’Captain Phillips’: ’Incomplete’ and ’less than completely satisfying’ (photo: Mahat M. Ali, Tom Hanks, Faysal Ahmed in ’Captain Phillips’) In Paul Greengrass’ thriller starring Tom Hanks, Captain Phillips, the titular Captain is a merchant ship’s skipper whose cargo vessel, the Mv Maersk Alabama, was hijacked by Somali pirates in March 2009. The event became worldwide news in nearly real time after the Captain was taken hostage by the pirates, who fled the merchant vessel in one of its lifeboats. In short order, the four pirates, with Captain Phillips under armed duress, found themselves pursued and surrounded by several American naval war vessels intent on preventing the Captain from being taken to Somalia — the inference being quite clear to all. Mostly adapted from the Captain’s memoir — a book with the unwieldy title A Captain’s Duty: Somali Pirates, Navy SEALs, and Dangerous Days at Sea — Captain Phillips is conversely...
- 10/14/2013
- by Tim Cogshell
- Alt Film Guide
Tom Hanks’ ‘Captain Phillips’ weekend box office: One of Hanks’ biggest domestic openings in the past decade Starring two-time Oscar winner Tom Hanks in the title role — though you wouldn’t know it by looking at the film’s poster — Paul Greengrass’ inspired-by-real-life-events Captain Phillips grossed an estimated $8.5 million from 3,020 venues on Friday, October 11, 2013, including $600,000 from Thursday night showings, according to studio estimates found at Box Office Mojo. Captain Phillips chronicles the adventures of the titular captain of an American cargo ship hijacked by Somali pirates in 2009. (Photo: Tom Hanks in Captain Phillips.) Budgeted at $55 million — not including marketing and distribution expenses — Captain Phillips should collect anywhere between $23-25 million by Sunday evening. A major Saturday surge and a strong Sunday hold could lead to even higher results, but for now that’s mere speculation. Either way, Captain Phillips has absolutely no chance of topping this weekend’s domestic box office chart,...
- 10/13/2013
- by Zac Gille
- Alt Film Guide
‘Captain Phillips’: Tom Hanks’ Somali pirates movie likely to trail ‘Gravity’ by a wide margin Starring Tom Hanks in the title role, Paul Greengrass’ Captain Phillips grossed an estimated $600,000 from showings on Thursday night, October 10, 2013. The film follows the titular real-life captain of an American cargo ship hijacked by Somali pirates in 2009 — reportedly the first such hijacking in two centuries. (Photo: Tom Hanks in Captain Phillips.) Seven years ago, Paul Greengrass came up with another film inspired by real-life events pitting heroic Americans vs. Muslim evildoers: the well-received domestic box office disappointment United 93, about the one September 11, 2001, flight in which the passengers rebelled against the Muslim terrorists. Distributor Sony Pictures is obviously expecting much better business for the less traumatic movie-fied events found in the $55 million-budgeted Captain Phillips, which, even factoring in inflation, has a price tag more than three times higher than that of United 93. In fact,...
- 10/12/2013
- by Zac Gille
- Alt Film Guide
Screened
Edinburgh International Film Festival
EDINBURGH, Scotland -- It's Sept. 11, 2001, and a man whispers into a telephone: "I love you. I love you". But it's neither a victim of that dreadful day nor a survivor. It's one of the perpetrators. In Channel 4's riveting drama about the events leading up to the atrocities of Sept. 11, Ziad Jarrah and his cohorts are portrayed as ordinary mortals whose fanaticism emerges from everyday lives that are otherwise quite mundane.
The decision by director Antonia Bird and writers Ronan Bennett and Alice Perman not to demonize the men who committed the most heinous crime in recent memory is a brave one. Indeed the film's evenhandedness may offend some. It's unhelpful, however, to dismiss the men as monsters and instructive to be reminded that great evil may be rooted in heartfelt delusion. This is a film of great intensity and should find a wide audience for its considerable cinematic merit and worthwhile contribution to understanding the incomprehensible. It airs Thursday on the U.K.'s Channel 4.
As in Channel 4's previous docudramas Sunday, The Deal and Omagh, the script for The Hamburg Cell is based on "known facts and actual events" and strives to portray them objectively. It follows the development of a cell of Muslim revolutionaries established in the German city of Hamburg five years before the World Trade Center's twin towers were brought down.
At the center is Jarrah, a rich man's son from Lebanon who is studying dentistry. More secular than Muslim, Jarrah falls for Aysel (Agni Tsangaridou), an independent Turkish student who objects when an Islamic group targets him for induction.
Karim Saleh plays Jarrah with the soulful innocence that Al Pacino brought to the young Michael Corleone. Like the Godfather's son, Jarrah's bland features and timorous smile mask an inner turmoil hinted at only in his haunted eyes.
Gradually, he is drawn into the clutches of a mosque whose members espouse violence as the proper means to wage the jihad they see as a requirement of their interpretation of Islam. He remains ambivalent, seemingly earnest in his affection for Aysel and confessing that, having attended Catholic school, he was an indifferent Muslim. But the imam tells him sharply that he must say his prayers. He was in an infidel society, and he must not let himself be alone.
As he becomes closer to fellow initiates Mohamed Atta (Kamel) and Ramzi bin al Shibh (Omar Berdouni), the incessant radicalization begins to take hold. The modern world is a confusion. The modern world wants to take God from him. Every able-bodied man must train for the jihad.
Atta in particular is convinced. A Palestinian, he is a lonely and ascetic man who chides his friends for taking a beer or even wearing their shirts open. He longs to return to his homeland but when he visits, his cold and distant father scolds him for not pursuing a doctorate, having just obtained his master's degree, and his mother pines for grandchildren. Back in Germany, whatever drives his anger occupies him fully.
