The Terminal

The Terminal is the story of Viktor Navorski (played by Tom Hanks in top form), a visitor to New York City who gets caught at JFK Aiport in a situation that has never happened before. The government of his home country was overthrown while he was coming to the USA, and the USA has no relations with the new government. Ipso facto, Viktor becomes persona non grata: "unacceptable". He is confined to the airport terminal, where he begins to construct a world where he can survive while waiting for something to happen. His sojurn at the terminal is quite believable and ingenious.

I like this film very much. It is charming, witty, and satisfying. It's negative critics say it's too syrupy, too cute, too long, too unbelievable, too Capra (this is bad?) and other such nonsense. Bah! Humbug!

I counted 57 rewarding moments in this film. I've never done that before, but I suspect that is a lot of rewarding moments from a movie, and that The Terminal count is well ahead of a half dozen other "comedy dramas" I've seen this year. I also suspect that director, Steven Spielberg, doesn't mind being compared to Frank Capra one little bit.