Rating: 
Summary: Lovely, though hampered by some misguided humor
Review: Lost in Translation has a beautiful, dreamy feel to it. Loneliness and the universal search for identity feature as the major thematic focuses of the film.
Two strangers who superficially appear to be very different (one being a older, fading actor and the other a young newlywed) share a common need for companionship and understanding.
While I loved the majority of the film, much of the humor that centered around the culture shock each character experienced was misguided and too stereotype-driven to be genuinely funny - instead the jokes came off as ignorant and cliché.
Rating: 
Summary: See it in a movie theater
Review: I loved this movie and thought it had powerful questions about living and relationships. But... you really need to see it in a movie theater to get the full impact. The city of Tokyo is a significant character in this story and cannot be fully experienced on a T.V. in your home.
Rating: 
Summary: Way overrated.
Review: I like Bill Murray but this film is way overrated for it's own good. It's not even remorely funny, and its drags it feet to the boring end.I like Bill Murray but he can't save this movie.
Rating: 
Summary: WE Hated This Movie, Bought IT and Sold It Same Day!
Review: I don't know what I expected but with all the acclaim it was sure more than this.
Bill Murray looking hang-dog and contipated mixed with a 19 yr old ,young enough to be his GRAND DAUGHTER,wondering around Tokyo and employing so many cultural steriotypes that had these been Black people would have been called the worst sort of racisim and incendiary speech!
Not to mention that both of these characters are rich , self-indulgent and spoiled. and their angst is purely existential!
These people have no REAL problems, they are bored and suffering Mainly from ennui!
And , sorry Bill,he looks AWFUL!
What would a girl that age POSSIBLY see in this dissolute old man?
I didn't buy it , didn't like it and unloaded it as quickly as I bought it.
Want to see a WORTHY best oscar nominated performance?
See Mystic River. Sean Penn ROCKED!
For my money give me Johnny Depp in Pirates over Bill Murray any day!
Rating:
Summary: Why so much fuss over this?
Review: Tokyo is a bewildering city for foreigners, if only because of its sheer size and of course the language barrier. But this movie beats the culture shock theme like a dead horse and jams every Japan cliche into its 105 minutes. I read in an interview that Sofia Coppola has spent some time living in Tokyo, which I find astonishing since Lost in Translation doesn't demonstrate the astuteness or sensibility of someone familiar with the place. No, Japanese are not uniformly short and not everything on Japanese TV is a wacky variety show (or b/w Kurosawa classic). And there are not many Japanese who speak otherwise decent English, but still confuse "l" and "r" sounds with such hilarity. I stayed at the Park Hyatt in Tokyo last year, I'm 6'6" and can attest that I had no issues with the height of my shower. If anything, I find Tokyo surprisingly accomodating for a person of tall stature, especially compared with other places in Asia. What can I say? This movie is total exaggeration. Why on earth would Bill Murray's character take the girl to some non-descript hospital where no staff speak a word of English - when Tokyo is packed with medical facilities and services catering to expats? But aside from all this, the characters themselves are a bit unconvincing. I did not buy the girl as a Yale philosophy graduate considering the trite dialogue of the heart-to-heart sessions and i have never known any self-respecting philsophy graduate to listen to self-improvement audio tapes. And Bill Murray's character, married 25 years but only just experiencing the monotony of married life with a young kid. Then there's the photographer husband (he seems about 18 years old) and a vain actress, neither really developed to any extent, and several token Japanese for flavor. It baffles me why this movie has received such acclaim.
Rating:
Summary: not for everyone, i guess..but hey.. i loved it
Review: So i heard that Sofia Coppola had a new movie comin out.. Immediately I my ears perked up... wasn't too keen on Bill Murray at first.. but hey.. I loved what she did with the Virgin Suicides, and the score especially.. Eventually saw the movie...wow.. a friend of mine said it was slow..so i went in with that expectation.. it's slow if you have a short attention span, or expect a car to explode every two minutes.. if that's you're thing this isn't for you..
nawh, I'm kidding about the attention span :-)
it's not an action flick,though.. someone said it was a boring film about two boring people, who double their boredom.. they were RIGHT.. a film about two real people being people, and done in such a lovely way.. It was funny, in a poignant way.. i don't see where the racism accusations come in.. anyhow.. it didn't feel contrived at any point, unlike some other movies(too many to list right now)
Bill changed my original thoughts of him in the movie.. he was superb! the on-screen chemistry between the two is tangible, and i shall definetly be on the watch for her career. bottom line.. great movie,with a great soundtrack.. Sofia has an eye (and an ear) for great cinema... it's a bit quirky at times ( due to the culture shock ) and a bit mundane ( the short snippets of conversation when they meet) but highly enjoyable.. oh and i LOVE the 'style b' poster, with Scarlet Johansson in the
Tokyo traffic, with the dinosaur scrolling across the building , and all the neon. Sofia Coppola is one of my favourite directors;granted she only has two films, but I patiently await her next project, whatever that may be.
