The "I am not sure" Movie Review

I have not really put any movie reviews on this blog other than to tell you how much I loved Napoleon Dynamite. So with out furthur ado here is the first installment of movie reviews. This one is the "I am not sure what I think" Movie review of LOST IN TRANSLATION a Sophia Coppola film, nominated for many academy awards last March.

This film takes place in Japan and stars Bill Murray as a washed up actor from the US who is a big star in Japan (kinda like today's version of David Hasselhoff and Germany). He has been hired to endorse a Japanese Whiskey and seems to be having a mid-life crisis (same old stuff - married with children - but lacking in love). Enter Scarlet Johansson's character, a young newlywed who is spending time in Japan while her work-aholic photographer husband (played by Frank, Jr. aka Giovanni Ribisi) is taking pictures of some band. The plot of the movie in a nutshell is these two characters meet in a bar by chance and form some sort of warped friendship/I couldn't tell if it was to be more sort of relationship. The movie ends when he has to go back home to the states to be with his family and how sad they both are that this 'chance encounter' has to come to an end. But they both know deep down that the one week they spent together will have a lasting impact.

So why am I not sure about this movie, well for one thing I didn't laugh like the critics told me I would. Here's the thing, I didn't hate it but I am not sure if I really liked it either. I just don't know. I sometimes get that feeling when watching these so called critically acclaimed 'artsy' fims. Does that make sense? I am curious if anyone out there has seen this film and would like to enlighten me, and if you havn't seen it then I'm not sure that I would recommend you do. I suppose if your in the mood for an artsy film it would be a good one. I don't know maybe I just didn't get it.