Okay, I admit it. I didn't actually go to the cinemas for this one. But I would've if only my brother hadn't left that pirated DVD at our house and my friend didn't invite me to bring it and watch it over at her house with homemade popcorn and iced tea. It was just too tempting an offer. And besides, it's a Hollywood film. It's not like their movie industry's as poor as ours, so surely piracy doesn't affect them as drastically as it does our country, right? Oh, well...
The Terminal. An altogether simple film with a simple setting, simple plot and not all that unique characters, but they were all interesting nonetheless. It hardly had any special effects (if there were at all), background music, or even dialogue. And apart from the last 5 minutes of the film, there were absolutely zero scenes set outside the airport. It's amazing how they were able to stretch the running time of this film into two hours, when it seems as though nothing's happening.
The love story between Tom Hanks' character (Viktor Navorski) and Catherine Zeta-Jones' character (Amelia - doesn't this name just always remind you of airplanes?) wasn't at all the focus of the story, but it was great that it became the key reason why Viktor didn't try to leave the terminal.
Anyway, it was just fascinating how they were able to find so many things for a non-English-speaking man not allowed on USA territory to do inside an airport to survive. I've seen those quarter-giving machines where you return the push carts before, but never thought it could actually be useful for someone who's waiting at the airport for a long time and doesn't have any money. Then again, I never thought of getting stuck in an airport before anyway because from what I know, if you managed to land in a country but not get through Immigration, the authorities would
just immediately send you back home. So it was really creative of the writers to have thought of a way to make a person's country inaccessible.
Imagine, having lost your country to war, while you're 25,000 feet in the air... And what's so great about this movie is that it could actually happen. I can just imagine this movie being given an example for the next INTLLAW (International Law) class, and my professor giving more examples, actual cases, similar to it.
Anyway, if you'd like to see just how much airplanes can cause such disorder in international law, you might want to check out what went on in the Lockerbie Case. To put it simply, a single airplane crashed, and the countries Great Britain, United States, Scotland, Libya, Canada and Malta all got involved. And that's already putting it simply.
Isn't it just weird that this is the date I suddenly talk about airplane crashes and International Law? :P
Well well well. Whaddya know? I've now posted four consecutive movie reviews. What can I say? I love the big screen.
