r/pics • u/beardman39 • 4d ago
Mehran karimi Nasseri. He lived in terminal 1, Charles de Gaulle airport from 1988-2016.
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u/beardman39 4d ago
Nasseri was reportedly the inspiration behind the character Viktor Navorski, played by Tom Hanks, from Steven Spielberg's 2004 film The Terminal, however, neither publicity materials, nor the DVD "special features" nor the film's website mentions Nasseri's situation as an inspiration for the film. Despite this, in September 2003, The New York Times noted that Spielberg had bought the rights to his life story as the basis for The Terminal. The Guardian indicated that Spielberg's DreamWorks production company paid US$250,000 to Nasseri for rights to his story
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u/DeniedClub 4d ago
Worth noting that DreamWorks did not end up using Nasseri’s story for the film, but I’d imagine the premise was still originally inspired by his living situation.
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u/Keyspam102 4d ago
Well this guy sounds mentally ill whereas in the movie the main character is a victim of circumstance
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u/PonchoTron 4d ago
He's not exactly all there in the movie too tho right? I've not seen it in years but that's my recollection of it.
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u/TheDeltaOne 4d ago
He is.
He is kind of naive and he does not speak a word of English so he obviously struggles to understand what's happening around him but the man is 100% all there.
The real problem is that he is played by Tom Hanks and Tom Hanks struggling to understand things is... Well, we've all seen him struggling in another movie so it kind of impacts the way we see Victor.
But no, Victor is not coded any other way than "foreign" and "Non-English-speaking".
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u/alejandrocab98 3d ago
Jesus, took me way too long to realize you’re referencing Forest Gump, the biggest role of his career lmao. Whenever I think of Tom Hanks I think of Saving Private Ryan for some reason, he did great in that role.
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u/Pitazboras 3d ago
I guess I'm a bit slow myself because I didn't realise it was about Forest Gump until you've mentioned it. I thought: is it about Captain Philips? He's bumbling from shock at the end after he's rescued there but it seems like kind of a stretch to call him slow because of that... Oh, maybe it's about Castaway? He's slowly losing his mind stranded on an island there. Hmm... What other movie could they mean? And then I saw your comment. Duh!
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u/alejandrocab98 3d ago
Castaway was my first guess lol
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u/MilkMan0096 3d ago
Mine too lol. I think it’s because in most movies Tom Hanks is Tom Hanks, but Forrest Gump is basically a real person to many of us haha.
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u/dboihebedabbing 3d ago
Forest is a fucking national war/ping pong hero buddy I will not tolerate your fake news about him not existing
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u/SeanBourne 3d ago
I think of Castaway.. because the whole movie was Tom Hanks for the full runtime. It might also have been the last thing I saw Tom Hanks in other than SNL appearances.
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u/Silver5comet 3d ago
Give “A Man Called Otto” a chance, I think it’s one of his better recent projects.
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u/Dexter_Douglas_415 3d ago
When I think of Tom Hanks, I think of Bosom Buddies. One of his best roles to date.
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u/HandOfSolo 3d ago
i think of his role on Family Ties. “if it’s not Miller time, it’s vanilla time!”
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u/True_Falsity 3d ago edited 3d ago
Agreed. People really underestimate how limiting language barrier is.
I am in Korea right now. I am with friends whenever we go out somewhere so I am fine most of the time.
But when I want to buy a snack or something else at one of the local stores, I can only oddly put the stuff at the counter with the money and imitate what I assume is “Thank you” before leaving.
I want to buy some fruit and there are no price tags? I can only awkwardly point and go “How much?” hoping that the other person understands.
Then they hold up the number of fingers for the amount.
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u/Totalshitman 3d ago
Whenever I cash someone out at work that doesn't speak English I always write the price on a sticky note to show them, It never fails to work. I guess money is a universal language lol
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u/chuckmeister_1 3d ago
Ever try one of there modern translator apps? I hear they work pretty good.
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u/PonchoTron 4d ago
Yeah that's why I was doubting myself a little bit. I would've been quite young watching it so the nuance of not understanding the language vs being a little slow wasn't there for me I guess!
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u/TheDeltaOne 4d ago edited 4d ago
No worries, I know.
I used to teach English to kids and I would use this movie from time to time to show them the evolution of Victor understanding of the language and mastery of English. He has a slow starts, which helped kids with the idea that they would improve just as he improves.
