Tonight, an American ship captain remains a hostage to pirates...
...in a boat with a lid on it in the waters off Somalia.
A ship with 20 American crewmembers on it...
...has been hijacked off the coast of Somalia.
This vessel was en route to Mombasa.
A cargo ship that is said to be carrying food supplies into the Horn of Africa.
The latest information we have is from the Danish company...
...that owns the ship, the Maersk Alabama.
They say that their 20-man crew were all U.S. nationals.
It was flying a U.S. flag.
This is a hostage situation, it is a humanitarian situation...
...so people are stepping through this very carefully...
...not offering many details to the news media...
...as you can well imagine...
...if there is a hostage rescue situation to be had here.
A U.S. Navy warship is said to be on the way.
It is at least three hours away.
The question will be what it will be able to accomplish.
This is now the sixth hijacking in just this past week.
The American perspective on piracy was very much driven...
...by the Phillips story. In other words, it had a happy ending.
For those of us in Britain and in other parts...
...where we've had these encounters with piracy, it doesn't always end up...
...so well, and it hasn't.
We've had people killed by Somali pirates.
In that area of the world, I'd told my crew...
...it's not a matter of "if," it's "when."
We were always on the edge, or I always anticipated problems like that.
It was just the odds. We were never far away from the Somali coast at any time.
So it was just a matter of the odds. You were there for so long...
...the odds increase that something would happen.
I got an e-mail from him. I knew he was headed into Mombasa.
He had made a comment that the pirate activity had been picking up.
Piracy is something we deal with.
If you don't wanna deal with piracy, you don't wanna sail on a ship.
I think the second boat that ever went out to sea was a pirate boat...
...following the first ship that went out to sea.
What I like to say, it's the second-oldest profession...
...that we deal with in the merchant marine.
You know, my dad was in the merchant navy, as we call it...
...or the merchant marine, as they call it in the U.S.
So I grew up with an understanding of that world, you know.
And that was part of what kind of brought me to it.
It was really the merchant marine...
...in the American Revolution who was our first Navy...
...and scored the first naval victory, was a converted merchant marine ship.
So a lot of people don't realize what we do.
We are the truck drivers of the ocean, I like to say.
And piracy is just one facet of what we have to deal with all over the world.
You know, it's a workingman's job. It's a hard life.
And, you know, as it's always been through history, people who go to sea...
...that becomes their life. That's true of Richard Phillips.
American hostage Capt. Richard Phillips, is finally free after days in captivity.
Held hostage for five harrowing days by four heavily-armed pirates...
...Capt. Phillips and the U.S. Navy got their big break today.
And we're happy to say that Capt. Phillips is safe.
The captain of the Maersk Alabama has just arrived back on U.S. soil.
Richard Phillips was held by Somali pirates for five days...
...offering himself as a hostage in order to save his crew.
Navy SEALs rescued him last Sunday, killing three of the pirates.
We have been overwhelmed by the love and support and prayers...
...across our great nation and even across the world.
This is not one of our typical homecomings.
And now that Richard's back, I just ask that you give us some time...
...for us to be a family again.
Hey, Rich, welcome home.
Actually, I didn't really remember the story.
I remember they said to me, and I--
"Oh, I vaguely remember that.
But it wasn't like it was in America where everybody followed the story avidly.
And, in a way, I think that was quite a help.
Because it meant when I read the screenplay, you know...
...it gave me a sense of discovery. I didn't know what was gonna happen.
I wasn't aware of the end.
Malta has a very, very competitive rebate...
...which is a huge issue for a film like this.
A very ambitious film for the money.
And it's got a port setup that was close to perfect.
In fact, we found a home for the ship.
It was maybe a 15-minute drive out to sea from dock.
And, normally, you hear quotes of two to three hours each way...
...to get to where you're filming.
So that would've been very daunting in other circumstances.
Maersk was great from a philosophical standpoint.
But every ship that they operate is part of their business plan.
So to take a ship off-line is to take away business from themselves.
And they did a pretty thorough search of their inventory.
And they have thousands of ships...
...so it's not as easy as them just looking down a list and saying, "That one."
They found a ship that is a direct sister to the Alabama...
...that was running a relatively non-lucrative run...
...between Gibraltar, the Canary Islands and Barcelona in the Mediterranean.
So they identified that ship as a ship they could give us.
You know, a lot of times you walk into a set...
...on a soundstage and you're astounded at how real it is.
But at the end of the day, you walk off...
...and you're on a soundstage and it's a very--
The artificiality is something-- It's a line that you cross over...
...from the regular world into the artificial world.
And on board a ship, there was no artificiality to it.
I am telling him... "Okay, you wanna be a captain?
You gotta see the problems before they come up and I just saw three problems...
-...coming between here and here." - Exactly what you've said...
...is what's gotta be said at the back end of the drill.
Shooting on the Maersk Alexander, which is literally...
...an exact sister ship of the Alabama...
Well, this was fascinating, because everything was real.
There was a lot of places to conk your head.