Rating:
Summary: A dull yarn
Review: This movie is watchable as a travelogue as it captures Tokyo's urban landscape, but as an exploration of empty despair, loneliness, culture shock, blah blah blah, I found it neither insightful nor amusing. It feels as though Sofia Coppola came to Asia for the first time, had a sophomoric affectation by how different things are from America and proceeded to make this silly movie where the audience is supposed to ponder such things as - the novelty of jet lag - how the Japanese have trouble pronouncing r's (this is really exaggerated in the movie) and many Japanese do not even speak English...TV is different too. Culture shock and introspection ensues. Yes, how profound. This movie is no better than shows like The Amazing Race, where the rest of the world is just an exotic backdrop for Americans to run through and observe such differences.
Rating:
Summary: What a movie!
Review: I did not know what to expect when I finally saw this movie. I had read so many rave reviews in the newspapers and watched critics say it was one of the best films of the year...I was convinced that I had to watch this movie. When I finally started watching it I kept expecting something funny to happen, after all, Bill Murray is one of the funniest actors alive (Groundhog Day, King Pin), but it wasn't funny. So immediately I said to myself, what a jip! He won the golden Globe award for best actor in a Comedy? But this isn't a comedy! I thought. By this time I was bored and turned it off only 10 minutes into the movie. But I was determined to watch it through so I played it again the next day and forced myself to sit through it. What I ended up watching was one of the best films I have ever seen! The story is not funny at all..It's actually sad...very depressing...But beautiful at the same time. It's about this middle-aged actor (Bill Murray) and a young married woman (Scarlet Johansen) who are drawn to each other. They are 2 Americans in Tokyo, and they movie shows them throughout the movie getting to know each other in this foreign place, and being alone in the world. It might be, they both realize, that they may be each other's soulmates, but the fact that loneliness is not a calamity but fate for these two surpass their feelings. This movie makes you cry at the end, and I seldom cry. I still think that Bill Murray's best performance was in Groundhog Day, but I am very happy that he has been nominated for an Oscar for this film. Usually these awards are not just for the sole movie they are nominated for, but for the body of their work...Take John Travolta when he won the Oscar for Pulp Fiction, for example! I think Bill Murray should beat Sean Penn for best actor this year (2004). I like Sean Penn a lot, (and I still think Sean Penn's best movie was Bad Boys-1982), but over all, Bill Murray was more effective in Lost in Translation than Sean Penn in Mystic River.
Rating:
Summary: Bittersweet film - nice imagery - two struggling souls
Review: I enjoyed this movie for a number of reasons. First, it is so wonderful to have a film about actual people moving through something approaching a real life on the road overseas. If you've ever traveled on business in a different culture you will recognize how this actually feels and how it intensifies the stage of life in which the two main characters find themselves. Isn't it wonderful that there are NO explosions, no 'action', no murders, mayhem, or monsters? Just actual human characters with failings and emotions. Bill Murray does so much with such complexity and subtlety that my appreciation for him has grown even deeper. Just a superb job. Scarlett Johansson is also quite special and memorable in this role. There is a pair of scenes that epitomizes what these two pull off together (there are many more wonderful scenes than this example). They are just before and just after Bill Murray is forced to open his door when he doesn't want to and Scarlett Johansson is on the other side wanting to ask him to lunch and he wants to go, but he can't just then and she understands why. His embarrassment and disgust with himself and her disappointment, hurt, and let down is sad but a wonderful scene to behold. They pull this off with a power that distills real life. The film seems to work hard for its R rating. The image over the opening title seemed unnecessary to me as well as the scene where he meets her briefly in a strip club and the drug references also seem tangential. The core of the story doesn't hang on any of these things. This is an adult film not because of the images, or sex, or drugs. It is an adult film because of the deep, complex, and subtle emotions it evokes in dealing with the pain the protagonists lives and the friendship that flowers for them in their exotic setting. It really is a touching and powerful film with some quite humorous moments.
Rating:
Summary: Save your money!
Review: This movie was awful, I sat there waiting for something to happen to make it a good movie but it was very disapointing and boring. Rent it for a couple of bucks but I wouldnt waste your money on buying it.
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