Lost in Translation movie... wow

Cafe Society
41

Well, the office reaction is mixed…

Most of us thought that bits could be construed as vaguely racist…and those were supposed to be the “funny” parts.

But as someone who is still feeling the effects of culture shock and not bonding well with the people I’m supposed to be friends with, I found it ringing much too true. I’ve found the other lonely person and gone on some mad adventures. I’ve spent nights drinking too much and singing.

I’ve gotten jealous in spite of myself.

There are things about LIT I don’t want to like, but have to- because I’m living them. I was the only one out of five of us who enjoyed it. I didn’t care that much for “Girl with a Pearl Earring” because it was too much like trying to inhabit a picture- the opposite situation.

AL

42

Arrggh… Murray sexy ? Charming maybe… funny certainly … sexy ?! No way :slight_smile:

Feel free to talk about it... I didn't mean to imply that "limited experience" would limit or make impossible enjoying the film... but more frequently those who have had these experiences would be amongst the "fans". 

I did say:   "I GUESS ... won't appreciate AS MUCH."   

The film isn't only about jet lag and feeling alienated... its got much more to it and anyone can enjoy it.
Anyone from Japan here ? I'm curious to know how this film went in Japan. Sucessful ? Did they like or hate it ?
43

It takes a truly dedicated fan of Scarlett Johannson, or else someone who is bored out of their skull and has nothing better to do, to watch her in one of her earliest, most career-defining roles…

as the big sister in Home Alone 3

44

Count me down as one who was quite underwhelmed by this inexplicably over-hyped movie. Here are a few things I had a problem with:

  1. Why, exactly, was Bill Murray’s character so interested in this girl if he didn’t want to have sex with her? She seemed a bit on the boring side to me.

  2. Was I the only one watching this movie and thinking that Tokyo looked like a DAMN interesting place to be? Are you telling me that a Yale graduate couldn’t find SOMETHING fun to do for a week there? Again, this would indicate to me that the girl was a bit on the dull side.

  3. Was I also the only one thinking that the movie would’ve been far more interesting had it followed her photographer husband to wherever it was HE was going? Shooting rock stars on tour on Japan? Sounds OK to me.

  4. Finally, did anyone else find it odd that the Anna Farris character (Cameron Diaz?) and the Bill Murray character (Harrison Ford? Sylvester Stallone?), two big Hollywood stars in the same hotel, didn’t even ACKNOWLEDGE each other? Correct me if I missed something, but wouldn’t the young starlet have been swooning over a big action movie star instead of some nobody rock photographer?

Oh well. It’s not that this movie was all that BAD…it was just…nothing special.

45

It just opened here in theatres, but with sick doggie at home, I can’t get off to the movies, and nicely enough, it’s been released on DVD in the US, so I downloaded it.

I’m totally blown away.

Without a doubt the best movie I’ve seen in quite a while. It’s a moving painting and Ms Coppola uses water colors with a feather-light touch. I can’t really add anything that hasn’t been said before in this thread, but I’ll try to answer Stephe96, not because I’m gonna change the minds of people who was bored out of their skulls (and I can see why), but mostly to sort out my own thoughts.

  1. I don’t know your age, but when men reach a certain age, all interactions with women don’t have sex as a goal. I’m sure he was tempted, seeing that she’s gorgeous, but like me who’s 23 years older than Ms Johansson, and 20 years older than her character, I’m sure that the thought of being a ‘dirty old man’ crossed his mind.
    And for her being boring - she was real. She looked real, acted real. If you find that boring… I dunno, there are so many movies and shows with contrived conflicts and cardboard (or cardbored?) characters, I found it totally refreshing.
  2. Yes, Tokyo did look interesting, but I think she was there at the wrong point in her life, hitching along with hubby, doubting her marriage and trying to find out what she was going to do with her life. Having all these emotions going through her mind, while arriving at such an alien place can be emotionally straining. I thought the movie captured her reactions perfectly.
  3. I suggest you rent Almost Famous. I like Ribisi and think he’s an excellent actor, but I think that there is a reason he and all other secondary characters are so two dimensional, as compared to the two protagonists: It’s just like that when to people fall in love (even it the spiritual sense that we see here), everything else just fades away. Hubby’s story is another story, which might be interesting. Hence mys suggestion for ‘Almost Famous’.
  4. I think that Anna Farris character is more of a young starlet: Jennifer Love Hewitt maybe. Someone flaky at least. And Bill Murray’s character is definitly past his prime. An action star that haven’t had a hit movie in a long time. I’d say more of Don Johnson. Then it makes perfect sense. No up’n’coming starlet would want to be connected with an older star, sliding into oblivion. And she’d want to act cool, like meeting big stars is so every-day for her, she won’t even acknowledge that old fart, not even for what he was.
46

Funny + charming = sexy. Especially when combined with restraint (i.e. carrying a lovely young thing up to her hotel room, tucking her in bed, and then walking away.) That is sexy. Everything else is window dressing.

