![]() ![]() It’s a cute notion but one that feels manufactured since Enrique doesn’t appear to actually meet Dolores until after she accepts his proposal through Viktor. The matchmaking between Enrique and Dolores also has a false quality as the young man uses Viktor as his conduit to getting her hand in marriage. Dixon’s allowing the rule infraction makes the character a bit more human but also less consistent. Viktor intercedes and uses his hard won knowledge of Customs rules to give the near-suicidal man a way to bring the medicine home to his Eastern European country. In one scene, he enlists Viktor to translate during a particularly tense moment when a passenger tries to smuggle medicine out of the country without proper paperwork. Stanly Tucci’s Dixon seems to be a man of malice but moments of compassion peek out once in a while. This is not to say that the other plot lines are any more convincing. Zeta-Jones’s presence in “The Terminal” seems to be just to add some star power to the proceeds and the romance between Viktor and Amelia never rings true. Amelia is a 39-year old, relationship-challenged single woman who can’t commit and this is the weakest of the several stories revolving around Viktor. His chivalrous act earns him a smile and, as their paths keep crossing, a mutual interest develops, though Viktor does not tell her of his ordeal, just that his is delayed. The only thing left to make Viktor’s exile completely tolerable is to find romance and it arrives in the guise of beautiful flight attendant Amelia (Catherine Zeta-Jones). When he takes it upon himself to begin finishing the construction work on Gate 67, he does such a good job that the foreman hires him on the spot with cash under the table. Now, the hapless traveler has a place to sleep, plenty of food and new friends. A driver for the airport food service, Enrique Cruz (Diego Luna, “Open Range”), has a crush on Dolores and enlists Viktor, with the promise of all the free food he can eat, to be his matchmaker. Still, Navorski makes a home for himself in the unfinished Gate 67 of the international terminal and, every day, takes his pass and his exit form to a pretty young Customs officer, Dolores Torres (Zoe Saldana, “Drumlines”), who feels for Viktor’s plight but must do her duty, stamping his forms with “Denied” in bright red. That is, until Dixon puts the kibosh on that plan to try to force Viktor out of his airport. He soon figures out that there is money to be made returning luggage trolleys and he starts to get the cash needed to survive. Now foodless, Viktor must live off the land and subsists on condiments and crackers. He loses his food chits when an airport maintenance worker, Gupta (Kumar Pallana, “The Royal Tenenbaums”), sweeps them into his bin and won’t let Viktor look for them…unless he has an appointment. Viktor’s first days of exile are spent in basic survival mode. Dixon tries everything he can to get Navorski out of his thinning hair and into the hands of some other government authority but, as days turn into months, he is stuck with Viktor. Being a good Krakozhian citizen, he follows the rules, much to the chagrin and aggravation of acting field commissioner Dixon, who considers Viktor a bureaucratic glitch that he simply wants to be free of. ![]() ![]() Suddenly, he is a man without a country and head customs official Frank Dixon (Stanley Tucci) tells Viktor “America is closed.” The now-refugee must live in a limbo state and fend for himself until his problems are resolved and, for now, he must fritter away his life in “The Terminal.” Robin: US Customs strips Viktor of his ticket home and his now-invalid passport, gives him food vouchers and a pass to the international terminal’s facilities and sets him lose with the order that he must not go outside the exit door. Viktor Navorski (Tom Hanks) arrives in New York’s JFK airport just as a violent coup shakes his country of Krakozhia. ![]()
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