Throughout the course of Captain Phillips, the film’s chief antagonist, Muse (played perfectly by Barkhad Abdi) continuously assures Phillips that “Everything gonna be OK”.  While it’s obviously meant to be a phrase to appease his hostage, it’s also obvious that he’s trying to reassure himself through this mess he’s gotten himself into. As the situation in the film continues to spiral out of control, he always seems to have that single phrase on the tip of his tongue, as a way of telling himself and Phillips (whom he and his ragtag team dub Irish), that things will work out and be OK. For the movie itself, things don’t just end up being OK; this a film that utilizes suspense and some superb acting to create one of the years most unexpected, but riveting surprises.

Richard Phillips (Tom Hanks) is the Captain of what seems to be a standard expedition, bringing cargo through some risky waters near Africa. But then four Somalis overtake the ship.  Held at gunpoint by the kidnappers ringleader Muse, and with no weapons on board, Captain Phillips must figure out a way for he and his crew to escape the kidnappers clutches and fast.

Director Paul Greengrass does a fine job of keeping a foreboding mood consistently running throughout the film, and expertly stages scenes that occur in cramped conditions. Greengrass is the director that actually popularized shaky-cam with his Bourne movies, but it still doesn’t excuse the sloppiness of certain scenes that utilize this method. Seriously, this school has tons of tripods, yet this major production couldn’t seem to afford one during several pivotal emotional scenes. It gets better as the films goes on, but it definitely hurts an otherwise spellbinding film.

Tom Hanks, who I’ve always felt is aces no matter what he does (sans Larry Crowne) really brings his A-game here, with his personality being the definitive every man one that Hanks has shown he can handle with flair several times in his career. A fter seeing “Gravity” last week, it’s interesting to compare Bullock’s performance from that film with Hanks in this one, as they both show a way of conveying sorrow and fear while also remaining inventive and brave under unspeakable circumstances. Truly, this has to be one of Hanks’ best performances in a career full of such performances, with one of the films very last scenes being perhaps the very best work he’s ever put on cinema.

In terms of other aspects of the film, the script always keeps things interesting ,never letting the audience feel like they know where the plots going, and always making every single character gripping, while Henry Jackman’s score also helps complete the film’s foreboding atmosphere.

Honestly, it seems like everyone brought their very best to this film, and believe me, it shows. While some horrendous camerawork is regrettable, I’ll let it slide this time around, solely for how good the rest of the film is. Everything with this film doesn’t just end up being OK; it winds up as examples of the very best kind of film in 2013.