47

Boring? I didn’t find her at all boring. She was smart, educated, had a nice understated sense of irony. She seemed a lot like Murray’s character, just younger and less sure of herself.

What she wanted to do was have fun in Tokyo with her husband. That’s why she went with him, but once they get there, she finds that he’s more interested in his rock’n’roll friends (whom she doesn’t like) and too busy with work to spend any time with her. Tokyo is a great city, but not when you’re worried that you’re marriage is falling apart. Note that Murray is just as bored as Johansson is, and for similar reasons. Does that make his character dull, too?

Ugh. Sounds like Entertainment Tonight: The Movie. Honestly, is there anything on Earth less interesting than a rock musician?

Neither of these characters are big Hollywood stars. Anna Farris is the sort of manufactured ingenue who do one marginally watchable movie, gets a lot of coverage in the tabloid press, and vanishes completely from the public consciousness inside of a couple years. Bill Murray’s character hadn’t been a big action star in more than a decade. Otherwise, he wouldn’t be pimping cheap Japanese whiskey. He’s not supposed to be Harrison Ford. He’s not supposed to be Sylvester Stallone. He’s not even supposed to be Charles Bronson. At best, he’s John Saxon. Twenty years ago, the Anna Farris’s of the day might have been swooning over him. The fact that in the present day, she doesn’t even recognize him is another dig at his ego, another example of how much of a has-been Murray is supposed to be.

48

Except that people like Harrison Ford, Sean Connery, Brad Pitt, etc. all do ads in Japan NOW. The Japanese will pay these people millions of dollars to endorse their products BECAUSE they are huge stars at the moment. John Saxon? Why would anyone give him $2 million to endorse anything? I’d bet that the Murray character is VERY closely based on someone like Harrison Ford or Sylvester Stallone. And I read somewhere that Anna Farris is basically playing Cameron Diaz in the movie.

So my question stands: why would these two Hollywood megastars not even acknowledge each other?

49

The movie made this absolutely and abundantly clear: the Bill Murray character is not a megastar. He’s past his peak, a has-been, a joke, a forgotten bit of B-movie trivia.

Maybe he is based on Sylvester Stallone, after all.

50

Sofia Coppola has been saying to anyone who asks that this is not true and she doesn’t know where the rumor started.

51

Oh come on. Who are you gonna believe? An anonymous chatter on the internet or the chick who only directed the movie?

Based on a real person or not, I still found it odd that the two Hollywood movie stars in the hotel had nothing to say to each other. I’ve been around actors. Business is ALL they talk about!

52

A few random comments:

  • It’s interesting that people find the movie so dead-on about the experience of being jet-lagged and alone in a strange country, because it worked just as well for me, someone who doesn’t travel overseas. I just saw the foreigners-in-Japan angle as a metaphor for the isolation and other-ness we all sometimes feel in our daily lives.

  • Bill Murray was playing an action star? I missed that. I assumed, because of the similarity between his name and his character’s, that he was playing a version of himself – a once-big star of action-comedies (think “Ghostbusters”) who is no longer a red-hot Hollywood commodity.

  • People who go into this movie expecting a comedy must be really confused. It struck me as a drama with a few droll moments – little observations of life that bring a smile to your face but not big laughs.

  • I didn’t see anything racist about any of the depictions of Japan. When you’re in a new place, the oddities are what stand out so the movie tended to focus on the odd parts of Japanese culture. That’s not to say all of Japan is odd or that it still seems odd once you’ve gotten to know the place.

  • This is the sweetest romance I’ve seen in a long, long time. I think Murray did want to sleep with the attractive young woman, but he was too classy to indulge in a fling with such a vulnerable, sensitive person. I think she wanted to sleep with the famous, funny, fatherly guy because it would make her feel attractive and secure, but she was too sensible to become a weekend conquest. What they settled on was sharing the knowledge that under different circumstances they might have shared something quite beautiful.

  • I don’t know why anyone would accuse Scarlett’s character of being boring. She was the one who introduced Murray to the local culture. She was the one visiting a temple.

Wonderful, quiet, evocative movie.

53

I don’t think boredom was the problem with Scarlett’s character. I think it was lonliness & alienation. She visited a temple, checked out an arcade, went clubbing…

54

This is the most overrated movie of the decade.

Scarlett’s made a career out of one expression: Mope.

Wow, I really wish that night on the town sequence lasted longer, because every frame was critical and it really helped the momentum of the entire picture. Not.