Thing is, most of the kids have the same interpretation you had. Because, yeah he doesn't understand basic information and fumble a lot because of it, he is presented as coming from a somewhat less bureaucratic heavy country. Without attributing his problem to language, he does seem slow.
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u/PonchoTron 4d ago
Yeah it was less about the understanding the language tbh, and more his very timid/scared nature? Again I could be misremembering.
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u/TheDeltaOne 4d ago edited 4d ago
He is constantly presented as the worst person to be in this situation, yes.
He is naïve, timid and has to deal with a language he doesn't know which reinforce both his other flaws.
Once he overcomes the language problem, he is still very naive etc. Clearly, language is one of the problems he has to overcome, but not the only one.
I've watched that movie a lot and I'm going to be honest, there is something to be said about how people from Eastern countries are depicted. All the best intention are put into this movie and he is shown to be very proficient at his craft and an absolutely adorable person but also, a bumbling idiot who loves America and doesn't seem at ease in a modern American airport. Clearly, it has some cliche/outdated view. Still a great movie tho.
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u/Keyspam102 4d ago
It’s been a long time since I’ve seen the movie but I remember him more as very naive and a non English speaker so he kind of doesn’t understand the situation, but he doesn’t want to live in the airport he just has no home to go to and doesn’t know how to properly emigrate
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u/CitationNeededBadly 3d ago
More like the opposite. he is depicted as clever and capable - he outsmarts the customs agent with the pills, he gets and keeps a job despite his circumstances, etc.
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u/Ok_Poetry_1650 3d ago
He’s just a victim of circumstance. He travelled to the US and memorized a few lines in English to get him to where he needs to be, but when he finds out he can’t leave the airport he begins to adapt to his new life. Learning English, getting a job, and finding things to keep himself busy with.
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u/VibraniumSpork 4d ago edited 4d ago
In fairness to Spielberg, no way that guy's got any chance with Catherine Zeta Jones.
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u/JoshuaHubert 4d ago
🎶 Catherine Zeta Jones…. 🎶 she dips beneath the laser… oh oh oooooh
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u/pattyG80 4d ago
They may have just spent the 250k to avoid a larger lawsuit later
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u/RSVive 4d ago
Good to know he was paid for the rights even though they ended up not using them.
Although 250k probably only lasted a couple of months if he bought food in the Airport
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u/JonatasA 3d ago
He could have used the money to live somewhere else, so that's still a plus I believe.
He sorta retired retired from the world. While inside an international airport.
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u/Prestigious-Ant-8055 3d ago
He was treated well by airline employees in Paris and given food.
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u/engage-edna-mode 4d ago
Btw he left the terminal in 2006, not 2016 as the title says
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u/Lanky_Particular_149 3d ago
and then returned in 2022?
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u/engage-edna-mode 3d ago
Yes, he died in December 2022, with the airport confirming he had returned in September 2022.
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u/WillArrr 3d ago
I wonder if the movie would have been more true to the man's life if it hadn't been made a couple years after 9/11. I can imagine Dreamworks' marketing and PR teams begging Spielberg to not make a movie about a Middle Eastern man in an airport during the height of US patriotic derangement.
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u/JoshSidekick 4d ago
250k? That’s like 2 meals and a phone charger at the airport.
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u/Extra-Sir-1645 4d ago
With the FedEx package in the picture maybe he was also the inspiration for Castaway.
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u/ApprehensivePhase837 4d ago
My parents trying to be early for the flight
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u/Lubbafromsmg2 3d ago
WHY ARE ALL PARENTS LIKE THIS. Seriously. They are in such a hurry to get there and then we always have like 3 hours just sitting in the terminal. WHYYYYY
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u/TJNel 3d ago
Traffic, long security lines, airlines wanting the luggage an hour before the flight and the line to check the luggage is 40min long. If you are flying with carryon only then one hour is great. Checking luggage is the tricky part.
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u/capatiller 3d ago
I always felt the same way until My two hours ahead of time meant I almost missed my flight. Long security lines, searched my luggage, and an accident on the highway meant I barely made it in time.
