The embarrassing thing is, this movie is just plain good. God knows it's more fun to rip some Hollywood jerkoff a new asshole in a review, especially when their daddy paved the way for their entire career. But Sofia Coppola is a young writer/director who will actually benefit the art of filmmaking if she grows old.


Sorry guys, but it's not a Hollywoodish flick. No pirates, no Rock, no governor candidates wielding helicopter guns, no computer generated fish, no music when the lovers find each other through a series of wacky comedic coincidences, and no Tobey Maguire.

To put it as simply as possible, this is a movie about real people. Somehow, one is able to actually identify with Bill Murray (playing a has-been movie star who's in Tokyo to plug a Japanese whiskey) and Scarlett Johansson (as a recent philosophy grad which, you guessed it, doesn't know what the hell to do with her life now).

These are two characters who are lost in their lives, and what better of a metaphor for this than to have them "on vacation" in a place (Tokyo) where you're not sure your peers would make sense even if you did understand the language? The contrast of cultures, the jokes that poke fun at stupid Americans just as much as the wacky Japanese, the fish-out-of-waterness that presents itself so boldly, all of these are factors of "Lost" that manage to be over-the-top without straying from reality for a frame.

Although there are a few tiny segments that could have easily said "bye-bye" in the editing room without being missed, Sofia Coppola is well on her way to becoming an auteur of cinema who will be remembered and admired long after she retires.

How this movie has become so successful thus far amongst critics and audiences is not because of its "sexiness," "daring," "triumph of the human spirit," or any of the other crap phrases coined to promote other "groundbreaking" indie flicks that turn a profit.

Its worthiness of the time it consumes comes out of the fact that it is a movie about the secrets, the reactions, and the little moments in life that make sense to us as individuals and yet somehow get "Lost in Translation" when shared with most others.