lost in translation
Posted on May 9th, 2006
by 
sass
sass
the other evening i revisited Sofia Coppola's Lost In Translation .. and was struck once again, on this second viewing, by what a beautiful mediation it is on alienation and love.
The film catches its mains Bill Murray and Scarlet Johannsen inside of a web of meaning; cultural codes that they don't have the key for, woven around them in a palpable sense of alienation. Yet within the dislocation of this frame Scarlet Johanssen's character chances upon moments of intensity and beauty; moments of depth which (temporarily) sear through the gap, requiring no translation. And then there are moments of human connection, of warmth, empathy, simpatico .. the radiant joy of randomly finding someone who truly and unexpectedly brightens the way on our path.
Watching the film illuminated something that I've been musing over : a shared characteristic in some of my favourite musicians - Joni Mitchell, Beth Orton, Nick Drake. The rawness of their music holds out beauty wrapped in melancholy, a sense of the intertwining of pleasure and pain, of both the gap between them and the continual and constant relationship of the two. And I read in Lost in Translation an echo of the intimate nature of that relationship : the inseparability of melancholy and joy. And I see something there about confronting the gap between our self and our world, the yearning to make that connection, to understand and be understood. And the tenderness of the very fact of the randomness of the manifest beauties and multiple losses that texture our lives...
The film catches its mains Bill Murray and Scarlet Johannsen inside of a web of meaning; cultural codes that they don't have the key for, woven around them in a palpable sense of alienation. Yet within the dislocation of this frame Scarlet Johanssen's character chances upon moments of intensity and beauty; moments of depth which (temporarily) sear through the gap, requiring no translation. And then there are moments of human connection, of warmth, empathy, simpatico .. the radiant joy of randomly finding someone who truly and unexpectedly brightens the way on our path.
Watching the film illuminated something that I've been musing over : a shared characteristic in some of my favourite musicians - Joni Mitchell, Beth Orton, Nick Drake. The rawness of their music holds out beauty wrapped in melancholy, a sense of the intertwining of pleasure and pain, of both the gap between them and the continual and constant relationship of the two. And I read in Lost in Translation an echo of the intimate nature of that relationship : the inseparability of melancholy and joy. And I see something there about confronting the gap between our self and our world, the yearning to make that connection, to understand and be understood. And the tenderness of the very fact of the randomness of the manifest beauties and multiple losses that texture our lives...
Access: PublicTagged with: alienation, joy, melancholy, translation, film, lost in translation, bill murray, sofia coppola, scarlet johanssen
alienation
May 2008
Yeah, I too found this film quite poignant and touching in this way. Loneliness and alienation is such a part of our postmodern world of neon signs and crowds. Bill Murray has developed, in his latter career, a very remarkable sense of bittersweetness which I find truly speaks to what it means to live life and what I see in people when I go out into the world. I also love the way they treated this subject with two individuals from such different generations. The generational gap is so painfully apparent in this film yet the two characters seem to resonate on a deeper level beyond cultural boundaries. It is a beautiful film that deserves a little patience to fully digest.
I was going to end that blog with “Oh, and I love Bill Murray”..
I am glad you elaborated for me.
Because Bill Murray is so central to making the movei what it is
his resigned weariness is so real and humourous and beautiful
its bittersweet.. exactly