Gate to Heaven

Ever imagined what is going on behind the scenes at an international airport? This German film gives an imaginative picture of how it might be. Between illegal immigrants, asylum seekers, baggage handlers and various other airport workers, a story about dreams develops. A Indian cleaning lady wants to become a flight attendant and an illegal immigrant from Russia works and lives underground on the airport premises with a group of other Illegals, while dreaming of a career as an airline pilot.

Travelling by baggage conveyor and using other people's ID cards to bluff their way through checkpoints, they take us into the underworld of Frankfurt Airport. A wondrous place, where one can access simulators and parked aeroplanes and move about like fish in the water. Where an illegal immigrant works on one of the museum planes on display to make it airworthy again --to carry him back home to Ulan Bataar.

Sounds like a fairy tale? I believe it *is* a fairy tale, and the makers were taking cues from Bollywood films, not only in the staging of a few dance scenes but also in creating a colourful cinematography for a drab place like an airport. Although a German production, this is a light-hearted comedy, not least thanks to the very international team that got together to make this (German comedies can be very heavy-handed, at times...). Don't expect too much in the way of romance, the storyline is sometimes a bit far-fetched, but it is an enjoyable way to spend an evening in front of the Telly.