Terminal, The

Director:  Steven Spielberg
Year Released:  2004
Rating:  2.0

A traveler from a nonexistent foreign country (Tom Hanks) gets stuck in (a 'replica' of) JFK Airport because of some Visa snafu (and a civil war back home) and is unable to leave. First friendly - and then hostile - Homeland Security man Stanley Tucci more or less allows him to 'sneak' out the door, but stubborn Hanks decides to stay inside and get into a series of wacky adventures, like falling in love with the gorgeous Catherine Zeta Jones, playing matchmaker for the kid from Y Tu Mama Tambien, displaying his honed carpentry skills, and becoming a symbol of rebellion for the (largely) minority staff. I admittedly enjoyed a lot of the laughs for the first hour of the movie, but things become desperate shortly thereafter when the screenwriters turn Tucci into a monster (with little motivation; it's clear that the Maxwell House can Hanks carries around is not a weapon) and its minimal charm fades - the last third is intolerably mushy filmmaking (and, keeping with Spielberg's track record, there are multiple places where it could end but doesn't).

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