September 1st, 2003
 
Cast
Bob Harris: Bill Murray
Charlotte: Scarlett Johansson
John: Giovanni Ribisi
Kelly: Anna Faris
Commercial director: Yutaka Tadokoro

Focus Features presents a film written and directed by Sofia Coppola. Running time: 105 minutes. Rated R (some sexual content).

Central Theme
Most of us wander through life as if traveling in a foreign land. We feel no one understands or cares. Those closest to us, while initially offering the promise of deep companionship sometimes become distant. We long for simple breakthroughs with another person, which when experienced are refreshing like rain on parched earth.

Story
Bob Harris (Murray) and Charlotte (Johansson) are two Americans in Tokyo. Bob is a movie star in town to shoot a whiskey commercial, while Charlotte is a young woman tagging along with her workaholic photographer husband (Ribisi). Unable to sleep, Bob and Charlotte cross paths one night in the luxury hotel bar. This chance meeting soon becomes a surprising friendship. Charlotte and Bob venture through Tokyo, having often hilarious encounters with its citizens, and ultimately discover a new belief in life's possibilities.

Shot entirely on location in Japan, Sofia Coppola's Lost in Translation is a valentine to the nature of close friendships and to the city of Tokyo. Ms. Coppola's film, from her original screenplay, contemplates the unexpected connections we make that might not last - yet stay with us forever.

Ms. Coppola studied Fine Art at California Institute of the Arts. She then wrote and directed the short film Lick the Star (which world-premiered at the Venice International Film Festival), followed by the feature The Virgin Suicides (which she adapted from Jeffrey Eugenides' novel, and which world-premiered at the Cannes International Film Festival). © Focus Features.

This film is a visual and verbal exploration of the agonizing disconnect and isolation that characterizes human experience. From the language barriers posed by an American in Tokyo, to the “ships passing in the night” of a wife using long distance time to select carpet samples instead of relating to her husband, to the dissonance of Tokyo’s cacophonous, jangled sounds contrasted with a peaceful, still garden in Kyoto, everything in this move underscores the pain of human isolation from self, others and place. It is a brilliant expose and exploration of the human dilemma with sweet relief offered by the ‘misery loves company” serendipitous friendship forged by Bob And Charlotte. Against the backdrop of foreign language, Japan’s alien culture and their marital malaise theirs is the sweet friendship without pretext or subtitles and with minimal subtext.

Beliefs

1. Most of us feel lonely, disoriented and disenfranchised.
   
2. Most communication is so bad we might as well be speaking a different language.
   
3. We are building a society that tries to deaden that pain through noise, bright lights, fast-paced games.
   
4. Natural beauty and ancient traditions still offer something real.
   
5. As our life experiences differ from the ones we love. Our lives drift apart.

Questions Worth Discussing

1. What are the artistic merits of this film?
   
2. What elements common to human experience did you resonate with in this film?
   
3. What elements in word, deed, theme or behavior created a dissonance with who you are or want to be spiritually?
   
4. What does this film tell us about who God is? Who humans are? What we are seeking in life?
   
5. How does the gospel respond to the issue of isolation and loneliness?
   
6. Is there a soul mate out there?
   
7. Can someone who was once like a soul mate become distant through the passing of time and changes in circumstances?

© 2001 - 2010 Dick Staub, CRS Communications.