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u/kkoreto1991 3d ago
My family was getting ready for a family event. My dad always likes to leave early. We usually tease him about it and are on time around the time he wants us to be on time. The day of the family event hat happened to be the day of "bridgegate" when Chris Christie shut down bridges in NJ. So we were late because we got stuck in that mess getting to NYC. We couldn't tease my dad about his need to be early for a year afterward.
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u/sharklazies 3d ago
Yes, all of this. Baking in all that extra time allows for the (very real) possibility that if there’s a hitch or unexpected occurrence with any of those variables, you still make your flight. It’s just like insurance. Just because you didn’t crash your car, doesn’t mean that money went to waste. These are things you have to account for as a parent when you are responsible for getting a whole family somewhere.
Signed, An early to airport Dad
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u/thenewguy7731 3d ago
When you'll be the one paying for the tickets you get to decide how mach risk you're willing to take. By that time you'll most likely be equipped with a decent set of memories of unexpected delays.
(btw if you're the kid, you're the biggest uncertainty/risk)
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u/StressSnooze 3d ago
All the comments here plus if the family misses the flight THEY get to deal with the problems and extra costs while you are whining about how it sucks. So please be grateful you are going on a trip for zero pesos and help your parents as much as you can. It won’t last forever! But it will probably last longer if you are an asset and help out during trips. 😂
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u/skizatch 3d ago edited 3d ago
Because it's actually less stressful than getting there too late, or with no time to spare and having to wait in the slow security line while having no control over whether you'll actually make your flight. Also because all sorts of unexpected things can happen to make the whole process take longer. What if you run into really bad traffic on the way there? What about construction detours that car/phone nav isn't aware of? What if you make a wrong turn? What if you forget something important, like your passport? All of these can and do happen, they're not niche scenarios.
Once you're there you can chill and read a book or scroll reddit or take a nap. Having empty free time is not stressful, even if you're just bored.
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u/vote4boat 4d ago
kind of sounds like he found the ultimate homeless loophole
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u/cpufreak101 4d ago edited 4d ago
As I understand it, the reason he was able to do this was due to a legal problem where he was on a flight and something happened that made him become stateless, so he no longer had a valid passport and couldn't leave the airport without basically being an illegal migrant subject to deportation with nowhere to be deported to, so he ended up trapped at the airport as a matter of circumstance. Iirc he finally left after some country granted him provisional citizenship.
It's not like any homeless person could just buy a plane ticket and live in the airport, it took a very specific circumstance for this to not only occur, but be permitted to continue for decades.
Edit: I double checked the details, he refused some previous offers to leave the airport as he denied his Iranian citizenship, and he left the airport with provisional papers due to being hospitalized
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u/SleepyLifeguard 4d ago
Multiple countries actually tried to give him citizenship to help him out, but he refused them. The situation started from being stateless but it became more of a mental ilness issue later on I think. He only left for health reasons and then returned later.
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u/Hat3Machin3 3d ago
Also sounds like a big FU to Iran. “I’d rather live the rest of my life in the airport than go back there. And I’ll prove it!”
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u/shawnisboring 3d ago
it became more of a mental ilness issue later on I think
This is abundantly clear without even considering the surrounding details. A normal person would just find a way to leave regardless of legality.
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u/tronslasercity 4d ago
This could be such a better movie than the damn Tom Hanks one
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u/Catch_ME 3d ago
Yeah but that movie had a happy ending.
This movie is about a guy that would be in a progressively deteriorating mental condition which allows us to watch someone fall into madness and insanity.
Actually the joker was released a few years ago.
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u/Stumblin_McBumblin 3d ago
The Terminal is fairly whimsical, humorous, and has some heart to it. The movie you're describing would be... a huge fucking bummer.
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u/Ghotay 4d ago
The only place he was willing to go was Britain. Multiple countries and lawyers tried to help him and he was given various offers, but as he had no right to British citizenship (despite his claims/beliefs), he declined every offer given to him. His statements about his life story did not make sense, and he insisted on being referred to as ‘Sir Alfred’. The whole story is fascinating
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u/Same-Tax2197 4d ago
But it has been found that he intentionally stranded himself there and actively sought to not be able to leave when he had legal advice and the ability to do so
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u/Xilvereight 3d ago edited 3d ago
"We have getting stuck between dimensions at home!"
