I’ve been enjoying the “Bill Murray Renaissance,” which seems to have begun with “Rushmore” and continued through “The Royal Tenenbaums” and this picture. On that rare occasion when a great comedian can turn out to be a great dramatic actor, it is usually in no small part due to him connecting his humor to some sadness or longing inside him. All humor is built on cruelty—or so I’ve heard—so all comedians must be sad or angry, somewhere; Murray’s “dramatic” roles have not simply been serious characters who happen to tell good jokes. Yet, matching him at every step, is Scarlett Johansson—yes, a scant 19-years-old, unless IMDb made a goof—with that terrific, almost monotone croak, like a distant relative of Lauren Bacall (she is quoted as saying that casting directors are always asking if she has a sore throat). She plays Charlotte as being at that age when we are all contemplation without conclusion. She is pudgy and not at all tough, yet possessed of that resilience that comes to those for whom indecision threaten to become a worldview. I couldn’t tell if Bob was in love with Charlotte by the end of the movie, but I know I was.
“Lost in Translation” is a movie without villains. As Charlotte’s busy husband John, Giovanni Ribisi is not uncaring or unfaithful. He is simply excited about his work and a little thoughtless; there’s sincerity in his voice when he tells her to quit smoking because “it’s very, very bad for you.” Bob’s unseen wife (voiced by Nancy Steiner, the film’s costume designer) is busy with their children, tired of his absence, and tired of being out-of-synch with Bob in general. She may seem harsh when he expects her to stop everything and be tender with him over the phone, but we have to remember that when she was Charlotte’s age Bob was probably just as distracted and uncommunicative as John.
Japan itself is not vilified either, although some viewers have mistaken the movie as making fun of the country. Shots of Japanese behaving in a manner that is peculiarly Japanese—the video arcade, for instance, in which a young gamer is much more physically expressive than American etiquette could possibly allow—are not framed and paced for comedy, but to convey how Bob and Charlotte can find no way in. Perhaps no culture on Earth shares so many similarities with America while still possessing so many striking differences. True, we do not see any Japanese points-of-view during “Lost in Translation” because the movie is not about those characters. The movie is about characters who are isolated and seeing things from another POV would only undermine that sense of isolation. A fine movie could be made (and probably already has) in which a pair of Japanese tourists mix together like this in America. This one just happens to feature Americans because Coppola and the two best actors for the job are American.
“Lost in Translation” is a movie of hotel rooms and hotel bars, of an unromantic yet beautifully photographed urban metropolis, where the leads look with wonder and wariness from behind windows, or appear small amidst crowds. I can’t stress enough how stark and unsentimental Sofia Coppola has made the movie. Her third film overall, after the love-it-or-hate-it “The Virgin Suicides” and a short film called “Lick the Star,” she is a master of calm moods, of delicate emotions, of all the things she couldn’t do while acting in “The Godfather Part III.” There are no plot contrivances in “Lost in Translation,” no missing MacGuffins, no idiotic misunderstandings, no obvious secrets, and no really stupid characters, only two people who have become exasperated with life and give defenselessness a try.
In the end, we can offer no solutions for Bob and Charlotte, but that’s not the point. I came to feel so much for them by the end. I had learned more about compassion. Taking apart “Lost in Translation” might rob it of its magic. Putting words and labels and definitions to things is not always a good idea. Bob and Charlotte could have had sex, they could have had an affair, but that would have just been to give what they share a name, to understand it in a larger context. What they have is too precious to reduce to a named thing, and they would rather just remember the way they looked at each other.
P.S. Bill plays Bob. Scarlet plays Charlotte. Giovanni plays John. It’s safe to assume that Coppola had these actors in mind when she wrote “Lost in Translation,” or at least when she named her protagonists.
Finished December 5th, 2003
Copyright © 2003 Friday & Saturday Night
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