Refreshingly Different

Rating: 9/10 (7 April 2005)

'Lost In Translation' is a novel movie experience. With it's languid pace, soft focus and sparse dialogue it possesses an almost dream-like quality. Bill Murray and Scarlet Johansson hold your attention as two disparate, lonely strangers in a foreign land (Tokyo itself is effectively a central character) who seek solace in each other's company to escape their self-imposed exiles at the Park Hyatt hotel. Murray, an international movie star, is on location filming a whisky commercial whilst Johansson is accompanying her photographer husband (a quirky Giovanni Ribisi) on a business trip. The film charts their burgeoning friendship forged through a mutual apathy borne out of loneliness and frustration. They talk, drink, sing karaoke and hang out in the hotel bar. 'Lost In Translation' is a film about finding both friendship and inspiration in the most unlikely of places. The fact that the central characters find understanding in such a foreign place demonstrates this to perfection with Tokyo proving an inspired location for a movie about finding meaning. In fact you could say it's wholly ironic. A clever and subtle film which rails refreshingly against convention, making Sofia Coppola clearly one to watch as a director.