THE TERMINAL by Steven Spielberg
‘Ever had the feeling you live on the airport?’
Meet Viktor Navorski (Tom Hanks) from Krakozhia (a fictious eastern european country). When he arrives in New York, his country has disappeared in a military coup, his passport and flight ticket are declared invalid and drawn in, and he is stranded in the transit area of JFK airport (which is in fact not the real JFK airport, but one huge soundstage, built in a Californian aircraft hangar!), neither allowed to enter New York, nor to go back to Krakozhia.
Viktor is the ‘divine fool’ – even stranded in a foreign place, without knowledge of English, civil war ravaging his country, he keeps good-hearted, polite and hopeful – and makes friends with the airport staff: an Indian cleaner, a Latino food-service guy, immigration officer Torres (Zoe Saldana) and, of course, the gorgeous air hostess Amelia (Catherine Zeta-Jones). He even finds a well-paid job on the airport and keeps waiting to fulfill his mission in New York (which involves a tin can containing ‘Jazz’) – and for beautiful but out-of-luck with men Amelia.
Schmaltz? Sure, but not too much. But that’s why you go to this kind of movies! And shame on you if you don’t have tears in your eyes at least once or twice – then you have no heart!
