From the moment I saw Sofia Coppola's Lost in Translation
, it's had my heart. A film as funny as it is sad, it captures the shared listlessness of two very different people as they fall in love while stuck in an unfamiliar place: Tokyo, Japan. Bill Murray has never been better as Bob Harris, a well-known actor in the midst of a midlife crisis, escaping to Japan to do a little commercial work. Scarlett Johansson may very well never be as good as she is here as Charlotte, a young Yale graduate who has no idea what do do with her life. She's married to a husband who pays more attention to his career than to her, and she's basically stuck to figure things out on her own. It's pretty much a given that any film shot in Japan is going to be a favorite of mine. It's a city that is tailor made for the big screen. A combination of big city, beautiful mountainous landscapes, and cultural landmarks. Yet that's just a small part of why this movie is so perfect. The desperation in the two main characters is apparent, but I love the way Coppola keeps their feelings at a distance. The two are friends first, who begin to realize the need for much more just as our desire to see them happy only grows. The film's final scene, a hushed whisper of words full of potential and promise, nearly brings me to tears every single time.
The below scene is from my favorite sequence, a karaoke party where Murray regales us with a rendition of Roxy Music's "More Than This". Johansson will never be quite as authentic as in this scene, where you can see Charlotte's eyes opening with her admiration of this smart and surprising older man. Movies just don't get better than this.
