Captain Phillips features an incredible performance from Tom Hanks, who does a masterful job portraying an average guy who shows great bravery and maintains preternatural calm during an act of piracy by desperate individuals.

By holding it together and not letting himself break down until AFTER the crisis is over, Hanks gives us yet another intensely human character to root for — this is his specialty.

Muse, the Somali pirate played by Barkhad Abdi, is menacing because the audience has never seen him before. This thin-to-the-point-of-starving “fisherman” shows us his own brand of calm and cunning, but which barely papers over the desperation of a young man who has no options in a society which lacks any form of functioning government.

A very intense real-life film that left one poor theater-attendee shaking and needing assistance afterward. Four stars out of five.