The Terminal: a Hollywood treatment for Merhan Karimi Nasseri
"Viktor Navorski (Tom Hanks) is a visitor to America from a small fictional eastern European country called Krakozhia. He's detained at JFK airport, New York, informed that a coup has occurred in his homeland and that as Krakozhia is no longer recognised by the US, his passport is invalid and he cannot enter the States. His nation no longer exists, so he can't go back, so he takes up residence in the airport terminal, scratching out a living and making friends with the people who work there. He even falls in love with strangely available airline hostess Amelia (Catherine Zeta-Jones), but all the while Navorski is being watched by a paper-shuffling airport security fascist Frank Dixon (Stanley Tucci).The film is, in fact, based on a real-life incident, namely that of Merhan Karimi Nasseri, the Iranian-born traveller who, having lost his documents, has been living on a red plastic bench at Charles de Gaulle Airport since 1988. DreamWorks, it seems, paid Nasseri for the rights to his story, but rather than have a character of Middle Eastern origin (the investors wouldn't like that), this gutless production opts instead for a fictional country."
(Brendan Walls, 2004)
Walls, Brendan (2004) Brisbane News, Brisbane, AUSTRALIA: Brisbane News.
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Marham Karimi Nasseri: In-limbo
I am a citizen of Charles De Gaulle Airport. -Marham Karimi NasseriDue to a bureaucratic glitch a airline traveller, Mr Nasseri was trapped in the non-place of the transit lounge in the Charles De Gaulle Airport at Roissy, France. For 11 years Nasseri shaved and washed in the passenger facilities, and kept himself occupied watching the eb and flow of the airport traffic. Despite intentions to settle in London in 1988 he was forced to make-do in a bubble of fast-food stores and gift shops until being freed by the actions of a human rights lawyer in 1999.
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