Lost in Translation (DVD, 2004, Widescreen)

Ok, I admit it. I hate Sofia Coppola. All of her movies are crap. EXCEPT Lost in Translation. My friend and I talked about this the other night, and I finally realized why I had such a damn soft spot for this movie.

First off, you have to understand that everything Sofia touches she turns into this dreamy, slow, and somewhat fanciful creation with characters who feel alienated. Point in fact, Marie Antoinette, which needed to be a strong, historical movie, became a boring slide show of pretty pictures set to jarringly modern music with a few bland lines thrown in for flavor, and left the audience feeling alienated.

But Lost in Translation NEEDS to be dreamy, slow and fanciful. It is a simple movie about two people who are lost and feel quite alone in this foreign place. Because the two characters are alienated from the world around them, they perceive it in a dreamy sort of way. The story is a very small slice of their lives, cut out and displayed to us in all its fanciful glory. If you actually experienced the same thing these two characters are going through, it wouldn't even be a story to tell your friends, because it is such a "two ships, crossing in the dark" kind of film.

But it works. It makes you think. You leave the theatre feeling hopeful about life, touched by everything going on around you, and remembering the smallest things, like the person you smiled at yesterday at the supermarket. Who knows what type of effect you had on that person's life?

Sofia Coppola is a one-note filmmaker, and this was the one note that she actually hit right. And trust me, when she hits it, she really HITS IT.