Aug 30, 2004 05:01 PM
1390 Views
(Updated Aug 30, 2004 05:01 PM)
What can possibly be great about a movie which runs for over 2 hours and has got an airport as its background..well I would say ..EVERYTHING!!The Terminal is a throughly enjoyable film. It takes you to a journey of pain & joy. It is not always necessary to ''reach to the core of humanity'' for a film to be enjoyable. Sometimes ''a rose is just a rose''. Sometimes a film is meant to entertain, and if we can find deeper meaning attached,so much the better.
Plot wise the movie is quite simple and Steven Spielberg has kept it that way,placing greater stress on the human factor of the movie.The virtues of honesty, kindness, loyalty, and patience were embedded throughout the story. I was amazed and amused by the creativeness and inventiveness of Tom and the other characters.
Going to the fact part ,the movie is loosely based on the story of an iranian refugee,Mehran Nasseri who has taken up shelter in the Terminal 1 of the Charles De Gaulle airport since 1988.
The movie is not as simple as watching a polite man caught in an uncomfortable situation and seeing how he dealt with it? Manners are underused in this world. It's a touching film. The actors did as they should do, they transformed themselves into the characters they portrayed. Tom Hanks was BRILLIANT(as always) Catherine Zeta Jones was BEAUTIFUL (as always) and the rest of the cast was GREAT!After a few minutes, it wasn't Hanks but Viktor that I was traveling with through his trials. And do you know, through it all, Viktor displayed the finest qualities of man....gentleness, manners, concern for others. Bravo, the film was lovely!
Viktor finally makes a few friends at the airport including a janitor, a food service worker, an INS agent who stamps his permission to leave with a big red declined every day, and develops a crush on the beautiful Amelia (Catherine Zeta-Jones), an airline hostess having an affair with a married guy (Michael Nouri). How Viktor copes and learns to live is kind of sweet, often funny, and sometimes sad. The fact that we buy any of this at all can be laid squarely on the shoulders of Tom Hanks who gives a remarkable performance as Viktor.
Not only does his accent stay consisted, his broken English never falters one bit as he learns phrases by comparing his Krakozia tour book to the exact same one written in English. He keeps Viktor consistent throughout, a simple man whose one desire is to be able to enter New York to fulfill a promise kept in a peanut can he carries from place to place.
Viktor is the kind of person Frank Dixon doesn't understand, can't understand, and yet in some small way perhaps envies him because he is able to relate to people in ways that Frank will never be able to.The movie leaves you with reaffirmed belief that following the rules, helping others, and having goals, no matter how small or personal, are possible in the most difficult situations. Never give up. People can control how they react to overwhelming difficulties and succeed.
The camera work is pretty good. It is very natural and makes you feel that you are a part of that movie sometimes - but it always show how each character in the movie feel. For example, the camera focuses on Viktor at a loss and move backward to show the whole people in the airport. This can make you sense how he felt segregated and helpless, even though there were so many people around him.
The Terminal is a delight in many ways, a must see, definitely!
