Lost in Translation (Coppola, 2003): Mini-Film Review

Sofia Coppola's 2003 film Lost in Translation is a portrait of Tokyo from the perspective of two foreigners who are at once confused and self-aware. Charlotte (Scarlett Johansson) contemplates life as an adrift intellectual post-college graduation, while actor Bob Harris (Bill Murray) reflects on marriage, children, and celebrity life back home in L.A. Writer-director Coppola's depiction of these intersections is complemented by a soundtrack that moves between silence and captivating pop. The images present objects in a way that render them both mundane and intelligible, but the meaning of the images is always elusive--just like the film's most memorable lines of dialogue, we hear sounds but we don't know what exactly is being said.

Lost in Translation trailer, posted on YouTube