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Thanks for all the presenters, and I believe you could always stimulate me to think through your presentations and assignments. Here I post a presentation based on the film Lost in Translation and the text by Simmel. What a chemistry...
Introduction Thanks for all the presenters, and I believe you could always stimulate me to think through your presentations and assignments. Here I post a presentation based on the film Lost in Translation and the text by Simmel. What a chemistry...
* Simmel’s “duality” of Strangerhood
o Co-existence and paradoxical feelings
+ Individuality and Objectivity
+ Closeness and Remoteness
* The “duality” of Lost in Translation
o The duality of Translation
o Idea of Allegory, Idea of Topsy-turvy
o Closeness and Remoteness
* Other aspects of urban Strangerhood
o Chance encounter
o Coincidence
o Estrangement
Film for Reference
* Sofia Coppola’s Lost in Translation (2003)
* Bob Harris played by Bill Murray
o An American movie star as advertisement model in Japan
o Have a break from wife
* Charlotte played by Scarlett Johansson
o Graduate of philosophy, on holiday with her husband
* John played by Giovanni Ribisi
o Charlotte’s husband,
o a photographer on assignment in Tokyo.
* Bob and Charlotte meet by chance as strangers on a lift
* Two lost souls make a connection in Tokyo, their foreign city.
Why Lost in Translation?
* The duality of Translation
o The transgression of two languages
(Japanese and English)
+ Spoken Japanese and perceived Japanese
+ Spoken English and perceived English
+ Japanese English and American English
o Mis|communication between the listener and speaker
+ English listeners and speakers (Remoteness and Closeness)
Why Lost in Translation?
* Idea of Allegory
o The upside|down world
o Hotel as Home|Home as Uncongenial
* Remoteness and Closeness
o The city as a stranger to us
o We as strangers in the city
o Bob and Charlotte, as strangers and friends
o Husband and wife, as strangers
Closeness and Remoteness
* Inside and outside, repulsion and distance
* proximity to strangers
* Claustrophobia
* Anxiety over close relationship
o “I don’t know who I married.”~ Charlotte
o “Your life, as you know it is gone. Never return”~Bob
* Bed talk with stranger friends
o The sleepless, the city’s storytellers, “The Thousand and One Nights”
o Storytelling, establishment of close relationship
Individuality and Objectivity
* Active and outside observer
* Herself, as a stranger
* Trapped in the hotel room
* Get out of her box and Stroll
* Freedom of a Stranger and Flâneur
* “The flâneur is the individual sovereign of the order of things…able to transform faces and things…they have only that meaning which he attributes to them…detached attitude” (The Flâneur, Keith Tester)
* An inside and outside participant of Japanese culture
* Self discovery
The Importance of Coincidence
* City as site of opportunities
- Meeting of strangers
- Criss-crossing of paths
* Coincidence: out of human control
* The “urban unconscious”
- Collective: common to everyone
- Strangers as the “unconscious selves”
The Importance of Coincidence
Anonymity
* Insignificance of identification
- Closeness and remoteness
- Names (objective)
vs. Identities (subjective)
- The use of pseudonym
Estrangement
* Simmel’s “estrangement”
- “An estrangement is wont to set in…at the moment when this feeling of uniqueness disappears from the relationship…” (147)
* Strangers from unique to replaceable
- Struggle between remoteness and closeness
Beyond Estrangement
* Estrangement based on “erotic relations” (Simmel, 147)
* Strangerhood in cultural genre
- Lost in Translation as romantic love story?
Strangerhood in Cultural Genre
* [the film] is the classic set-up for a May-November romance … But [it] is too smart and thoughtful to be the kind of movie where they [the two leading characters] go to bed and we’re supposed to accept that as the answer … They share something as personal as their feelings rather than something as generic as their genitals. (Roger Ebert’s film review)
Strangerhood in Cultural Genre
* Lost in Translation as postmodern cultural text on urban strangerhood
- beyond convention of romantic love story
- realistic portrayal
- complex characters
- ambiguous ending
- contradicting elements (e.g. duality) in the relationship
Questions for discussion
* “Everyone wants to be found.” In what ways is this statement related to the idea of strangerhood?
