Just watched "Lost in Translation" So what was the big deal?

[Reciprocity]

This movie had such a big buzz last year that I was looking forward to watching it. Thank goodness I didn't pay $20.00 for the DVD. Impulse buy. So now that I've suffered through it . I think that I missed what it was that made such an impression on others. Yes Bill Murray was wonderful but I have always found him to be so. Can you help this hick from the Piney Woods of East Texas out on this?

[mopinko]

1. when you find out

let me know. that was my reaction exactly.

[Zeke]

19. Yea, Verily...

Nothing to see here!

I concur.

[burythehatchet]

2. it appeals to a pretty narrow cross section

I liked it. I think men in their 40's related to it pretty well.

[Taverner]

3. Thought it was OK...not oscar material

Good dialogue, and the movie had a great feel to it.

Without the hype, you probably would have liked it better, I'm guessing.

[xray s]

4. It kind of captured the lonliness of business travel

Not that you would want to blow $20 on a movie about that.

[Nlighten1]

5. It bored me...

Was I missing something?

[Dookus]

6. That was the biggest head-scratcher of the year....

I thought it was a total "eh" movie, and couldn't figure out WHY so many people loved it?

And I'm a man in my 40's.

[eaprez]

7. I thought it sucked too.....

...the Tokyo scenery was nice....but it was obviously too sophisticated for me because I didn't get it.

[On the Road]

8. It Was About

unexpectedly making a connection with an unlikely person when you're feeling isolated and abandoned. I DID think it was Oscar material, although it was surprising hit -- a lot of movies like this get ignored.

But if something is built up in a certain way, it's almost bound to be a letdown.

[BlueJazz]

9. I enjoyed it on many, many levels... n/t

[NJCher]

10. I loved that movie!

In addition to being about an unexpected connection, it is about exactly what the title says: that some things are lost in translation. There just isn't any better way to say it than that. Elusive, phantom experiences that can only be appreciated by those with a common culture.


Cher

[VLC98]

11. I thought it was crap.

I got it in a lot from e-bay. My husband and I watched for about 45 minutes and had to turn it off. It really put me off going to Japan as well.

[Reciprocity]

12. Thank the maker I though it was just me.

The plot had such potential . Two lonely people feeling lost in an alien environment. They paralleled each other on so many levels. I just kept thinking that it would eventually pull in all these things and take off. But all it did was leave me flat thinking I'm not sophisticated enough to appreciate it.

[girl gone mad]

13. I loved the Virgin Suicides..

and found Lost in Translation to be a big let down. As annoying as the Cameron Diaz character was, I thought she would have been a lot more fun to hang out with than the snooty leads. I also wish Scarlett would have changed her underwear once in a while.

[GOPFighter]

14. I expected better from a movie with Bill Murray

:shrug:

[mitchum]

15. It was...nice (that's about it)

Also keep in mind that the Hollywood machine has to blow up a couple of young talents from time to time as a future investment. Lucky Scarlett and Sofia got to be Matt and Ben last year.

[2bfree]

16. I really liked it................

My 18 year old son loved it as well, my husband thought it was boring though.

[R3dD0g]

17. There have been 2 movies

that I've rented and ejected before the credits rolled. This is the second and the first was Fabulous Baker Boys

[parasim]

18. I just watched it today also...

... it really resonated with me because I've spent a few weeks in Tokyo in a similar situation. It was spot on in capturing the confusion and lonliness of traveling to a city where no one speaks your language. The film expressed the essence of Tokyo extremely well. I loved it.

[Paragon]

20. As Yogi Berra once said...

"Some people, if they don't know, you can't tell 'em."

I have a copy of Lost on DVD, and I love it.

[NJCher]

35. LOL!!

That is the perfect--and I mean perfect--quote for this discussion.

Lost in translation, indeed.


Cher

[Lucky Luciano]

21. Lost in Translation was just ok though it did not turn me off

completely - probably because I am such an Asia-phile and can relat to some of the experiences that are in the movie. Other than that - feh.

My all time worst movies that made me almost swallow a bottle of sleeping pills (as if the sleeping pills were needed to knock me out) were:

The Hours :wtf:
The English Patient :wtf: :wtf:

Awful Awful Awful...boring...boring....boring...and I had ZERO sym(em)pathy for any of the characters in those two movies that seemed to take days to complete as i sat in the theater wanting to tear the hair out of my head.

[psychopomp]

36. The Hours cracked me up

My friend and I laughed through half of the movie...we were practically begging for half the characters to do themselves in. LiT was great Bill Murray, mediocre Tokyo. Better job than "Black Rain" in getting Tokyo down, but BR was a more entertaining movie.