Soon the three students are in Afghanistan being trained by al-Qaida. When they return, the Hamburg cell leaders flatter and cajole them to join their violent plans. With growing and devastating suspense, the film shows the tragic path of fanatics who have lost sight of their objectives and redoubled their efforts to get there.
Throughout the building tension, the film offers reminders of how evidence of the impending assault was overlooked and how warnings of the dangers were not heeded. With the terrible Sept. 11 images seen only fleetingly at the beginning, the film ends with the perpetrators disappearing through an airport departure enclosure.
THE HAMBURG CELL
A Mentorn/Inner Circle Pictures GmbH/Simply Committed GmbH co-production for Channel 4 produced in association with the Canadian Broadcasting Corp.
Credits:
Director: Antonia Bird
Co-writers: Ronan Bennett, Alice Perman
Producer: Finola Dwyer
Executive producers: David Aukin, George Carey
Cinematographer: Florian Hoffmeister
Editor: St. John O'Rorke
Production designer: Richard Hoover, Phil Roberson
Art director: Ulrich Schroder
Nicholas Scott, Iris Trescher
Costume designer: Antje Gebauer
Cast:
Ziad Jarrah: Karim Saleh
Mohamed Atta: Kamel
Aysel: Agni Tsangaridou
Ramzi bin al Shibh: Omar Berdouni
Marwan Shehhi: Adnan Maral
Abdulrahman Al-Makhadi: Kammy Darweish
No MPAA rating...
Edinburgh International Film Festival
EDINBURGH, Scotland -- It's Sept. 11, 2001, and a man whispers into a telephone: "I love you. I love you". But it's neither a victim of that dreadful day nor a survivor. It's one of the perpetrators. In Channel 4's riveting drama about the events leading up to the atrocities of Sept. 11, Ziad Jarrah and his cohorts are portrayed as ordinary mortals whose fanaticism emerges from everyday lives that are otherwise quite mundane.
The decision by director Antonia Bird and writers Ronan Bennett and Alice Perman not to demonize the men who committed the most heinous crime in recent memory is a brave one. Indeed the film's evenhandedness may offend some. It's unhelpful, however, to dismiss the men as monsters and instructive to be reminded that great evil may be rooted in heartfelt delusion. This is a film of great intensity and should find a wide audience for its considerable cinematic merit and worthwhile contribution to understanding the incomprehensible. It airs Thursday on the U.K.'s Channel 4.
As in Channel 4's previous docudramas Sunday, The Deal and Omagh, the script for The Hamburg Cell is based on "known facts and actual events" and strives to portray them objectively. It follows the development of a cell of Muslim revolutionaries established in the German city of Hamburg five years before the World Trade Center's twin towers were brought down.
At the center is Jarrah, a rich man's son from Lebanon who is studying dentistry. More secular than Muslim, Jarrah falls for Aysel (Agni Tsangaridou), an independent Turkish student who objects when an Islamic group targets him for induction.
Karim Saleh plays Jarrah with the soulful innocence that Al Pacino brought to the young Michael Corleone. Like the Godfather's son, Jarrah's bland features and timorous smile mask an inner turmoil hinted at only in his haunted eyes.
Gradually, he is drawn into the clutches of a mosque whose members espouse violence as the proper means to wage the jihad they see as a requirement of their interpretation of Islam. He remains ambivalent, seemingly earnest in his affection for Aysel and confessing that, having attended Catholic school, he was an indifferent Muslim. But the imam tells him sharply that he must say his prayers. He was in an infidel society, and he must not let himself be alone.
As he becomes closer to fellow initiates Mohamed Atta (Kamel) and Ramzi bin al Shibh (Omar Berdouni), the incessant radicalization begins to take hold. The modern world is a confusion. The modern world wants to take God from him. Every able-bodied man must train for the jihad.
Atta in particular is convinced. A Palestinian, he is a lonely and ascetic man who chides his friends for taking a beer or even wearing their shirts open. He longs to return to his homeland but when he visits, his cold and distant father scolds him for not pursuing a doctorate, having just obtained his master's degree, and his mother pines for grandchildren. Back in Germany, whatever drives his anger occupies him fully.
Soon the three students are in Afghanistan being trained by al-Qaida. When they return, the Hamburg cell leaders flatter and cajole them to join their violent plans. With growing and devastating suspense, the film shows the tragic path of fanatics who have lost sight of their objectives and redoubled their efforts to get there.
Throughout the building tension, the film offers reminders of how evidence of the impending assault was overlooked and how warnings of the dangers were not heeded. With the terrible Sept. 11 images seen only fleetingly at the beginning, the film ends with the perpetrators disappearing through an airport departure enclosure.
THE HAMBURG CELL
A Mentorn/Inner Circle Pictures GmbH/Simply Committed GmbH co-production for Channel 4 produced in association with the Canadian Broadcasting Corp.
Credits:
Director: Antonia Bird
Co-writers: Ronan Bennett, Alice Perman
Producer: Finola Dwyer
Executive producers: David Aukin, George Carey
Cinematographer: Florian Hoffmeister
Editor: St. John O'Rorke
Production designer: Richard Hoover, Phil Roberson
Art director: Ulrich Schroder
Nicholas Scott, Iris Trescher
Costume designer: Antje Gebauer
Cast:
Ziad Jarrah: Karim Saleh
Mohamed Atta: Kamel
Aysel: Agni Tsangaridou
Ramzi bin al Shibh: Omar Berdouni
Marwan Shehhi: Adnan Maral
Abdulrahman Al-Makhadi: Kammy Darweish
No MPAA rating...
- 8/30/2004
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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