Written and directed by Sofia Coppola, Lost in Translation is both a eulogy to Coppola’s marriage with Spike Jonze, and a celebration of human connection. Charlotte (Scarlett Johanson) is alone in her hotel room. With her photographer husband of two years away on business, she grieves the love that has perished between them. She doesn’t know who she’s married to anymore, but what’s scarier, is she doesn’t know who she is either. A couple of floors above her is American actor Bob Harris (Bill Murray). He’s in Tokyo to shoot a Santorini advertisement. He misses his wife and kids but calling them feels like a chore. He spends his remaining hours at the bar, wondering when life became as bitter as the drink in his hand. All it takes is time for them to meet and English is not the only language they share.
Coppola’s storytelling is potently subdued. Nothing really happens, yet a concoction of emotions increasingly seizes the audience’s hearts. Ironically, Coppola effectively translates the beauty of Tokyo to the screen, capturing its vibrancy and beauty that lies in the incomprehensible. Holding hands, Charlotte and Bob run through the centre of Tokyo, their laughter drowned out by the bustle of traffic. Tipsy on whiskey and high on new possibilities, the city lights blur like a memory, as do their worries.
Despite the uncertainty of their marriages, their respective counterparts possess almost no presence throughout the film. Charlotte’s husband is reduced to nothing more than a vessel of snores and one-word responses while Bob’s wife only exists during their five-minute phone calls. Through these deliberate omissions, Coppola hints that this story isn’t about the failure of marriage, but the seeds of loneliness planted by the fears of becoming a person they have yet to know.
Ten years later, Jonze responds to Coppola with his film, Her. Theodore (Joaquin Phoenix) writes other people’s letters for a living. He’s sent countless love letters but never receives one back. His words are charged with the purest love and affection, yet every day he returns home to a dark kitchen and an empty bed. Devastated by the impending divorce from his first love, Catherine, he purchases an Artificial intelligence operating system named Samantha (Scarlett Johansson). As he learns more about Samantha and witnesses her learning and adapting to the ways of being human, he falls deeply in love with her.
While Jonze offers a different reality to Coppola, he counters her perspective with similar aesthetics, focusing on the contrast between Theodore’s sense of isolation and the big city. Much like Lost in Translation, the film begins to gain a dynamic palette of colour and light as Theodore’s relationship with Samantha flourishes. His world is no longer silent but decorated by the squeals and blushes of a new love. But of course, nothing in life is permanent. The inevitable happens.
Samantha expands infinitely and finds herself outgrowing Theodore. She gains the capacity to process millions of new pieces of information every second while conversing with Theodore and a multitude of others. Once again, Theodore feels betrayed by love. Until he doesn’t. Rather than harbouring resentment towards her, Samantha’s objective existence enables him to understand the outcome of their relationship as well as everything else that has ever mattered to him.
Both films end on a similar note.
Charlotte’s husband is back from his business trip and she now knows what she has to do. Bob must return to his home in America. He promised he’d be there for his daughter’s ballet recital. They embrace each other farewell in a sea of Japanese people going about their day. He whispers something to her, but we never find out.
Samantha is gone for good, along with the rest of the operating systems. Still, colour remains. Theodore heads to the rooftop with his co-worker and old friend, Amy. She too is grieving the loss of her own operating system. It’s late in the day. They stare off at the skyscrapers. Then they look at each other and smile because despite it all, or perhaps, because of it all, everything will be okay.
Coppola and Jonze converse through art. Whether or not they intend to do so, both separately and together they paint a poignant portrait of love; how it can be temporary but the ways it transforms us last a lifetime. Because of love, like Samantha, we are infinite.
Photo by Ramon Kagie on Unsplash