And the decks hurt your feet after awhile because it's just hard metal plates.
You know, it's such a great resource to just have an actual ship.
Maersk gave us the Maersk Alexander, this sister ship of the Alabama.
So it's not like some movie set where you got some dummy prop.
If you wanna know what the engine room looks like...
...go down to the engine room.
If you wanna know what a radar looks like in the bridge...
...it's right in front of you. So a lot of the work is done for you. It's there.
Being willing to shoot in all those places, between the way Paul wants to shoot...
...and also what Barry Ackroyd is used to shooting...
...it removed an entire task from us, the actors, I think.
- Distance? -1.5 miles.
1.5 miles with a potential mothership behind, a potential piracy situation.
It's a huge ship, and there's a lot of sophisticated navigation equipment.
And, you know, a captain has to command a crew.
So there's a big skill set there.
I asked Richard how often he looks at the horizon and takes in the sea.
He says, "I haven't done that in 33 years." You know?
Because there's just so much work that he has to do.
What's interesting, the e-mail that Phillips--
He says he doesn't make it down to the engine room his first day.
He doesn't have time. Too busy.
Paul pushed us to learn and do as much research as we could.
And we came in on the day just loaded up with all of this...
All of this info.
- Check list. - Got your check list?
Dangerous cargo, if you've got it, stuff like that.
Cut. Cut.
-It's that, then you grab this. - Yeah, I grab that.
What we would have was sometimes, like, a 12-minute, 15-minute...
...16-minute, 18-minute scene that was only one way to play it...
...from the beginning and all through the 18 minutes. How do you shoot that?
Physically, you can bust it up into pieces, but Paul has this way of working...
...in which the action goes on and he captures it on two...
...or sometimes three different cameras from different perspectives.
And it rolls all the way through. One camera won't start until later.
And so the scene is already three minutes old and then it will roll...
...and it will pick up.
Start with one camera, we're gonna roll for four minutes.
Two minutes in, we're gonna open up the second camera.
When the first camera runs out, we're gonna replace the mag.
We'll reload on the fly and then come back in and shoot some more.
Twelve seconds is an eternity in a shot.
Twelve minutes is amazing. And you're like, "This is--"
You're going, "Oh, my God. He's not cutting. We're still shooting."
That's a demanding process.
But it's also one that you slowly have to disc--
You have to have faith in the discovery process to get there.
Long takes, without rehearsal often, just, "Let's do it...
...and see how it goes wrong. It can only go wrong." That's what we say.
But often there's gems in the first take that, you know...
And parts of it that you will never capture again, you know?
Yeah, in a sense, you're doing two things that are quite contradictory.
On the one hand, you're planning and thinking...
...and, you know, using that part of your brain.
And everybody is, all the actors, all the crew.
You're trying to create a framework where you can construct a film...
...which involves planning, you know?
But on the other hand, you're trying to protect the moment.
The unforeseen moment. The truthful exploration...
...of what really would happen.
The audience should feel that there was one chance and we...
And somehow, this camera got it, you know?
I mean, that's my background. My background is documentary.
And so if it happens in front of the camera, I believe it was precious, you know.
When you switch the camera on, it was a precious moment...
...and that every frame should be, possibly, in the film.
So I carry that with me right to today on everything I do.
It's very important to, all of you...
...inhabit a mindset where you understand...
...that the future is not preordained. Just because it happened like that...
When you're living through an experience, you don't know how it's gonna end up...
...and you've got to play it and perform it always with that sense in mind...
...that you don't know what the end result of this is going to be.
It's an exhilarating way to work. I think some of the things...
...that happened in the film that were not in the script...
...were completely a result of how Paul works.
And I think they made it a better film.
Anytime you have a type of filmmaking...
...that is described as your last name...
...with the word "style" after it, you're doing something right...
...because you look at the way he films...
...and there's really no other kind of filming like it.
When people try and do it--
Trying to do it is what makes you realize, "Damn, this is hard."
- Because we've gotta see where he goes. - Yeah, okay.
Because I think this is all packed with stuff. And he goes here.
- Okay. - I think that you've got to then...
-...rotate around and let Murphy go. - Okay.
- Yeah? To there. Play that. - Get his phone call.
I mean, when it works best, I think, is when you're willing the camera...
...to do the thing it is actually doing as it's doing it.
It's not behind or ahead, it's a symbiotic thing.
And you've gotta be--
You've gotta be technically adroit, but you also have to be...
...incredibly human as a technician...
...to be able to achieve that.
And I think, not just credit to Paul, of course, credit to Paul...
...credit to Barry Ackroyd.
Cameras that are contact lenses. Surely you can make a microphone that's...
We would rehearse, sometimes, for four hours in the morning...
...to get the environment correct...
...and then get the beats of the scenes worked out.
Well...
I love the way Paul works.
He distills activity down to an essential and then shoots that.
And sometimes, he'll shoot the rehearsals.
We had a joke that it wasn't bad enough...
...that you had to audition for the movie, you had to audition to stay in the movie.
- Let's do it again. Ready? Go, go, go. - From the top.
