Respectability is alive and well ...

Rating: 7/10 (30 December 2003)

Set largely in the Park Hyatt Hotel in Tokyo, with some interesting panoramas of that great city, Lost In Translation presents as a very real life-like set of circumstances a lot of us could easily find ourselves encountering. The film follows a week in the lives of two quite different people - Bob Harris, a middle-aged actor, in town on business, having left his wife and family at home, and Charlotte, an attractive girl young enough to be his daughter. She is visiting Tokyo with her husband, but he is totally preoccupied with his work as a photographer, and we see as little of him in this film as she does. Bob and Charlotte are drawn together, as they both feel marooned and very alone in the big foreign city, and simply find solace in each other's company. Despite the obvious generation gap, they become more attracted to each other. But he is not about to throw away his 25 years of marriage, nor she her much shorter but equally devoted commitment to her young partner. The temptations are there, make no mistake, and on occasions their silent thoughts appear almost as clear to us as if they were subtitled on the screen. I found it uncannily easy to identify with the older of the lead players, as the situation, dialogues and behaviours were so believable - not exaggerated or over-the-top, as in so many similar films. Part of that identifying was a hope that, if in his position, I would have the strength to react the same as Bob did, right up to the very satisfactory ending which we were all quietly wishing for.