Lost in Translation

Being in a profession where there is constant noise, I enjoyed this movie for a very odd reason. The characters are pulling away from a hyped up society, away from a world, much of which is based on needless, trivial noise. Everywhere they go there is more numbing action. Watching the director of the commercial gyrating, trying to act like a real film director, despite the fact that they are doing a 30 second liquor commercial, typifies some of what this movie is about, a world where people are worn into the ground by a type A culture that is as vapid and unnecessary as we can imagine. I thought the Bill Murray character developed tremendously. While this trip to Japan was excruciatingly dull (money isn't everything), I believe that he began to see things he hadn't seen before. I liked that while he was struggling with his marriage, the crises were simple, day to day things that living brings to us. The young woman he meets shows through a whimsical kindness, that he is worth something. She is refreshing to look at an to be with. He, like many middle aged men, has self doubts. Because she has a sense of purity and can talk to him honestly about her world and his, he should go back to his life a little more sustained.

Lost in Translation (2003) Sofia Coppola's Lost in Translation is a wistful, beautifully observed meditation on loneliness, connection, and the strange spaces in between. Set in the neon-lit sprawl of Tokyo, the film captures the feeling of emotional dislocation-not just in a foreign land, but within one's own life.

Bill Murray stars as Bob Harris, a faded American movie star in Japan to film a whiskey commercial. He's adrift in his own midlife ennui, his marriage a distant echo. In the same hotel, young Charlotte (Scarlett Johansson), a philosophy graduate accompanying her busy photographer husband, wrestles with her own sense of purposelessness. When Bob and Charlotte meet, their quiet rapport forms the fragile soul of the film.

Their connection is delicate and undefined-somewhere between friendship, romance, and companionship. Coppola wisely avoids overt sentimentality or resolution, instead focusing on stolen moments: a shared silence, a glance across a crowded room, a night wandering Tokyo's surreal nightlife. The intimacy they share is about being seen and understood in a world that often doesn't listen.

Murray's performance is masterful-wry, tender, restrained. Johansson, luminous and introspective, brings quiet depth to Charlotte. The chemistry between them is electric in its understatement. Cinematographer Lance Acord captures Tokyo's glittering alien beauty, while the dreamy soundtrack-Air, Phoenix, The Jesus and Mary Chain-wraps the film in a haze of melancholy.

Lost in Translation isn't about dramatic events or revelations. It's about emotional nuance-the kind of aching solitude and brief human connections that leave lasting imprints. It lingers like a memory, especially the whispered final goodbye that remains one of cinema's most poignant mysteries.

A soulful, subtly profound film that captures the ache of being lost-and the beauty of being found, even briefly, by someone who understands.

Review written by artist jayakumar jrain.

For anyone who wants a synopsis of this movie, the critics Ebert and Berardinelli have excellent, complete reviews of 'Lost in Translation', and they both give it their highest ratings.

My wife and I saw it tonight on DVD, with DTS 5.1 sound and both think it is a remarkable movie. I like Bill Murray in just about everything, and this will go down as one of his strongest performances, as Bob, the actor in Japan for a week doing whisky commercials. Scarlett Johansson plays Charlotte, the young wife virtually abandoned in the city to do her own thing as her photographer husband (Ribisi) goes to various locations for shoots.

What I liked most was the realistic feel. Being in a strange city, with unusual customs and a language you have no hope of understanding. Meeting someone who because of circumstances (age, marital status) will only ever be a friend. Being able to talk freely. Reflecting on where we've been and where we might be going. Many of the negative comments about this movie relate to an impression that it is 'boring.' I'll put on my 'maturity hat' and state that anyone who thinks 'Lost In Translation' is boring simply was not able, at least while they watched it, appreciate the inner beauty of this movie.

The scene that made the whole story come together for me was when they were in one of their hotel rooms (doesn't matter which), overhead shot, they were in bed talking, fully clothed, he is on his back staring at the ceiling, she is on her side, eyes probably closed, the tips of her feet barely touching the side of his leg, and he moves his hand and puts it on her feet. Then the scene fades to black. It is the kind of tender, non-sexual touch that tells us how close they have become, and that theirs is a relationship of mutual trust and admiration, not one of lust.

People like Bob and Charlotte really exist, and they really do meet up in very similar situations. After a week, they must go their separate ways, he to his family and activities of his kids, she to wait for her husband and figure out how to get out of the rut. We sense that he does not love her the way she needs, and we wonder what will happen.

Before IMDb eliminated its discussion feature there was a lot of dialog about what he whispered to her in the street at the end of the movie. To have made it obscure is suitable, it allows each viewer to imagine what they thought he would have said. In real life he is 34 years older, he does have a family, she is still just trying to figure her life out, to me it would have been a comment of genuine affection and encouragement that things will work out well for her, either with her husband or with someone else.

When I used to think of what made a good movie, I would look at a movie from all aspects: direction, cinematography, editing, acting, story etc. The sum of all these parts make up the whole, and are also what lead me to my opinion of a film...

Then came Lost in Translation. The first time I watched this movie, I felt a strange sense of depression that lasted for a few days, but I couldn't put my finger on why. I watched it again and again, and felt the same way each time. I thought maybe it was because I have never traveled and would really like to, or that I have the desire to find the perfect woman in a strange world.

Whatever the case, I realized one thing. LOST IN TRANSLATION MADE ME THINK. It made me question my life, its purpose, whether I was happy or not, and what I want do with it. Never has a movie touched me in such a way, and for that reason, this is the one of the greatest movies I have ever seen. That doesn't mean its the best movie ever made, in fact, I can name many that are technically better than this film, like the one I named before. But I cannot name a movie that has had more effect on me than Lost in Translation, and that is why I love it and will love it forever.

Think of the last movie that really made you think, one that had such a great influence on you that it somehow changed your life, even for the littlest bit. That, to you, is a great movie...

It's been a long time since a movie has made me hurt the way this one did. Perhaps "hurt" isn't the right word. "Ache" is more like it. I could so completely identify with both characters.

Bob is a middle-aged actor caught in a life which has lost its zest and purpose, doing what he "ought" to be doing (making money doing whiskey commercials) instead of doing what he WANTS to do (plays). And then a young, beautiful, intelligent woman enters his orbit. On that level alone, with its mute longing and sexual tension, I can identify with him.

And then there is Charlotte, a student of philosophy seeking herself, her soul lost and adrift. She doesn't know who she is, doesn't know what she wants. Her life is a quest for authenticity of self. And I identify with her because so much of my life I have been seeking the same thing.

This movie isn't for everyone. They will call it boring, lifeless, limp. There are people, I realize, who have never experienced that kind of longing, who had never sought meaning in their lives, and searched for their own lost souls. They live for the here and now, without giving a thought to the spiritual aspects of life.

A friend said introverts will love this movie, extraverts will hate it. I think that is a fair surface assessment. This movie is all about the inner lives of two people whose souls connect for a brief time in an alien city. It is a love affair not of bodies, but of minds and spirits.

Some this movie will make angry. Some this movie will make weep.