I had all these notions in mind before watching the flick. Besides, I'm not going to dazzle you with my prescience on this one, for reasons that shall become obvious.
I got off to a rocky start in reviewing Captain Phillips. As a regular movie-goer, I had seen the predictable trailers and advertisements for months prior, and wondered at the disconnect between this dramatization and reality. As a military Geek, I had followed the actual event - particularly the finale involving Navy Seals - with great interest, based on the representation of their superhuman performance. And as somebody who routinely practices a bare but consistent minimum when it comes to safeguarding my own house, possessions and the safety of my family, I looked on incredulously at the ability of Somali "pirates" to emasculate the world's most powerful nations and largest corporations by capturing literally hundreds of giant freighters laden with billions in merchandise using nothing more than a handful of dinghies, rusty carbines and Radio Shack walkie-talkies.
Seriously, these pirates had not the resources to take down my humble abode in Northwest Houston, so it was surreal that the international maritime community was unable to deal with them for almost a decade. As a long-time advocate of shouting at the television screen, on no subject did I shout longer or more loudly than about the sheer idiocy of the people who owned and ran the freighters that plied the Gulf of Aden, with the possible exception of their respective governments. Just ask my wife.
That brings us to Tom Hanks. I could go on forever about my decades-long dissatisfaction with Hanks, but that will be a topic for another day. Today I will simply observe that since he starred in the movie "Castaway" in 2000, I have lived simply to avoid ever watching him have another "Wilson Moment". You know the one I'm talking about: In Castaway, as the sole survivor of an airplane crash on a deserted island, Hanks' character suffered the elements, starvation and loneliness in such Christ-like proportions that he felt compelled to draw a face on - and fall in love with - a partially deflated soccer ball. In fact, throughout the second half of the movie, he talked to it, slept with it, had dinner with it, played with it and took it for walks.
When it washed out to sea later in the film, Hanks' felt such guilt over his inattention to Wilson's safety and so tragically missed his little round paramour that he delivered forth an epic eulogy complete with rendered loin cloth, much emoting and the expenditure of many calories, which is saying a lot, since by that stage in the movie Hanks' character was lacking loincloth and food, whilst Hanks as an actor has always lacked the chops to plausibly emote.
And thus we come to the crux of the "Wilson Moment" phenomenon: If as an actor you cannot deliver genuine human emotions through any subtle means, then you employ means that are not. In Hanks' case, that means yelling a lot. So, since you've either already seen Captain Phillips or are going to see it regardless of what I say, look for his Wilson Moment(s) and then watch Castaway again. You will find that sublime, pure and joyous unintentional comedy that stalks the pretensions of actors like Tom Hanks the way Woody Allen stalks teenage fashion shows - and on that basis alone, you can enjoy Captain Phillips in a way that most of the movie-going public will not.
And what I wouldn't give to be a fly on the wall when the real Captain Phillips previewed the movie. In real life, he appears to be a man of unusual courage and stoicism, and his public accounts of his misadventure are factual, sober and fairly self-deprecating. Once Hanks' got done with him, though, he had to be asking himself whether there was enough money in the world to justify Tom Hanks presenting him to the world as a big fat effing crybaby, much less somebody who went all Stockholm Syndrome and developed a deep, meaningful relationship with the vicious cannibal that lead the small pirate crew.
As I alluded earlier, the "Wilson Moment" was not the only depravity this movie inflicted on reality, and that is where the Navy Seals come in. The Trailers and other hints released by the studio portrayed the Navy Seals the same way the Media did directly after the conflict, as cool, uber-efficient assassins who swept in under cover of darkness and promptly took out the pirates with some nifty improvised subterfuge, three shots fired, and no collateral damage. The only problem is that the actual intervention didn't even remotely go down that way, which is a shame, because the truth of the matter is so much more interesting than the fictional account.
In reality, the three pirates who remained on the lifeboat with Captain Phillips were not taken out with just one shot each by snipers from the deck of the navy ship towing the lifeboat. They apparently pumped dozens of rounds into the boat, miraculously missing Phillips yet riddling the pirates. Another Seal team then assaulted the lifeboat, gained entry, and riddled all three pirates with many more bullets. Now, there has been some quibbling about the rights of even pirates under international law, but that criticism has been for naught. Everybody knows pirates deserve no more justice than can be accommodated with a rope and a convenient yardarm, but the reality of the rescue stands in sharp contrast to the fictional account of the take-down, which was inexplicably rendered antiseptically clean, perhaps to enable the narrative and the "special relationship" that Hanks had formed with his bloodthirsty captor.
The last detail of the True Story, though, is the real kicker, and was also intentionally excluded from the movie: After the Seal team exited the lifeboat and both Captain Phillips and the dead pirates were evacuated, the $30,000 ransom money was never seen again. You cannot make this stuff up, which is why I am astounded that the Director saw fit not to include it. Exactly how cool would it have been if the Seal Team leader had said to his crew - as they boarded the Black Helicopter that lifted them off the Carrier - "drinks are on me boys; and there's gonna be a little something extra in your Christmas stocking this year."
And if they were righteous souls, they'd have given Captain Phillips a taste, because Seals are fair that way. Hooyah!
And who knows? Maybe the producers get around to telling that story in the sequel. In the meantime, I've got only a modest use for the movie "Captain Phillips", and no use at all for the over-bearing Tom Hanks.
"Wilsonnnnnnnnnnnnnn!"
"Wilsonnnnnnnnnnnnnn!"
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