Amazingly sterile and disconnected

Rating: 3/10 (1 April 2007)

Bill Murray plays a famous actor named Bob who goes to Japan to do an ad campaign for big bucks. The problem is, he's experiencing a bit of a crisis before he arrived (a sense of disconnection with his wife and kids), and being in a totally alien culture, he is even more lost and alone. Some of the observations about the way that the Japanese do business and behave are pretty interesting, but there aren't enough of them after the first twenty minutes or so. Having a Westerner come to Japan and feel lost and overwhelmed is an interesting starting point for a film. Unfortunately, the film never really seemed to go anywhere after this interesting start. Plus, the characters (especially Bill Murray's) ultimately turned out to be rather selfish, so I really didn't care about them.
The main theme of this movie is a sense of disconnectedness. Unfortunately, in making the two leads (Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson) feel alone and disconnected in Japan, the audience, too, feels pretty much the same way about these leads as well as the movie as a whole. As a result, the movie is extremely somber, sterile and moves at a snail's pace. Both Johansson and especially Murray seem to almost sleepwalk through their roles--showing very little energy or emotion. Overall, it's a sometimes interesting but sleep-inducing experiment that failed. After seeing this and THE LIFE AQUATIC WITH STEVE ZISSOU, it seems Murray's career is stagnating. While critics might enjoy these films, they are NOT what the average person would enjoy. As for me, I much prefer the funny Bill Murray of WHAT ABOUT BOB? and THE MAN WHO KNEW TOO LITTLE.
By the way, if you DO like seeing Murray play a zombie-like character like he did in this film, then I suggest you also watch BROKEN FLOWERS--another recent film where he gives an identical performance with absolutely no emotional range.