A Hijacking feels like the anti Captain Phillips, which I have not seen YET, but am eager to so I can compare and contrast the films. A Hijacking is a Danish film that focuses on two fronts during a hostage crisis: the people on the ship, primarily the ship’s cook, and Peter, the CEO of the company that owns the ship, played by Soren Malling. For people with an aversion to subtitles, most of the characters speak English so there are few subtitles. A Hijacking is a tense, but riveting drama that has the feel of a documentary, but is not based on real events and is a thriller rooted in the mundane disgusting details of daily life.
A Hijacking is not an action film. A Hijacking is fairly low key for a hostage situation. Most of the violently dramatic scenes occur off screen or are only heard or alluded to. The majority of A Hijacking takes place in the conference room over a speakerphone. A Hijacking uses the psychological terror of not having enough information and the elusive nature of the opposition’s intentions to create suspense, which makes A Hijacking feel authentic.
A Hijacking also somewhat feels like a more humane take on the slick ultimate white man genre in movies such as Arbitrage and The Lincoln Lawyer when the man in the suit can easily shift and master any thorny situation regardless of the socioeconomic environment. When the audience is introduced to the CEO, a Danish man of color has to get Peter to seal a deal that he cannot consummate with a room full of Japanese businessmen. Of course, Peter does it so the audience is already psychologically primed to expect that Peter will be able to do the same with the Somali pirates.
While A Hijacking does depict the hardships of living on a ship filled with hostages, A Hijacking is primarily about Peter’s pain and uncertainty during the negotiation. He is a CEO, not a hostage negotiator, and is emotionally entangled and held hostage to the situation. The story emphasizing Peter’s empathy and Malling’s acting are what saves A Hijacking from being a standard Richard Gere or Matthew McConaughey slick ultimate white man thriller. The refusal of the camera to move from the confined office spaces also adds to the feeling that Peter is equally victimized by this process, which perhaps the actual hostages would not appreciate.
A Hijacking is an excellent and unexpected combination of a portrait of Stockholm Syndrome and the dynamic of corporate negotiations. Omar, the English speaking pirate, characterizes himself as not being a part of the pirates, but classifies himself as a hostage like the Danish men however we never actually see him interpreting for the pirates during the negotiations. He is well fed. He lives in the captain’s cabin and is the one making threats. He is actually the head of the pirates and an expert at emotional manipulation, which the cook begins to realize as A Hijacking unfolds.
A Hijacking is not a slick Grisham style thriller, but a subversive approach to the hostage negotiation dynamic. A Hijacking may be problematic for emphasizing the suffering of the CEO over the actual hostages, but with all the talk of corporations as people, A Hijacking finds a feasible way to humanize a corporation.