Thriller hailed as ‘the most intense movie’ now available to stream on Amazon Prime Video

Amazon Prime Video subscribers are flocking to stream this thriller, which has long been described as one of the genre’s most ‘intense’ movies.

Released in 2013, Captain Phillips stars Tom Hanks in the lead role of Captain Richard Phillips, an American merchant mariner who is taken hostage by Somali pirates.

Its story is biographical, based on the 2009 Maersk Alabama hijacking, in which four pirates in the Somali Basin seized the Danish/US cargo ship, prompting a days-long rescue effort.

Directed by Paul Greengrass, Captain Phillips also stars Catherine Keener as Andrea, Phillips’ wife, Michael Chernus as first officer Shane Murphy, David Warshofsky as chief engineer Mike Perry, and Corey Johnson as helmsman Ken Quinn.

As for pirates and their allies, Barkhad Abdi plays pirate leader Abduwali Muse, joined by cast members including Faysal Ahmed as Nour Najee, Mahat M. Ali as Walid Elmi, Mohamed Ali as Assad, and Ibrahim Maalim as Hufan.

Captain Phillips was a critical success upon its initial release, grossing $218million (£161.3m) against a $55m (£40.7m) budget.

When awards season came around, it received six Oscar nominations, including for best picture, plus best supporting actor for Abdi.

Abdi’s supporting role was so highly acclaimed that he also won a Bafta, plus a London Film Critics Circle award. As for Hanks, he received further individual nominations at the SAG Awards and Golden Globes.

Captain Phillips currently has a near-perfect critics rating on Rotten Tomatoes with an impressive 93%, while audiences rank it with 89%.

Among the reviews, Deborah Ross of The Spectator writes: ‘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.’

‘This high-stakes, visceral drama allows the audience to experience the myriad emotions at the same time as the characters. It captures what is truly remarkable about the human spirit in times of peril,’ praises Candice Frederick of Reel Talk Online.

‘It seems strange to say that an actor as awarded and acclaimed as Tom Hanks is still capable of surprising us. But he does in Captain Phillips, which is one of the best films of the year,’ says Jason Bailey of Flavorwire.

As for audiences, @TheMovieSearch lauds its ‘tense and layered experience’ for making a ‘memorable’ watch.

@TheFilmGuy describes it as ‘bone-chilling’, while Anne C says the whole thing is ‘absolutely perfect’.

‘One of the most intense movies I’ve seen with Tom Hanks portraying a character so convincingly. Brilliantly directed, great cinematography and the whole cast excels in character. Captain Phillips is a real life hero indeed. Highly recommended,’ echoes @FransB.

‘If you don’t like this movie, you need to ask some serious questions of yourself,’ declares @MMC1970 in another five-star review.

Speaking in 2013, lead star Hanks, now 69, made it clear he wanted to do the real-life story of a hero justice by portraying Captain Phillips, who was imprisoned on a small, enclosed lifeboat, as was his crew of 19.

‘I think it’s important not to redefine somebody’s motivations,’ he told Parade. ‘You have to have people do or say things they never did or said and be in places they never were… You’ve got to be a journalist and a historian and a filmmaker all at the same time.’

On the filming experience for the high-seas hostage drama, Hanks also told Today that the cast were literally put through their paces.

‘We had a very, very small little lifeboat that we shot in. It smells horrible in there, it’s got the worst lighting on the planet Earth – it became trashed instantaneously.’

He added: ‘We were living close enough in order to see the pores in each other’s faces. It became a very tactile experience for us all.’

Hanks went on to say it was a genuinely ‘terrifying’ ordeal just as an actor, while co-star Abdi, 40, said that, despite the film not ‘condoning’ the crime of piracy, ‘people will come away with compassion for Muse.’