Alternative to What: "Lost in Translation" (2003)

Scene from Lost in Translation

Welcome to Alternative to What: a weekly column that tries to find a great alternative to driving to the multiplexes. Based on releases of that week, the selections will either be thematically related or feature recurring cast and crew. The goal is to help you better understand the diversity of cinema and hopefully find you some favorites while saving a few bucks. At worse, this column will save you money. Expect each installment to come out on Fridays, unless specified. 

THIS WEEK:

Lost in Translation (2003)

- Alternative To -

Anomalisa (2015)

In the echelon of modern movies, the idea of cinema is to be lively. There needs to be action at every turn. In fact, that's pretty much what you'd get if you think of the biggest grossing movies of each year have shown. People want excitement to stimulate them and make them feel good. However, there's a certain appeal to the other side: the side that lingers more on a stare and silence, where minimalism is on full display and there's nothing really exciting going on. I'm talking about the cinema of loneliness. It's not a popular genre because, well, it doesn't take much to be lonely and it doesn't make you feel great. In the case of Anomalisa, you get to experience that sensation in a new and visceral way.
The story takes place in a hotel, where the protagonist wanders around in somber reflection. He wonders what his life is all about, unable to connect with anyone. I have already written an essay a few days prior about the film's ability to be effective adult animation. However, it also sounds like another film that does almost the same thing, but in a realistic landscape. Lost in Translation predates Anomalisa by 12 years and may share a little too many similarities in constructs, but it's a far more appealing look into the value of finding connection when there is nobody out there for you to clamor on to. The one advantage is that this was Sofia Coppola's second film, and was able to tap into her own celebrity status and find a deeper and emotional resonating. It has only become more frustrating and less accessible to viewers as she's gone on (See: Somewhere), but her sophomore film pretty much encapsulates the perfect picture of her mantra.
With Bill Murray in the lead, she tells the story of an American celebrity in Asia, trying to find someone to connect with in between shooting absurd commercials and sitting in hotel bars, contemplating life in general. It's a film rich with the gazing and brooding that defines loneliness. However, it also works because there's a connection in the odd pairing of Murray and Scarlett Johansson. They find a kinship that feels partly predicated on them being the only other person by which they can relate to in the country. In a way, it brings out some of the more emotional and visceral aspects that remain undefined, save for visual cues of smiles and memories that build - leaving one to wish that they never separate and return to America, where they're still likely to feel isolated. It's the discovery of the film that inevitably has made it a milestone film of the 00's cinema.

There's a lot of different factors that could be brought to the film's success. For starters, it could be Murray's Oscar-nominated performance, where he subverts the sad sack persona by finding the deeper struggles of his character. It could be the beautiful cinematography, wonderful soundtrack, or the way that it manages to feel like an exploration of life in its truest forms. As a whole, it's possibly the most elegant film about loneliness to come out in the past two decades, and the earnest connection that the two leads have is refreshing in that it manages to be more than trope-filled love moments. It's about something more complicated, and the film succeeds at making you relate to them in ways that don't seem plausible at first glance.

I know that it could be blasphemous to argue that Lost in Translation and Anomalisa are the same film, but executed in different forms. There are those obvious differences, but the films are essentially about the struggle for connection, which is found by people in hotels. Don't mistake this as a dismissal of Charlie Kaufman's latest. His impressive animation design itself adds a bigger depth to the story and makes the isolation factor far more interesting in ways that animation rarely is. Both films are great, but if you find yourself lonely in a hotel room and want another film to watch, Lost in Translation isn't that bad of an option.