Captain Phillips

I'd heard good things about this film but it was actually better than I had imagined. In fact, I'd go so far as to say it's great, probably the best new film I've seen this year. A lot has to do with Tom Hanks. I never thought I'd say this, but his performance was brilliant. For much of his career, I'd had him down as a jobbing everyman, appearing in formulaic, populist fare and so I'd actively avoided him. Under the astute guidance of director Paul Greengrass however, Hanks rips this film open by downplaying the role of Richard Phillips, real-life tanker captain. No histrionics, no money-shots. Just a paunch, some grey hair and a number of stares and glances that tell us exactly what he's thinking.

Greengrass is responsible for giving Hanks his head and 'under-directing him'. When asked on Wittertainment how you direct Tom Hanks, Greengrass replied "Get out of the way. Let him get on with it". And it worked, as did the prepping of the pirates, four lads who'd never acted on film before. They're also solid, especially Barkhad Abdi as the leader/captain. Greengrass has done this before with Bloody Sunday and United 93 - stripping away all the artifice of the performances and making us think we're watching a documentary. The fact that he also knows how to ratchet up the tension and move the story along at a nice old click proves he's one of the best directors knocking about right now.

The story itself hardly needed any dramatisation. The first container ship of it's size to be boarded by Somali pirates who then kidnapped the captain, precipitating a showdown with the US navy. Writes itself really but credit must also go to the writer Billy Ray for not gilding the basic outline too much (no hand-wringing relatives, no sentimentality, no meat on the bones).

Keeping a tale like this balanced may have been eschewed by others but Greengrass gives fairly equal time to both parties - the tanker crew and the pirates. Maybe the film could be read as a critique of globalisation (Hanks and Greengrass beg to differ on this) and I reckon this is underlined when Hanks says to Abdi, "There's got to be something other than being a fisherman or kidnapping people" and he replies, "Maybe in America, Irish. Maybe in America".

Quality all round. Check it out.

Gravity

Saw this for free in Kobe at a preview screening, so I've still never paid for a Sandra Bullock film. Well done me. She's alright in this, to be fair, and she needs to be, as it's pretty much a two-hander with Clooney as the other hand.

So where to start.....? Probably the visuals. They are suitably spectacular and they'll sweep the boards at the major awards ceremonies. The 3D was fine and didn't give me a headache (unlike The Hobbit) - I even flinched from the screen a couple of times. More impressive was the stillness, the lack of sound. Even when disaster was pitching up all around, we (and presumably the astronauts) don't realise it until we actually see the speeding metal debris. The lack of a whizzy, zoomy, bangy, boomy soundtrack is shocking and, I reckon, the standout point of the film.

Storywise, it's fairly basic and I'm reasonably impressed with the pared-down nature of the plot. Without spoiling too much, it's fundamentally - DISASTER! - GO THERE - BUGGER! OK GO THERE - END. It would have been tempting to overblow the whole narrative and another director may have done so, but not a steady hand like Cuaron. Ninety minutes or so for an epic technical feat like this must have taken great restraint or.......

......it's quite possible that the budget was spunked on the Framestore people (responsible for the visual effects) and they scrimped a little on the writing. That's where the film lets itself down slightly for me. Some of the ideas are pretty old hat; Clooney is the experienced old veteran ready to retire, Bullock is the new recruit, not really up to speed with things, later having a kind of epiphany with a random stranger. Some of the dialogue is quite corny, especially Clooney telling stories of his past to anyone who will listen. And the central 'message' is a bit hackneyed with a slight whiff of religion in the air.

So maybe I was expecting too much because although I was gobsmacked by the technical aspect of it, I wasn't that moved. It is a pretty immense effort though and I'd recommend seeing it, if only for the spectacle of the opening sequence.

Oh, and Bullock falls over again. Damn you, Gravity!