Fishing Without Nets

Name: Fishing Without Nets
Genre: Thriller
Released: September 26, 2014
Duration: 109 min
Rating: 65

2014

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Generally favorable reviews based on 9 Critic Reviews

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Movie Details & Credits

Drafthouse Films | Release Date: September 26, 2014 | R

Summary: A Somali pirate has a crisis of conscience during a hijacking after befriending a hostage.

Director: Cutter Hodierne

Genre(s): Thriller

Rating: R

Runtime: 109 min

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Critic Reviews

100

Alan Scherstuhl

Sep 23, 2014

Cutter Hodierne's gorgeous, harrowing debut feature, Fishing Without Nets, doesn't just ask you to feel a bit for Somali pirates, as Captain Phillips did -- Hodierne puts you in their shoes. Read full review

Dennis Harvey

Sep 25, 2014

Cutter Hodierne makes an accomplished feature debut with this very well-crafted, empathetic hijacking drama. Read full review

Stephanie Merry

Oct 9, 2014

Details count in this movie, whether it’s well-executed camera work or the affecting score. Read full review

John DeFore

Sep 25, 2014

Cutter Hodierne's Fishing Without Nets is a tense drama with well-drawn characters and only as much action as its story requires. Read full review

Nick Prigge

Sep 28, 2014

Though this setup is perhaps infused with too much piety, cheating audience empathy toward the main character, it nonetheless generates a compelling air of social fatalism. Read full review

Ignatiy Vishnevetsky

Sep 25, 2014

If nothing else, Fishing Without Nets looks good on a big screen, directed in the kind of slick, just-off-arthouse style that mandates every shot of a character walking be framed from behind. Read full review

Martin Tsai

Oct 2, 2014

Although director and co-writer Cutter Hodierne tells the story from the pirates' viewpoint, he adds no more dimension to them than the one we saw in "Phillips." Read full review

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Devilmath

Sep 27, 2015

Fishing Without Nets was announced as Cutter Hodierne’s response to Captain Phillips, the drama by Paul Greengrass that premiered at last year’s London Film Festival. The two films have a very similar subject: a pirate story set in modern Somali waters. Whereas Greengrass’s feature was aFishing Without Nets was announced as Cutter Hodierne’s response to Captain Phillips, the drama by Paul Greengrass that premiered at last year’s London Film Festival. The two films have a very similar subject: a pirate story set in modern Somali waters. Whereas Greengrass’s feature was a high-tension thriller, told from the point of view of the American cargo being hijacked, Fishing Without Nets switches the perspective, having the pirates as protagonists. Released officially in the U.S. at the beginning of October, Hodierne’s first feature has struggled to convince audiences and critics, and feels more like a missed opportunity.

Fishing Without Nets might not star celebrities of Tom Hanks’s caliber, but all its actors portray their characters very convincingly, especially lead actor Abdikani Muktar. His character, Abdi, is a Somali fisherman who joins a local group of pirates to support his family. The struggle between his will to keep his traditional, honest job, and the lure of making easy money with the pirates is a perfect example of the social fatalism that distinguishes the film. Fishing Without Nets reiterates the assumption that most men are forced into piracy, but it doesn’t dwell enough on the social or cultural causes of this phenomenon; all the focus is on the hijack, the struggle for power between the pirates, their disorganisation and inability to deal with things bigger than them. Although the plot significantly differs from Captain Phillips, and is certainly not as compelling or suspenseful, Fishing Without Nets mirrors the American drama quite efficiently; however, it lacks in contextualisation,and oversimplifies its most important and high-potential aspect.… Expand

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