The Magyar metropolis is star-struck as living-legend A-list movie actor Tom Hanks stays here while shooting the newest installment of the “Da Vinci Code” series, and while there haven’t been many signs of him out and about in the city yet, we had fun imagining which major Budapest sights some of his most iconic film characters would want to visit.
1/8
Allen Bauer/Splash
In this lighthearted 1984 romantic fantasy film (the first teaming him with director Ron Howard), Hanks plays a New Yorker who falls in love with mermaid Daryl Hannah. He probably won’t find his piscine playmate there, but perhaps Allen would enjoy stopping by Budapest’s Tropicarium – home to thousands of exotic fish on view in gigantic glass tanks.
2/8
Rick Gassko/Bachelor Party
Plenty of stag-party groups rampage around Budapest every weekend, so we reckon that Rick – the temptation-resisting protagonist of this raunchy 1984 comedy – could have a wonderfully wild blowout with his boisterous buddies at places like Kazinczy Street and … although those good-time guys may never be sober enough to board a beer bike.
3/8
Josh Baskin/Big
If a 12-year-old boy were to suddenly awaken in the body of a man, as happens to Hanks in this widely beloved 1988 film, Budapest might be an easier town for him to survive in than New York City. Here Josh could gain some comforting perspective by riding the – where kids take on the grown-up roles of conductors aboard a real train.
4/8
Forrest Gump/Forrest Gump
Who knows how simple-minded Forrest might alter the course of Hungarian history if he spent some time floating through life in Budapest? In the multiple-Oscar-winning 1994 movie, every interaction Forrest made seemed to have positive impacts, so we truly hope that he’ll come visit here – he’d certainly enjoy running around the track.
5/8
Captain John H. Miller/Saving Private Ryan
Stephen Spielberg’s 1998 depiction of the Invasion of Normandy in World War II portrays Hanks as the leader of a platoon of U.S. soldiers on a special mission; on multiple occasions, Captain Miller would’ve definitely appreciated the medical facilities of Budapest’s , active during that time… but unfortunately under German control.
6/8
Chuck Noland/Cast Away
After being stranded on a desert island in the South Pacific for years in this 2000 adventure film, Chuck becomes a scraggly survivor who converses madly with inanimate objects… and actually, he’d fit in quite well with many of the partiers at the annual ; Chuck would certainly have an easier time finding food on the Island of Freedom.
7/8
Viktor Navorski/The Terminal
Similarly to the plot of Spielberg’s 2004 romantic comedy, it’s conceivable that a foreign traveler in Hungary might find himself trapped in a Kafkaesque state of limbo preventing him from entering or leaving the country – but if that happened here, Budapest’s recently renovated Franz Liszt International Airport wouldn’t be a bad place to be stuck.
8/8
Professor Robert Langdon/The Da Vinci Code-Angels & Demons
While Hanks is in Budapest reprising his role as the code-breaking hero in the film adaptations of Dan Brown’s best-selling novels, he should go sleuthing around atop Castle Hill. This centuries-old cathedral is full of mysterious iconography, and the deep caverns beneath it might hold precious relics – perhaps even the Holy Grail?
