Dir. Sofia Coppola
Lost in Translation is about a week in the life of two Americans in Tokyo. The woman is a young wife who is left alone while her husband works on a photo shoot. The man is an aging actor who is being paid a lot of money to be the face for a Japanese whiskey. Both are in Japan temporarily, Charlotte until her husband finishes the shoot and Bob until the ads are all done. You see them cut off from everything familiar, in a place not even the letters on billboards are meant for their eyes. Each is completely isolated, desperately trying to kill time until they can go home. To make matters worse, neither can sleep. It makes for a lot of time for them to kill. That�s how they meet, in the bar of the hotel in the middle of the night, two English speakers in a far-away land. They meet and bond. It�s made subtly clear that these people have absolutely nothing in common, but they are desperate for each other�s company like a drowning man is desperate for help. It�s not sexual or sleazy; it�s survival of the mind. They grow to care and learn from each other.
I walked away from Lost in Translation feeling sad and knowing a little bit more what it would feel like in some alternate universe where things aren�t hostile, just terribly uncaring. To make matters worse, it�s not an alternate universe, it�s not even another planet. You can feel like that in Japan, or right here in your own home town. Now I�m all depressed. Alcohol was a big thing in the movie. I think I�ll go get a drink.
I rate it: Matinee
Scarlett Johansson as Charlotte
Bill Murray as Bob