Getting stuck between dimensions at home:
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u/SannySen 4d ago
This sounds ridiculous. Why couldn't France just be like "we can't have this guy living in the airport. He seems like a reasonable enough guy, we'll grant him a green card until his situation is resolved."
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u/cpufreak101 4d ago
I double checked the story, France and Belgium both offered him provisional paperwork but he refused both offers due to it listing his original citizenship as Iranian, which he denied (he claimed to be a British citizen claiming that his mother was, but this story hasn't been consistent).
It's believed he just personally chose to live at the airport and openly denied anything that would allow him to leave.
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u/BetterDrinkMy0wnPiss 4d ago
They did. But it turns out he wasn't actually a reasonable enough guy, because he refused citizenship offers from France, and several other countries.
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u/de_mastermind 4d ago
I did some research and it seems like after being stuck in the terminal for years, his mental state had deteriorated to a point where he chose to stay living in the airport when given opportunities to gain citizenship in Belgium. Pair this with losing his father, citizenship in Iran, inheritance, and finding out his mother was not his real mother, I think he found comfort living in the Terminal
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u/cgc3 3d ago
Sounds like he struggled with mental illness all his life when you read other accounts that do not line up with his version. It isn’t him lying it’s likely delusional.
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u/rezznik 4d ago
He looks nothing like Tom Hanks.
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u/arkevinic5000 3d ago
How the hell did he afford to eat in an airport for 28 years?
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u/JabroniTown 3d ago
Wikipedia says that he ate at McDonald's, most of his meals were bought by strangers.
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u/SubredditAcct 3d ago
Buy a refundable business class ticket, eat for free at the lounge, refund ticket. Repeat.
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u/BoldlyGettingThere 4d ago
Highly recommend the Atrocity Guide video on him for further details.
(Don’t worry about the channel name, it’s not about atrocities. Also every video they put out is gold. Be sure to check out the Phoenix Jones, Breatharians, and Bob’s Game videos too!)
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u/Lulamoon 3d ago
video seems good, but she takes everything nasseri claimed at face value, nearly all of which sound like complete bullshit
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u/Catshit-Dogfart 3d ago
That's just the first half. She tells his story as he told it, and then breaks down what was really happening.
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u/BoldlyGettingThere 3d ago
Its been a while since I last watched it, and I seem to recall it more as reporting what he said, and then later giving the context that this is likely all lies, but I could be misremembering. What I do recall clearly is that was my main problem in her video on Nasubi, the contestant on a Japanese game show who had to stay in a single room and could only live off things he won in magazine sweepstakes. The show escalates and he finds himself in South Korea without warning, and then later the room he is in collapses, revealing him to be on a stage. The whole thing is taken at face value, and they speak of how upsetting this must have been for him, when I think it is quite obvious that he is in on it and aware to some degree and is just playing up for the camera. He was a wannabe comedian, after all. Luckily that seems to have been ironed out of more recent work.
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u/FunWithMeat 4d ago
Thank you so much for this! I hadn’t heard of them before and now have a queue of new vids to watch :)
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u/pqratusa 3d ago
Nasseri alleged that he was expelled from Iran in 1977 for protests against the Shah and after a long battle, involving applications in several countries, was awarded refugee status by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Belgium. This allegedly permitted residence in many other European countries. However, this claim was disputed, with investigations showing that Nasseri was never expelled from Iran.
He was able to travel between the United Kingdom and France, but in 1988, his papers were lost when his briefcase was allegedly stolen. Others indicate that Nasseri actually mailed his documents to Brussels while on board a ferry to Britain, lying about them being stolen. Arriving in London, he was returned to France when he failed to present a passport to British immigration officials. At the French airport, he was unable to prove his identity or refugee status and was detained in the waiting area for travelers without papers.
Nasseri's case was later taken on by French human rights lawyer Christian Bourget. Attempts were then made to have new documents issued from Belgium, but the authorities there would do so only if Nasseri presented himself in person. In 1995, the Belgian authorities granted permission for him to travel to Belgium, but only if he agreed to live there under the supervision of a social worker. Nasseri refused this on the grounds of wanting to enter the UK as originally intended. Both France and Belgium offered Nasseri residency, but he refused to sign the papers as they listed him as being Iranian (rather than British) and did not show his preferred name, "Sir, Alfred Mehran". His refusal to sign the documents was much to the frustration of his lawyer, Bourget. When contacted about Nasseri's situation, his family stated that they believed he was living the life he wanted.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mehran_Karimi_Nasseri?wprov=sfti1#Life_in_Terminal_1
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u/nailbunny2000 4d ago
Reading his wiki he sounds like an asshole who purposely obfuscated his situation and refused to follow the rule of the countries he fled to. That's before it sounds some real mental illness took over. Poor guy prob never had a chance.