[jpgray]

22. Ambiguity and paint-by-numbers ennui posing as meaning

If I were a critic, I would headline it that way.

[Gothic Sponge]

23. IMO it was a good Indie film, but the hype killed it.

[Longhorn]

24. Same reaction here in Central Texas!

We only paid $3.95 on Movies on Demand, though. Not a waste of time but no "there" there.

[Zorro]

25. I found it hilarious in subtle ways

The scenes on the commercial set with the director ranting and Murray completely unable to comprehend what is being said, with the translator finally telling him in four or five words what the director wanted, wryly captures the kind of interaction (or lack thereof) that occurs in business meetings with non-Japanese speaking Americans and their counterparts.

This and a number of other scenes reinforce the notion of isolation in a culture that resembles American culture but is actually quite alien. I think Sophia Coppola builds on this sense of isolation to raise other questions about separation, loneliness, and the importance and meaning of companionship, love, marriage, and desire. However, she doesn't beat the moviegoer over the head about these things -- it's up to the viewer to make these connections.

Anyway, I thought it was a fine little movie.

[otohara]

26. I Liked It Better Second Time

don't know why - just did.

[rockymountaindem]

27. OMG!

I just watched it too and I also thought it sucked.

It's like... there's some connection between us... quick! what am I thinking of right now?

[radiclib]

28. This movie really spoke to me

It said, "You never want to go to Tokyo."

[stopbush]

32. That may have been the problem for me. I dislike things that

turn me off to places I've never been. I like to travel and discover on my own. The movie was almost xenophobic in its portrayal of Japanese culture. I sat there thinking, "who's the problem here? Surely, not the Japanese. After all, it's their country. Bill Murray's character is the guy who's here simply to make a buck. So, make your buck...and get the hell out."

It reminded me of the attitudes so many Americans have towards foreign cultures. Maybe I missed the point of the movie, but it didn't do anything for me.

[Old and In the Way]

29. It was OK.

I'm a big Bill Murray fan and I've been in very similar situations....I enjoyed the social scenes; Japanese popular culture is strange. But I felt that the storyline was ambiguously unresolved at the end....but maybe that was the ppoint.

I also rented Mystic River. Wow, that movie kicked me. Robbins and Penn were so into their characters.....a stunning movie with a haunting storyline.

Watching Lost in Translation after Mystic River was a real letdown, I think.

[Mr. McD]

30. We watched it last night too

I agree it was OK but not great. The acting was good, the plot understandable but I guess just not my kind of story. :shrug:
My wife liked it better than I did.

[stopbush]

31. Didn't like it at all. I saw an Ebert & Roeper show when the DVD came

out (I had already rented it and viewed it at home). They had highly recommended the movie and were shocked when they received many e-mails from people who rented the DVD and thought the movie sucked. They wondered if it *lost* something in the *translation* from big screen to TV viewing (like the wide-angle desolate scenes that pop up on occasion).

Whatever, I didn't see it on the big screen and didn't care for it. Maybe the over-hype played into my disappointment (unfulfilled expectations and all). This is the kind of movie that is great if you discover it on your own (ie:Talk to Her; Sex and Lucia), get a warm feeling about it and file it way back in your memory. Ten years later, it shows up on late night TV and you say, "oh, yeah, I really liked that one...maybe I'll watch." But when the critics shove it down your throat that that's what it IS, the personal discovery element is eliminated...and a small enjoyable flick is overwhelmed by unrealistic expectations.

My 2¢.

[mulsh]

33. jesus and mary chain

Just Like Honey, remastered, last minute while the credits roll. almost worth sitting through the movie. It was definately better than seeing them live.

[asthmaticeog]

34. It was rubbish.

Second rate Jim Jarmusch meets third rate Wong Kar Wai. Independent and foreign filmmakers do the plotless, subtext-as-the-whole-point thing WAY better on a fairly regular basis and get few props. But if an offbeat flick's director's name is "Coppola," well, then, it must be a groundbreaking work of unparalleled genuis. Tarantino worked the same scam, just with exploitation films instead of art-house fodder.

[joeybee12]

37. Hooray! I may have seen a more boring movie in my life, but I can't recal

one!

Bill Murray was good, but he was being a good Bill Murray. I can see how he got a nomination, which he deserved, but he didn't deserve to win, and he didn't.

As for Sofia, she proved she can't act in Godfather III, and now we know she can't direct OR write. If she wasn't a Coppola, she'd be busing tables at the Denny's on Sunset, because she goofed up too many orders while trying waitressing!

[indypaul]

38. Lost In Production n/t