The Terminal

I have seen this movie a couple of times and I could watch it again over a weekend with friends or even family. 'The Terminal' is a Steven Spielberg movie starring the talented Castaway famed Tom Hawk and the ravishing Catherine Zeta Jones. The movie is a sweet love story within an airport (in-fact there is not one but two of them).

The Story is essentially about a man called Viktor Navorski (Tom Hanks) who is flying from his home nation Krakozhia (fictitious) where a civil war breaks out after  he leaves which prevents the US officials from letting him enter New York and he spends more than nine months at the  J F Kennedy airport. Unable to leave the airport or return to Krakozhia, Viktor instead lives in the terminal, carrying his luggage and a mysterious Planters peanut can. During his stay at the airport, he befriends Enrique (Diego Luna), Gupta Rajan (Kumar Pallana), Salchak (Eddie Jones) and also meets flight attendant Amelia Warren (Catherine Zeta-Jones) who asks him out to dinner but being the gentleman that he is, he cannot go because he has no money, even the 25 cents that he earned by retrieving vacant baggage trolleys is stopped by the Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Head Frank Dixon (Stanley Tucci) who wants Navorski removed from the airport but Victor wouldn't leave until he gets that autograph of a tenor saxophonist Benny Golson, who his Jazz enthusiast dad loved until his death.

I love the way Navorski tries to find means to earn for himself at the airport to take Amelia out for dinner, specially the scene where he is waiting for the call from the Discovery store where he would have applied for job and when finally he learns that the vacancy is filled he runs off to the washroom. The story is extremely touchy at times and with a fine humor. It is very rare that I find such innocent clean humor in movies lately.   

Catherine though has rather smaller role but stands out as an actress with good acting & looking stunningly beautiful as ever (from all the movies that I have watched I find her most beautiful in this one). A confused 39 years old flight attendant Amelia, who could possibly get any guy she wishes, eventually gives up on her seven year existing relationship with a married man to fall in love with Victor. Also the way Enrique seeks Victor to help woo the  female Customs and Border Protection officer (Zoë Saldana) in exchange for food, who he ends up marrying later on, is really adorable.

After much battle with the authorities at the airport, Victor fianlly manages to step out in NYC and get that autograph but it costs him his love.

So if you like love stories and want to watch one with family or your sweetheart over a holiday, this is the best suited one for you. I wouldn't call it the most romantic exactly but a very nice movie to watch. To know what happens to Victor in the end do watch the movie. This movie will leave you in tears and happiness at the same time :).