I’m slowly making it through the day after a somewhat ill-advised late evening with Joseph. As usual there were rampant discussion about philosophical and scientific theories, effects of the Internet on humanity, the many uses of a nail gun, and a brief history of Scandinavian mythos.For some reason people avoid us at the bar. There were more personal topics broached that had necessitated the evening of drinks, but the big finale was a breakthrough discussion on the movie Lost in Translation.
Lisa and I absolutely loved the movie, but Joseph and his companions left the film somewhat disinterested. Fortunately, around 2 AM this morning he finally got the chance to truly discuss Sophia Coppola’s masterpiece with me 🙂 . I don’t think I’ll be revealing any spoilers here, but if you haven’t seen the film you might want to skip the next paragraph.
The intital discussion focused on some of the more simplified movie concepts, such as the relationship of the title to the film’s content. To me the title was more than just the obvious commentary on the characters predicament in a foreign land, but also how Bob and Charlotte had become lost in the “translation” of their lives – in this case playing the word as though it has the same meaning as transition or transformation, etc. Eventually we turned this into a more typical debate over how the characters matched up in each other’s lives and how they had actually come upon this bizarre relationship. But the true moment of clarity was when Joseph made a comment about Bill Murray’s character more or less representing Charlotte’s husband as he would become. Similarly Charlotte would be the younger version of Bob’s wife before he had become famous. In that respect, Bob felt an attraction to Charlotte as he tried to recapture that which he had lost and saw in her.
This wasn’t necessarily a major breakthrough for the world in general, and I’m even sure that it’s been discussed on message boards across the Internet long before Joseph had that epiphany. But it certainly increased my appreciation of an excellent film and made him realize that it did indeed deserve a second look. Ahh, the power of discussion. It’s amazing what two minds can accomplish (even after a night at the bar) when you “pit” them against each other – not necessarily in conflict, but merely a form of non-aggressive contest. Whew, I think I’m finally awake now!