I loved being lost

Rating: Null/10 (14 July 2004)

I have read through the many and varied comments this movie has generated. It does not seem to be a film that one can be indifferent to.
I have to say that I loved the movie. Having lived in Japan on three occasions, for a total of about 9 years, the final stint being five and a half years or so in Tokyo, I found it instructive to see how people who do not understand Japanese cope in Japan. Knowing Japanese, the untranslated Japanese dialogue was very funny, especially when 'translated' in the movie.
Being almost besotted with things Japanese, I guess I will willingly see any movie with a Japanese setting or theme. There is one movie that somewhat comes close to LIT. Back in the early 80s, a movie with the title "Tokyo Pop" was released. It starred Carol Burnett's late daughter as a singer who comes to Japan seeking fortune and success in the music scene, and leaves having achieved fame and fortune as well. The plot and message in the movie are very different to LIT but they are linked by the fact that Tokyo is as much a character in "tokyo Pop" as it is in LIT. The two movies are also linked by the casting of Yutaka Tadokoro, and also by the inclusion of real-life Japanese show biz personalities, and special versions of their TV programmes for the two movies.
The two movies portray Tokyo at different times, obviously. "Tokyo Pop" is the Tokyo right before the bubble economy, and the launch of Tokyo on a world fashion and style stage. In the intervening time, the Japanese economic bubble grew and grew, people from all over the world flocked to Tokyo, Japan and increasingly its subculture, became very a la mode and so on. LIT has captured Tokyo well after that economic bubble has burst.
The theme of love and romance exists in the two movies as well. "Tokyo Pop" has the 'love' consummated, whereas no such thing happens between Charlotte and Bob.
Back to LIT: was it boring? I recall at one point that the action was a little slow, but having said that, it was necessarily slow. Coppola made us empathise fully with her characters. Having seen the movie a second time, I do not recall at which particularly moment I thought the pace of the movie had slowed. The message that Coppola was giving, I feel, was the ennui of two people who had found themselves in Tokyo, not necessarily by choice, and having to endure a period of time most definitely on the periphery, without understanding or involvement in the host culture.
Was there no dialogue? No plot? The movie was one long continuous stream of dialogue. The utterances and silences are all meaningful, and the non-dialogue scenes were used skilfully to carry the plot. Yes- the movie has a plot. It is like a classic shipboard romance, with no chance of the romance, unconsummated, being allowed to continue back on 'dry land'.
The movie also reminds me of "Bladerunner". The depiction of Los Angeles with many Tokyo-esque features figured prominently in that movie. Two things, the noise of music and recorded announcements was one, and the massive side-of-building-video-screens was another. Since that movie's release, scores of travel writers would write of many East Asian cities, not just Tokyo, but also Seoul, Hong Kong, Osaka, etc as being like "Bladerunner". After a while that would grate on me, as it seemed like a simplistic orientalist approach to large East Asian studies. But seeing a portion of the movie a second time, the simile 'like "Bladerunner"'is indeed true. The seemingly all pervasive 'sound' in Japanese cities like Tokyo, and the monolithic video screens, and also huge neon signs in Japanese cities, like Tokyo. Coppola used these to good effect,with Charlotte cruising through the night time rain spattered streets of inner Tokyo, through the neon charged streets of Shinjuku, in a taxi, or the Shibuya crossing, with about three giant video screens, and acres of neon.
So, yes, Coppola makes Tokyo look pretty incredible.
She has also captured Japan in a beautiful way, without making it chocolate-boxy at all.
In an ideal world, detractors of this movie should spend some time in Tokyo, to see and feel for themselves what the characters in the movie saw and felt to at least get some empathy. But that will not happen, of course.
After seeing the movie, I asked myself "Why Tokyo?", and not, say, Seoul, Beijing or Shanghai, Jakarta or Saigon? I guess it boils down to Tokyo being immediate, accessible, familiar yet confusing and ultimately impenetrable. And to have that as the stage for two people who are not exactly willing participants in the circumstances that brought them to Tokyo in the first place makes the theme and part of the title 'lost' so apposite when set in Tokyo