Also, I think this movie could have been better if the two leads were not the most self-absorbed, insipid people I’ve ever seen committed to film.

After watching this and the jawdropping snoozefest THE VIRGIN SUICIDES, I’d rather watch Sofia act again at this point. Oh, that’s right. I went there.

55

Count me as another one who was not only disappointed, but cannot understand the amount of praise heaped on this film. It wasn’t the worst movie I’ve ever seen, but it certainly wasn’t good, much less Oscar worthy in any category. As far as people who say “you don’t watch enough movies”, I watch an average of 8 movies a week. Have for years. I know what I like, and this crap wasn’t it. No it isn’t a complete crapfest, but it simply isn’t that damn great. It captures loneliness, culture shock, jet lag, etc? I’ve been in that situation countless times, and I can tell you that it doesn’t require a movie to capture it. The one wireless commercial with the defeated looking guy going through metal detectors, sprawled on his bed, slumped in a cab and seeing “delayed” by his flight says more than this movie did. This movie is simply boring. I’m sure that some “sophisticated” types like to claim that that is the point of the movie. I HATE travelling, HATE being away from my family, HATE being in a place that I don’t understand, but once there I never required a young blonde chick to find a way to have fun, no matter where I was. (Granted, I always wished I had a young blonde chick looking for fun, but…)

A local radio DJ recently voiced a theory that I always agreed with: Movie critics who watch movies for 8 hours a day, every day, for a living, lose their minds when they see something different, and different means great. Sorry, but just because it is different, doesn’t mean it is brilliant or even good. On the other side, someone who watches 3 movies a year thinks that anything with Adam Sandler is a brilliant movie. This movie was different. So what. I believe that a large part of why it is even nominated is because of the writer/director. Kinda follows my belief in Oscar Conspiracy.

I think of this movie the same way as I think of Citizen Kane. So many critics have said that it is so great, that there are too many people who believe that they should love it, and therefore do.

My home life is movies. I watch a lot of them. It’s my escape from reality, same as a book. It takes a LOT for me to not like a movie as I only ask them to do one of the following: Make me laugh or even just amuse me, consistently. Make me think to keep up. Scare me with something other than gory dismemberment of the token hot chick. If nothing else, entertain me to the point where I am sucked into the story. This movie, while watchable, did none of those things. I did NOT want to watch Whale Rider or Bend it Like Beckham, but I bought the DVD’s after I did.

I’m still stunned that this movie is up for not one, but the number of Oscars that it is. I strongly believe that it is only because of sex and name… Sophia Coppola. I just don’t get why so many people think this is such a great movie, other than the fact that it is not sexual, not violent, not suspenseful, not mysterious, not intellectucal, not frightening, not moving, not funny (besides a very few one liners), or even entertaining. It’s as bland as an unsalted saltine craker. The people I know personally who like the movie and try and justify the jet lag, loneliness of travel etc… have never been in that situation… They just like to believe that that is how it is. It captured the imagination of people who haven’t been there. Perhaps that is it, after all. Romantic fantasy for people who haven’t left their county, much less a county.

Just as a side note, I can’t believe that Bill Murray, who played a light version of everything he’s ever done, or Sean Penn, who played the same version of everything he’s ever done, will beat out Johnny Depp, who I’m not a fan of, who truly acted. That really chaps me. Best actor to me, is who made me ignore the actor, but believe the character.

56

I thought this movie hit the right notes on every level.

The night out scene was the best part for me since it perfectly captured the feeling of being out in a foriegn city, drunk, with people you don’t know, and wondering when it will end. I’ve been there. I even ended up singing for a barful of Hungarians who wanted to hear “Blowing in the Wind” and, fortunately for me, they didn’t know the words; I didn’t know them either and made it up as I went along.

I liked the subtlety of the movie. I liked that events weren’t telegraphed and that most everything we learned about the characters grew out of their behaviour and not from expository dialogue.

57

Okay, it’s really simple: A poster said that Lost in Translation was the worst movie he’d ever seen. I replied that he needs to see more movies, because there are far, far worse movies than this one. It’s really as simple as that, and it was even explained by another poster. I can see how some people might find it boring or it didn’t connect with them, but calling it “the worst ever” is simply meaningless backlash against the praise and attention this movie is getting.

This thread, the one before it that Cervaise linked to, and the one asking about the title of the film, all give interpretations and explanations as to why some people (myself included) think it’s a great movie. It’s not just because it’s different, unless by “different” you mean “containing believable dialog instead of overemotional speeches or predictable made-for-TV movie snatches of exposition and one-liners.” It’s not because a Coppola is involved – I don’t recall Matchstick Men or The Virgin Suicides getting tons of attention at Oscar time. And it’s not because the director’s a woman; in fact, it’s pretty offensive to try to undermine the achievement with a comment like that. Coppola herself said she didn’t realize that she was the first American woman nominated for Best Director until they told her – it’s not a big deal to anyone other than people writing special-interest Oscar buzz news, or people desperate for any way to further the Oscar nominee backlash.

