Sofia Coppola's second feature-length directorial outing, Lost in Translation, stars Bill Murray as Bob Harris, a washed-up, mild-mannered seventies American movie actor who now finds himself resigned to making Japanese liquor commercials in Tokyo.  He befriends another American, Charlotte, played by Scarlett Johansson, whose husband, a music video photographer from Los Angeles, leaves her stranded in their hotel room for days at a time while away at work.  Bob, who lives in the United States and has been married for twenty-five years, shares Charlotte's frustration with her two-year marriage that seems to have quickly lost its spark.  A subtle romantic attraction exists between the two, and their wrestling with this situation creates the central conflict in the story, though it exists well below the surface of events.  The film centers around the two exploring Japan as naive Americans, both together and individually.

Shot entirely on location in Tokyo, there are lots of great locales to be enjoyed by the viewer.  Coppola mixes the urban concrete jungle of Tokyo perfectly with the serene shrines found outside the city to create a diverse and powerful illustration of Japanese culture to a vastly unfamiliar American audience.

Shot traditionally, the film still manages to try unique things.  Many scenes simply consist of either Bob or Charlotte sitting alone in their hotel respective hotel rooms with no dialogue whatsoever.  Others focus on the two main characters's reactions to Japanese culture from an American perspective.

Though touted by some as offensive to the Japanese, there seems to be little to find offensive unless it is sought out.  There are definitely some funny moments between Bill Murray's character and various Japanese characters, but this seems only to further demonstrate the reaction of clueless Americans in a foreign land when faced with a completely different culture, which is one of the film's central themes.

Lost in Translation is sold as a comedy, but the dramatic moments far outweigh the comic ones.  What little humor contained in the film is deliciously dry, and the film's wit is not to be ignored.  The drama transpiring between the two main characters, however, is where the viewer's attention is ultimately led.  Bill Murray's performance is superb as a post middle-aged man who seems to have no life, but rather an existence.  Scarlett Johansson does an equally excellent job of portraying the same feelings from a younger perspective.  The resulting mesh between the two characters is unmatched in recent cinema.

Sofia Coppola not only directed the film, but also penned its original screenplay. The result is an excellent product of American filmmaking.  The fact that the film consists of several layers that must each be digested by the viewer makes it one of the best and perhaps most unique films of last year.  The film manages to tell a beautiful story about two people without being formulaic, but rather by doing so in a way that's rarely seen in American cinema.  Casual movie fans will appreciate its wonderful story and brilliant acting and critics and film scholars will be floored by its groundbreaking style.