Tokyo time



Caught Lost in Translation last night and thought it was excellent. Very mellow with almost Woody Allen overtones to it. Many of the scenes (written and directed by Sofia Coppolla) were filmed in a very naturalstic style, eschewing nromal movie camera angles and lighting, which gave a kind of realistic fly on the wall quality to some shots which I liked. She used Air for her earlier film, the Virgin Suicides (based on Jeff Euegenides novel). Here it was one member of Air (I forgot who) who helped with the music. Some of it struck me as Air influenced by My Bloody Valentine - then on the scene where Bill Murray's jaded actor and the wonderful Scarlett Johansonn's unsure wife go on a fun night out what's the backing track? My Bloody Valentine from the Loveless period... Love that album, happy memories of dancing round my student pad to it while my brain was being rewired by certain enjoyable consumables.



The film does poke a lot of fun at modern Japanese culture, but not I thought in a racist manner. Personally I thought it was affectionate abuse, the type you can only put on someone you like, although the jokes about Japanese folk mixing up their Rs and Ls gets a tad wearing after a while. Anyway, it is a damned good film and well worth seeing. A quick pint afterwards lead to several and a discussion of the finest of single malts prompted me to go and get some whisky (I'm a slave to suggestion... Well, to suggestions that I like, heh heh). Fun night.



I really need to see Tokyo one of these days.