Sarah's Recommendations: Lost in Translation


Overview: An American actor, Bob Harris, on the brink of a mid-life crisis comes to Tokyo to film TV commercials, where he runs into Charlotte, a newlywed college graduate. They both seem to have one thing in common: their sad lonely desperation to feel the presence of another human.

Good: The cinematographer, Lance Acord, did an incredible job capturing Japan in all of its nuances and quirks. I felt like much of the movie's excellence was due to his visual work. Coppola is successful at superficially introducing us to the lives of these characters, which is the feel she wanted to elicit. And I appreciated how she kept the love between the two characters very simple and pure, as if they were in each other's lives for this brief 1 week period to bring some joy and then never see each other again. It was not out of lust but out of a need to reexamine their own lives and come to a realization of how to translate their own existence in life.

Bad: Albeit the movie was visually appealing and the acting was pretty good, this was not enough to keep my attention. It was pretty boring. "Lost in Translation" is the type of movie you would probably have to watch again to realize that there was no meaning you were supposed to grasp from it, it was just about two people needing to rejuvenate their mundane existence and the audience is left with a feeling of uncertainty as to the characters ever achieveing that awakening. I would not watch it again so I guess there goes that. It took a good 30 mins. before I could pseudo pay attention to it and even then, the writing, the acting, the visual presence, and the directing did not keep my attention.

Recommendation: I would not watch it again. And I can only half (5/10) recommend that you watch it a first time even with all the accolades it received.

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arun said...
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