Lost [and found] In Transition: the city in Lost in Translation

• Autores: José Duarte
• Localización: Avanca / Cinema 2012 / Cine Clube de Avanca (dir.), 2012, ISBN 978-989-96858-2-6, págs. 618-622
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • Lost in Translation (2003) by Sofia Coppola is a film that explores the (romantic?) relationship between Bob Harris(Bill Murray) and Charlotte (Scarlet Johansson), two characters lost in a foreign city where they find each other.What the film proposes is mainly a look into ‘the transitory nature of human life’ (Allsop, 2004), which most of thecritics did not seem to agree with.Instead, some of them (Koohan, 2003: 1) considered the film to be racist or about the desolation of the modernmetropolis. However, the journey that Bob and Charlotte undertake throughout the city of Tokyo is not only anencounter with what is strange, unfamiliar oran encounter with the ‘Other’, but it is also a narrative where the city(and this specific city) plays an important role in shaping the relationship and the characters’ identity, allowing themto act differently than they would in their home country.Therefore, the aim of this paper is to look at the external scenes in this movie so as to highlight the importance ofthe city as a visual landscape and spatial experience that, either real or imagined, helps these characters to be lost[and found] in transition.