* Are there any similarities between the Flâneur and Stranger?
o Co-existence and paradoxical feelings
+ Individuality and Objectivity
+ Closeness and Remoteness
* The “duality” of Lost in Translation
o The duality of Translation
o Idea of Allegory, Idea of Topsy-turvy
o Closeness and Remoteness
* Other aspects of urban Strangerhood
o Chance encounter
o Coincidence
o Estrangement
Film for Reference
* Sofia Coppola’s Lost in Translation (2003)
* Bob Harris played by Bill Murray
o An American movie star as advertisement model in Japan
o Have a break from wife
* Charlotte played by Scarlett Johansson
o Graduate of philosophy, on holiday with her husband
* John played by Giovanni Ribisi
o Charlotte’s husband,
o a photographer on assignment in Tokyo.
* Bob and Charlotte meet by chance as strangers on a lift
* Two lost souls make a connection in Tokyo, their foreign city.
Why Lost in Translation?
* The duality of Translation
o The transgression of two languages
(Japanese and English)
+ Spoken Japanese and perceived Japanese
+ Spoken English and perceived English
+ Japanese English and American English
o Mis|communication between the listener and speaker
+ English listeners and speakers (Remoteness and Closeness)
Why Lost in Translation?
* Idea of Allegory
o The upside|down world
o Hotel as Home|Home as Uncongenial
* Remoteness and Closeness
o The city as a stranger to us
o We as strangers in the city
o Bob and Charlotte, as strangers and friends
o Husband and wife, as strangers
Closeness and Remoteness
* Inside and outside, repulsion and distance
* proximity to strangers
* Claustrophobia
* Anxiety over close relationship
o “I don’t know who I married.”~ Charlotte
o “Your life, as you know it is gone. Never return”~Bob
* Bed talk with stranger friends
o The sleepless, the city’s storytellers, “The Thousand and One Nights”
o Storytelling, establishment of close relationship
Individuality and Objectivity
* Active and outside observer
* Herself, as a stranger
* Trapped in the hotel room
* Get out of her box and Stroll
* Freedom of a Stranger and Flâneur
* “The flâneur is the individual sovereign of the order of things…able to transform faces and things…they have only that meaning which he attributes to them…detached attitude” (The Flâneur, Keith Tester)
* An inside and outside participant of Japanese culture
* Self discovery
The Importance of Coincidence
* City as site of opportunities
- Meeting of strangers
- Criss-crossing of paths
* Coincidence: out of human control
* The “urban unconscious”
- Collective: common to everyone
- Strangers as the “unconscious selves”
The Importance of Coincidence
Anonymity
* Insignificance of identification
- Closeness and remoteness
- Names (objective)
vs. Identities (subjective)
- The use of pseudonym
Estrangement
* Simmel’s “estrangement”
- “An estrangement is wont to set in…at the moment when this feeling of uniqueness disappears from the relationship…” (147)
* Strangers from unique to replaceable
- Struggle between remoteness and closeness
Beyond Estrangement
* Estrangement based on “erotic relations” (Simmel, 147)
* Strangerhood in cultural genre
- Lost in Translation as romantic love story?
Strangerhood in Cultural Genre
* [the film] is the classic set-up for a May-November romance … But [it] is too smart and thoughtful to be the kind of movie where they [the two leading characters] go to bed and we’re supposed to accept that as the answer … They share something as personal as their feelings rather than something as generic as their genitals. (Roger Ebert’s film review)
Strangerhood in Cultural Genre
* Lost in Translation as postmodern cultural text on urban strangerhood
- beyond convention of romantic love story
- realistic portrayal
- complex characters
- ambiguous ending
- contradicting elements (e.g. duality) in the relationship
Questions for discussion
* “Everyone wants to be found.” In what ways is this statement related to the idea of strangerhood?
* Are there any similarities between the Flâneur and Stranger?
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