It kind of sucks to be told that the only reason I like the movie is because I’m a movie snob, or because I’m told to like it, or because I have a Coppola fetish, or because I’m a poser who wishes my life were as lonely and miserable as the main characters’ of the movie. I always thought it was because it had great dialog, a couple of brilliant performances, and echoed my impression of Japan.

I think you’re taking that interpretation too literally. I’ve visited Tokyo and Kyoto as a lonely non-Japanese-speaking Westerner, and I could identify with the movie. I’m not an ex-movie star or lonely newlywed, I didn’t stay in a fancy hotel, I don’t know people there or have work to do there, and I didn’t meet a young woman who taught me how to connect with people on an emotional level that transcends words. But I can still identify with the movie. The movie did a spot-on perfect job of showing how big and just plain foreign Japan can seem to westerners, and that feeling of being surrounded by 13 million people and still being completely alone.

Johnny Depp did a great, great job in Pirates of the Caribbean, and I was really happy to see that a performance in a Big Summer Blockbuster-type movie get nominated for Best Actor, instead of the usual Oscar-bait type performances. But I still think Bill Murray gave the better performance. There are more layers to a great acting performance than just disguising yourself. Did he ever stop being Bill Murray? No, not at all, but he never stopped being Bob Harris, either. He brought as much of himself to the part as was already written, and the movie simply wouldn’t have worked without him. Depp took his over-the-top character and made it more interesting and did an astounding job with it, but in the end it was still a fairly trite character. Murray did a perfect job of conveying the humor, fun, and underlying sadness required for the part.

But besides all that, I’m glad you really talked about the movie and audiences’ response to it, instead of just posting a belligerent, rude, needlessly hyperbolic and dismissive tirade in an attempt to get attention. Hypothetically speaking of course; no SDMB poster would ever do anything like that.

58

I don’t get it either – the hype over the movie or the actors. I LOVE Bill Murray and was really looking forward to this movie, but I stayed with it for an hour last night and couldn’t stand it any more. I don’t believe one has to be a world traveller to identify with culture shock – I’ve experienced culture shock travelling in the U.S. I identified with Scarlet and Bill; yet…Scarlet apparently had been to Japan before – she had Japanese friends, yet she was bereft during her husbands absences. As I said, I love Bill, but I didn’t see this as an Oscar performance. He had more dialogue and did more acting in Groundhog Day. For “world travellers” and fellow Americans, they sure did have a hard time making conversation at the bar. I’d like Bill to get an Oscar, but not for this movie.

59

Now. Not to beat up too much on this movie…I mean, it’s not THAT bad. But didn’t anyone else find the ending, where Bill Murray whispers something to the girl that the audience doesn’t hear, to be just a LITTLE bit of a cop-out? Maybe a tad too pretentious? I know, I know…the moment is “too intimate” and “between lovers” for the audience to overhear…I get that. But I’m sorry…that just smacks of hindsight ‘spin’ of the fact that the filmmakers hadn’t thought of an ending to the movie. Too intimate? What about all the other ‘intimate’ moments between the characters that we DO get to listen to? Why even include the scene if you don’t want the audience to share in it? I’ve read or heard somewhere that Coppola actually HAD written lines for this scene, so she obviously thought it important enough to include, right? I have nothing against ambiguous endings, but I don’t really think this qualifies. How 'bout simply ending the movie when Murray spots the girl, stops his cab and runs after her? Fade out. The end. Then I wouldn’t have felt cheated by the ending. But after investing interest in these characters for the entire movie I think the audience deserves at least a hint at what was said at the end. Anyone else feel this way?

To paraphrase a character on ‘The Simpsons:’ “I could’ve stayed HOME and not heard what he said to her…”

60

:smiley:
Ah, Stephe, but that’s the point isn’t it. Here you are, posting about it, so obviously Coppola managed to tickle your imagination or annoy you or whatever. She created an emotion. And you have to fill in the blanks, just as you do when reading a book (by visualising the characters interact) she took the opposite road of a bok, seeing that this is a movie, i.e. in the narrative flow of a book, we always know what the protagonists thinks, but create our image of what he looks like. In a movie, it’s generally the opposite way, though needless exposition and soap opera actingusually delivers all the answers on a plate, thinking that the audience can’t think for themselves.
So she turned it around, made us voyeurs, and jerked the chain holding our suspension of disbelief. It was a great moment, hinting at whatever you yourself think or want to happen.
Just brilliant.