The crew of a Danish cargo ship is hijacked by Somali pirates who proceed to engage in escalating negotiations with authorities in Copenhagen.
Confident and suspenseful.
A slow burner; intense, utterly engrossing and believable.
Watching this back-and-forth play out is astonishingly tense, with the actors performing as if their lives really are on the line, and Lindholm uses this scenario to make potent points about class divide and corporate responsibility.
Paring away the characters' back stories and what's-my-motivation speeches, it's a sober, documentary-style account, but it's as nerve-jangling as any thriller.
It is complicated, it is intelligent, it is the very antithesis of Hollywood.
Without resorting to graphic violence or melodrama A Hijacking builds into an extremely tense tale with all the nail-biting immediacy of an unfolding news story.
Flies buzz, sweat trickles, negotiations continue, and you feel your breath dry up.
Danish director Tobias Lindholm spins an exacting drama out of a crisis on this deft, verite-style account of Somali piracy in the Indian ocean.
Excellent.
Nerve-racking viewing.
There’s no moralizing here, just unsparing realism.
With horrible realism, Lindholm parallels the unnerving state of capture with the financially motivated process of release.
General release. Check local listings for show times.