Lost in Translation (2003)

This year's Mantlepiece Movie, where everything is so aesthetically perfect and emotionally arid that it's the cinematic equivalent of one of those plastic-covered couches you aren't supposed to sit on. Sofia Coppola demonstrates again that she has a prodigious visual talent, a fashion photographer's idea of depth and her father's late-career inability to distinguish between directorial vision and reckless excess (what the fuck is up with "lip my stocking"?). Also, having Bill Murray project a hangdog look in addition to his trademark withering sarcasm does not a penetrating study of isolation and loneliness make, Ms. Coppola. I'm with Theo on this one -- ennui and total fucking boredom are not the same.

Grade: C+