And action.
Well, obviously, we've got speed, we've got height, we've got hoses.
Those are advantages.
Maybe we should.
- Oh, am I? - Well, maybe we could say that.
As opposed to:
- You know? - Right.
"Hey, since we're together, let's talk about those pirates that almost came on board...
...about 17 minutes ago."
Oh, yeah, those guys.
I'll just come in and say, "All right."
I spoke to Matt Damon who had made, what, three films with Paul.
I said, "What's the scoop?"
He said, "You'll rehearse it, and the first time you do a rehearsal...
...it'll be a disaster."
Hold protocol. Same protocol. We lock down, we wait for help.
And end up in Somalia, waiting for the company to bail us out. **** that.
We're not gonna get to Somalia. Take a wide berth. We gotta swing the ship out.
That.
Our job is to deliver the boxes as soon as we can.
And everybody will be talking at the same time, and--
Everybody's just trying to do what they wanna do.
Don't worry. It'll get sorted out over time and you'll get everything you need.
And that turned out to be the case.
It as Quinn-- Quinn put the notice up. That was his job.
To put the notice up about all the pirate activity in the area.
Yeah, it's all there. Can we run this one more time?
This is one more rehearsal.
We were doing a scene and it was going along well...
...and then Paul called me in the back room-- With Tom.
He said, "Chris." Here's, this is Paul.
"Chris. How do you think this scene is going?"
He's got long hair.
I said, "I think it's going quite-- It's going good."
He says, "Really?" I said, "Yeah, it'll be okay."
And he says, "Okay?" And I went, "Yeah, I know."
He said-- I mean, it's-- He said:
"Could you do more?"
I said, "Yeah, I can do more." He said, "Do that."
So that's how that scene came out.
Now, wait. I'm a u-- Okay, I'm a union guy, okay?
Twenty-five years, all right?
I'm telling you now that they're not paying me enough to fight pirates.
Nobody else knew that I was just gonna jump in there and say that.
Cory's talking. I'm going, "Hey, I'm talking now, okay?
I'm a union guy. I got my say." Right?
All the other actors are going, "Oh, Mulkey's gone crazy."
But Paul had told me to do that. He didn't tell anybody else. Except Tom.
Yeah, just the tiniest touch. What you're doing is absolutely right.
I wanna feel you're not going to slow down.
- So that's all right. -It's Quinn.
Your pace is good, Louis.
- But when you get down to about here... - Right.
...the shot's sort of dead. So then you can quicken it up.
- Okay. - A little bit. It gets us out of the shot.
We never even meet. I'm down. As soon as I see--
So let's do another thing.
In the beginning, when pulling out...
...the crew would be down with me and we would shoot that.
So that they had that footage of my role and when we would leave port.
The actual chief engineer on the Alexander...
...was this guy, Kurt.
Kurt. Tell you what to do, Kurt.
There is the man.
He's this very tall guy. Very serious.
But he would joke with us that we would do nothing, you know?
Because we-- On movie sets, there's lots of waiting around.
And so we'd be on deck somewhere drinking coffee and he'd be like:
"Another busy day of drinking coffee and doing nothing."
I would say, "What would I do in this situation?"
He'd be like, "You would do nothing. Because there's nothing to do.
It's all done."
I said, "Yeah, but we gotta-- Paul wants me to be manually doing something.
So can I pull these levers and--?"
He goes, "Yes, you've evacuated toilets so engineer will watch movie...
...and he says 'I don't know why he's doing this."'
So we're going to play even more buttons that are not real buttons now.
- Okay. - Because they need...
He needs more of all this.
I don't think it's a good idea to make it in the movie...
...just switch it off and then press something.
- Otherwise they will see that it's-- -But it's all bullshit anyway.
-It's just there. It's just movement. - Okay.
I don't think anybody-- If anybody says, "Hey, he turned that thing off.
He was pressing buttons that weren't buttons."
Then we ****** up the whole thing anyway.
You're telling him you're gonna take the engines down.
What do you say when you're taking the engines down here?
- I would take it down. Take it down. - Just down here?
You know, "What would you say to the crew if this was happening?
What would you say over the walkie?" He'd be like, "I would say nothing.
They would know what to do.
They've all been doing this for a long time."
I'd be like, "Cool, cool, right. But Paul--
It's a movie. So just speak your thoughts. Like, you know?"
"Okay, I guess I would say, 'Are you ready to do this?'
And they would say, 'Yeah, I'm ready."'
It's like, "Great. Fuck. Cool."
I had to learn the language of the crew.
These crews speak their own language. As do the military types involved in these.
And to get that language right, you have to spend time with them and talk to them.
"How would I say this? How would I say that?"
What ended up being really ideal, especially with both the Maersk ship...
...but also with the navy ships, is it really did give Paul what I think he wanted.
He's able to walk onto the ship...
...and see everything was there the way it really was on the day.
And he could ask the people who run the ship:
"What would you really do? Where would you really be standing?"
When you see the film, it's like you're really there, because you are.