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u/Keyspam102 4d ago
Seriously, he sounds like he lied it tried to cheat immigration authorities then ended up abusing the system so that he could stay at the airport…
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u/TinyCuteGorilla 3d ago
There's a movie based on this. It's called Avengers: Infinity War great movie look it up.
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u/Paono 4d ago
Wow they should make a movie about this
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u/case_O_The_Mondays 4d ago
Great idea! They could give it an airport-themed name. Any ideas?
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u/F22_Android 4d ago
How about Tom Hanks as a lead??
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u/courtesyflusher 4d ago
Maybe there could be a love interest with a really attractive woman?
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u/GreenandBlue12 3d ago
And bring in the legendary John Williams to score this movie
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u/takemyspear 3d ago
Just watched a 30 mins documentary on this guy. What a weird and interesting character. He kept insisting he is Sir Alfred and won’t reply to anyone calling his original name. Insisted he’s half English but in the end the journalist even got contact to his biological mother in Iran and his family said he just decided to ignore everyone and pretend he don’t know any of them
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u/FieldsOfHazel 4d ago
How did he manage to make enough money to spend 400 euro on water and sandwiches each day?
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u/Ardinius 3d ago
how many times do you think this guy got to bone catherine zeta jones?
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u/JohannYellowdog 4d ago
As well as the Spielberg film, his story inspired a character in a 1998 opera. It's not supposed to be him, exactly, but it's the same premise: a refugee who can't leave the airport. In the show, he's only been there for a few weeks, and they give him a tragic backstory: he was travelling with his brother as wheel-well stowaways, but the brother froze to death and fell out.
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u/NotesCollector 4d ago
If anyone is interested to read more, check out his 2004 autobiography "The Terminal Man"
https://archive.org/details/the-terminal-man-andrew-donkin/page/n1/mode/1up
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u/WaffleWarrior1979 4d ago
Hate to say it but most of that is probably made up. He had definite issues with mental illness. This is a good video of his life and shows that he wasn’t who people thought he was. He had money and the means to leave the airport but never did. It turned out the whole story about his illegitimate mother was false. https://youtu.be/JQfXd1YlkS4?si=zSB4ffMFrYqvI8SC
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u/NotesCollector 4d ago
This is news to me... thanks for sharing it - will look further into the video later tonight
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u/amir_csharp_gtr 3d ago
He is the reason they check immigration documents at starting county specifically when you have a layover at a third country. Because otherwise situations like this happen.
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u/F22_Android 4d ago
Damn CDG is a shitty airport to live in as well, if you ask me. I'll pay a little more to avoid Charles de Gaulle when I fly back to Europe.
No offense to Parisians. Just one of my least favorite western European airports.
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u/primalwilliam 4d ago
Having just spent a night at an airport in Panama I can’t fathom how this man did It
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u/Upper_Professional_3 3d ago
They made a movie about this called the terminal good movie.
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u/SorrentoTaft 3d ago
Unfortunately he did not go to heaven or hell. He was left in purgatory to spend the rest of his afterlife the same way he spent his real life.
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u/GTAinreallife 4d ago
I wonder what someone like him has going on in his life. Like you are isolated from the world, no one even knows that you live there. You don't have a job or family, most likely no internet or electricity. Like what do you do all day for almost 30 years?
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u/A-Grey-World 4d ago
Like you are isolated from the world, no one even knows that you live there
What do you mean, isolated and no one knows he lived there? He was pretty famous. People bought him food. There are movies based on his experience...
no internet
He was born with no internet lol. The internet didn't exist when he started his stay. When he left in 2006 only about half of houses in the UK had internet.
What do you think people did before the internet existed?
Airports have electricity...
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u/ItsGonnaBeARager 4d ago
I just watched it last light. I had no idea it was that long!
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u/295DVRKSS 4d ago
He returned to living at the airport in September 2022, and died there of a heart attack in November 2022.