VN go home (or, welcome back Steven Spielberg)

Rating: Null/10 (26 September 2004)

Spoilers
The Terminal brings back the good old Spielberg from the ET days. We see again his childlike playfulness  I mean who else can get as much fun out of a surveillance camera? We get a generous dose of the simple warmth of the 'little people' ('not pygmies and dwarfs', as Bob Hope said in the 1971 Academy Award show that he hosted) - I mean it reaffirms to those of us who have this experience that our best friends in life are the other three regular 'hands' at the card table.
Some critics in town are way overboard in denouncing TT as American propaganda. While there are unquestionably Hollywood movies aplenty waving the big-good-Americans-helping-the-rest-of-the-world flag (e.g. Tears of the Sun), one of them TT certainly is NOT. To be aroused in anti-American sentiments just from hearing 'The United States' or 'New York' is getting a bit close to paranoia. What Viktor Navorski (Tom Hanks) wants is to go to a certain jazz artist, and the fact that this means going into the U.S. and New York City is purely incidental, in the context of things. Replace that with Paris, France, the script works just as well. As a matter of fact, the true events by which the story is inspired did happen in Paris, France.
Rather, TT is about perseverance, survival, friendship and commitment. No preaching by Spielberg, who just let the ideas tickle you gently. The romance is just a little overdone, I agree.
This has become almost too predictable but once again, Tom Hanks is a big reason, if not the biggest reason, for watching a movie. Katherine Zeta-Jones playing Amelia Warren has completely recovered her look, shape, and girlish charm in the Zorro/Entrapment days, and that is another reason. Stanley Tucci keeps reminding me that I'm watching Stanley Tucci and that's a good thing, making the villain Frank Dixon at least a little lovable. Even stereotyping in the hands of a good director becomes a plus, as borne out by the cast of minority roles in this picture.
There's no point getting too serious about TT. For example, challenging that one just can't learn English by putting two travel guides (one in English and one in mother tongue) side by side is just about as meaningful as challenging that 5 cakes and 2 fishes can't possibly feed 5,000 people. What I like, on the other hand, is little things such as Spielberg's self-referencing when Viktor Navorski intimates that he is afraid of sharks. At the end of the day, all I know is I haven't laughed so much and so heartily in a movie for quite a while.