It comes towards the end of the film, when Scarlett Johansson\u2019s character Charlotte and Bill Murray\u2019s Bob have already connected, already spent a week or so together in the Japanese capital exploring its restaurants and nightlife and hanging out in the hotel bar.<\/p>\n
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Bill Murray was 52 when this film was shot; Scarlett Johansson was 17.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cLet\u2019s never come here again,\u201d Charlotte says, \u201cbecause it would never be as much fun.\u201d<\/p>\n I think about that line a lot. Should you go back to places you\u2019ve loved? Should you try to recreate travel experiences? Because without the same people, without the same circumstances, you\u2019re surely doomed to fail. Should you just move on?<\/p>\n Lost in Translation<\/em> is about people trying to move on, or at least move forward. It\u2019s about drifting through life without considering what you\u2019re doing. It\u2019s about being a foreigner in a foreign place. It\u2019s about attraction, and connection. It\u2019s about Tokyo.<\/p>\n I rewatched Lost in Translation<\/em> a few nights ago, to mark its 20th birthday \u2013 something that can be a little dangerous. Some movies don\u2019t age so well. If you ever saw the film Human Traffic (set in the Cardiff, Wales club scene during the late \u201990s) and enjoyed it, I would implore you to never watch a single scene ever again.<\/p>\n Despite problematic elements, there\u2019s still much of Lost in Translation that rings true.<\/span><\/p>\n As someone who loves travel though, and loves Japan, Lost in Translation<\/em> is always an easy sell to me. It\u2019s one of the great travel movies. All these locations I love, these experiences I recognise.<\/p>\n And there\u2019s still so much of Lost in Translation<\/em> that rings true, that captures the experience not just of being in a foreign place at a crossroads in your life \u2013 where the setting, somewhere huge and yet anonymous like Tokyo, can make you feel even further adrift \u2013 but of visiting Tokyo itself.<\/p>\n This film has been criticised for indulging in clich\u00e9, but every experience Charlotte and Bob have in Tokyo, every single thing they see, I have experienced or seen there as well. Walking wide-eyed through a blaring arcade parlour; flipping on the hotel TV and finding some bizarre, random game show; singing in a karaoke booth at 3am; standing next to someone on the subway and realising they\u2019re reading hardcore anime porn \u2026 all those things have happened to me.<\/p>\n This film is an outsider\u2019s view of Japan, but I don\u2019t think that\u2019s necessarily a bad thing. There\u2019s value in having your own experience as a foreigner reflected back at you.<\/p>\n I love watching Japanese productions that shed light on this country from the inside, but I also enjoy seeing the quirks and frustrations that only first-time visitors would understand. Yes, the experiences you see in this movie aren\u2019t exactly original, but they\u2019re the things that tend to happen when you have no idea what else is out there and you stick to a well-worn tourist path.<\/p>\n Also believable: the weary disdain that Murray\u2019s character has for any of the Japanese characters in the film. I\u2019ve seen the way some foreigners act in Japan, the patronising treatment of local people, the failure to engage in any of the cultural niceties or norms. That\u2019s real, even if it\u2019s hard to watch.<\/p>\n Some parts of Lost in Translation<\/em>, however, haven\u2019t aged so well. Like, ah, the ages. Bill Murray was 52 when this film was shot; Scarlett Johansson was 17. His character is a movie star; hers is a jobless college graduate. There\u2019s a huge imbalance that\u2019s nothing short of creepy, and it\u2019s impossible to watch now without being grossed out by any hint of attraction.<\/p>\n Many of the travel elements don\u2019t look so good these days, either. I used to think this film so perfectly captured Tokyo, and the experience of being in Tokyo, but watching it now, you really wince at some of the lazy inaccuracies.<\/p>\n Multiple Japanese people in Lost in Translation<\/em> are either abrupt or outright rude to Bill Murray\u2019s film-star character. That\u2019s so completely jarring with any experience I have had in Japan, where local people are without fail deferential and polite.<\/p>\n In one of the opening scenes, Murray\u2019s group of handlers from the Suntory whisky company shove business cards at him with one hand. That would just never happen. These Japanese characters essentially just act like Americans with different accents; no effort has been made by the filmmakers to understand Japan or reflect its culture in the movie\u2019s local characters.<\/p>\n Other small moments jar, too. Murray keeps opening and closing his own doors when he gets in and out of taxis \u2013 if you know Tokyo, you know they\u2019re automatic, and touching them is frowned upon. You do it once, but you don\u2019t do it again. At a restaurant, Murray is served a hideous beer with the tiniest bubble of froth on top. Again, not going to happen.<\/p>\n A Japanese friend of Charlotte\u2019s also trashes a bar and their group has to make a run for it, throwing glass bottles on the street as the bar owner shoots at them with an airsoft gun, which is so utterly unbelievable. Again, it\u2019s an American\u2019s idea of the way Japanese people would act.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n