Tom Hanks to Play Captain Richard Phillips in new Film about a Hostage and Somali Pirates

Sony Pictures has brought on actor Tom Hanks to play Captain Richard Phillips in a new film based on his true life experience as a hostage with Somali pirates. 

Phillips was the leader of the cargo ship Maersk Alabama, and he ended up giving himself up as a hostage to Somali pirates to keep his crew from having to leave the ship with them. After three days alone with the armed pirates in a small lifeboat, Phillips was saved by Navy SEALs who staged a raid that left three captors dead and another in custody.

Hanks is such a fantastic actor, and this is a perfect role for him to play. The film will be based on the memoir that Sony optioned called A Captain's Duty: Somali Pirates, Navy SEALs, and Dangerous Days at Sea. Scott Rudin, Kevin Spacey, Dana Brunetti and Michael Le Luca will produce the film, and the script for the film was written by The Hunger Games scribe Billy Ray.

This is going to end up being a really good movie. 

Here's the run down of the book:

"I share the country's admiration for the bravery of Captain Phillips 

and his selfless concern for his crew. 

His courage is a model for all Americans."

--President Barack Obama

It was just another day on the job for fifty-three-year-old Richard Phillips, captain of the Maersk Alabama, the United States-flagged cargo ship which was carrying, among other things, food and agricultural materials for the World Food Program. That all changed when armed Somali pirates boarded the ship. The pirates didn't expect the crew to fight back, nor did they expect Captain Phillips to offer himself as hostage in exchange for the safety of his crew. Thus began the tense five-day stand-off, which ended in a daring high-seas rescue when U.S. Navy SEALs opened fire and picked off three of the captors.

"It never ends like this," Captain Phillips said.

And he's right.

A Captain's Duty tells the life-and-death drama of the Vermont native who was held captive on a tiny lifeboat off Somalia's anarchic, gun-plagued shores. A story of adventure and courage, it provides the intimate details of this high-seas hostage-taking--the unbearable heat, the death threats, the mock executions, and the escape attempt. When the pirates boarded his ship, Captain Phillips put his experience into action, doing everything he could to safeguard his crew. And when he was held captive by the pirates, he marshaled all his resources to ensure his own survival, withstanding intense physical hardship and an escalating battle of wills with the pirates. This was it: the moment where training meets instinct and where character is everything. Richard Phillips was ready.