Tom Hanks is the greatest actor alive

The main thing you should know about Captain Phillips is that it really puts you through the wringer. It’s based on the true 2009 story of the hijacking of a US container ship by Somali pirates, and the Navy Seal rescue mission that ensued — pirates, a word of advice: if you are going to kidnap Tom Hanks, America is simply not going to let you get away with it — and my heart was in my mouth throughout. It is nail-bitingly exciting, even if you know the outcome, and I think I can safely say it’s a better film than the one I thought I was going to see. Or, to put it another way, when I initially saw ‘Captain Phillips’ was about to open my first thought was: ‘Gosh. I wonder who is playing Princess Anne.’ That is still a film I’d go to, probably, but unless Anne ambushes a pirate leader in a ship’s engine room, and holds him with a knife to his throat, I don’t know how it could be more thrilling than this.

This is directed by Paul Greengrass, who made Bourne Supremacy and Bloody Sunday and United 93, and has taken the action-thriller and turned it into something both supremely intelligent and compassionate. (Well done, Paul! Seriously!) The star is Hanks, who plays Phillips, commander of a ship carrying cargo from Oman to Mombasa. Hanks gets it in the neck sometimes, for not doing very much, although what he is actually doing is this: not appearing to do much. World of difference. And it’s this very unforcedness that makes him one of the greatest actors alive, and in the final minutes of this film, he produces something so riveting and extraordinary and true, if he doesn’t receive an Oscar, I’ll eat your hat. (I don’t wear hats, remember, which is why it always has to be yours.)