Captain Phillips (2013)

Great directors re-tell history through image. Paul Greengrass puts viewers inside history, as if the drama is happening in real time. His 9/11 tragedy “United 93” buckled me. “Captain Phillips” reaches higher -- despite clunky family babble talk at the opening -- at every moment and then after the action ends, our director lets the stench of violence smother as our hero (Tom Hanks) openly sobs in shell shock. You know the story: In 2009, four Somali bandit pirates took command of a U.S. cargo ship off the horn of Africa, and when their shit hijack plan went south, they jumped in a lifeboat with New Englander and freighter captain Richard Phillips (Hanks). Assured as death, the men invite the full force of the U.S Navy. Don’t fuck with America. Greengrass shows the pirates as desperate men out for mere money, clueless to the animal they unleashed, and Americans as trapped in first-world glory. Intense and highly claustrophobic, Greengrass captures the terrible, unknowable toll of crime -– terrorism, whatever you call it -– on body and soul. As the pirate leader, American immigrant and film newcomer Barkhad Abdi equals Hanks’ astonishing performance. His character may be outgunned. Not the actor. A