I've seen this movie a couple of times now, and as sensitive as I am to prejudices of other cultures (and believe me, growing up in a small East Texas town exposed me to a lot of prejudices - something I'm glad I got away from somewhat after moving away), I did not see anything offensive about Japanese culture in this movie. If anything, after seeing examples of cultural differences, it made me want to go to Tokyo on one of my future vacations. I think it actually improved my desire to expose myself to more Japanese culture and hopefully visit there someday. that's my two cents, anyway.
Oh - and for what it's worth, the teletubbies scare the bah-jeezus out of me :)

I tried watching this movie twice on DVD.

I conked and zoned out both times.

"Ok, so they were in Japan, right?" said I at the end.

Well put. I saw this last night and thought it was a great film, very deserving of the Best Picture Golden Globe.

I liked this blurb of a negative review from the "lost-in-racism" site:

"Coppola shows us Japan solely through the eyes of her characters, who see the Japanese as cartoonishly infantile, infatuated with asinine TV shows, karaoke and silly video games."

Of course! The whole movie is from the perspective of these two lost souls stuck in a country that is unfamiliar and overwhelming. We are seeing the Japanese culture exactly as they do, probably exactly as we would if we were just dropped there without any foreknowledge of what to expect.

-"Do want totally unoffensive cinema that is sterile and bland as the Teletubbies?"

Dont forget that Tinky Winky is evil and will turn you children gay!

"He is purple — the gay-pride color; and his antenna is shaped like a triangle — the gay-pride symbol,"

...so there!

Yeah yeah. Just like Spongebob Squarepants and Ren And Stimpy

http://www.8bitjoystick.com/archives/jake_there_is_something_about_spongebob.php

Ah, yes, but let's not forget that Triumph the Insult Comic dog is a racist too.

http://www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/TorontoSun/Entertainment/2004/02/13/pf-345995.html

I dunno. Are the French a race?

Yeah, it's definitely not racist. The only people who say that are psycho PC's who can't handle any depiction of another culture that's not ridiculously positive.

watched the movie now here in tokyo with my gf! i agree it isn't racist at all. wonder why some ppl overreact so much. then again i wonder why this movie is so hyped. it's just a usual movie. can't claim that i'd said it's a very great movie. fallen angels and chunking are soo much greater if i had to compare.
the end is sad, yes. i've felt the same when i first visited and had to leave tokyo (and my gf).
then again there are some really unnecessary stereotypes in the movie... i guess that's what hillbillies would expect from japan. but then again i think this movie wasn't made for hillbillies.

Dear Jake,

I am the spokesperson for Asian Mediawatch, lost-in-racism.org campaign.

I am 1/2 Japanese American and I lived in Japan for 10 years before I moved back to NYC. I speak fluent Japanese too. I really enjoyed the
stay there and I sincerely hope that your
experience will be just as good as mine if you visit there someday.

However, here is the problem. It is not essential that the film take place in Japan. Take away Japan and the important themes in the film remain: Bob and Charlotte are still isolated and lonely, and they form a relationship. Bob still avoids his fans no
matter what language they speak. Charlotte is a philosophy student is soul searching, often away
from her husband, or an outsider to senseless
conversation. Even in Japan they could have sought out American companionship but they don't
because the story is centered around Bob and
Charlotte. However, take away Japan and what you do lose is anti-Japanese racial humor and
commentary and those weird Japanese people. A
film that relies so heavily on Japanese stereotypes and portrays negative attitudes towards Japanese culture should not win an Oscar. If you want to put a film up on so high a pedestal, it should without a doubt deserve it. "Lost In Translation" does not. Had this film been set in Africa or Mexico, for example, I do not think Coppola would have given such a shallow and racist portrayal of a people. Even if she wanted to, studio bigwig would never have let her.

I know exactly what the film is about ... and there are both good and bad elements. And the film should not win the prestige of an Academy
Awards due to its flaws. That's our goal:
inform the voters and convince them to vote against the film.

A voter and friend of the film's editor spoke to us when we are distributing flyers at one of the voter screenings and said(paraphrasing) "I can see how some Asians are offended by the film.
However, personally the film is just too
juvenial for me to take it seriously for awards consideration." Unfortunately, the Academy
Awards is more about politics than merit. If it was about merit, then there are plenty of independent films out there that would be
recognized.

Pointing out flaws in other films does not
diminish our viewpoints on this film. We each have limited time and resources, and have a
right to pick and choose our own endeavors and express our viewpoints. Other Asian Americans groups have expressed their viewpoints on a
variety of issues and films. We choose to address this film at this point in time. There are critics that share our viewpoints and we have supporters from different ethnic groups: Asian American and non-Asian American and we are pleased.

Our campaign is not about the Japanese audience in Japan. When Japanese turn on the television and go to the movies, they have many
opportunities to see both positive and negative images of themselves. We are instead concerned with the perspective of the United States
audience. As an Asian American in the United States, when I turn on the television or go to the theatre, I seldom see people such as myself portrayed well. I also hear and see racist humor about Asian Americans on radio,television, and film. In a film such as "Lost In
Translation," the Japanese characters are
strange and weird. This is not the worst film
to portray Asians, however neither does it
deserve the prestige of an Academy Award. If
there were more positive portrayals of Asian
Americans in the media to balance the negative portrayals, then the film "Lost In Translation" would not strike such a contrast.

Finally, we are not attempting to censure
filmmakers' artistic freedom. As an artist, Ms. Coppola should be open to criticism. It is
early in her filmmaking career and she has the support of her father Francis Ford Coppola. Our main point is that this work does not deserve the prestige of an Academy Awards because it
relies too heavily on Japanese stereotypes for racial humor and commentary.

Also I'll ask you to go back to our site and
take a look at our campaign flyer. It should give you more understanding of where we are
coming from.

Best Regards,

Tom Roman
Asian Mediawatch

P.S.
According to the recent poll from "Variety" magazine (must read for Hollywood insiders) the most this movie will get Oscar for will be the Best Screenplay. Even that is in danger now that this campaign is in final dead heat and it has become the three way race between LIT, "In America" and "Finding Nemo". Best Director and Best Picture, pretty much hands down to Lord Of The Rings and Peter Jackson and for Best Actor, Sean Penn is expanding his healthy lead for the past week, also Johnny Depp is taking some votes away from Bill Murray.

So it started to look more likely that this movie will go home empty handed or just with one Oscar. Which exactly the way we wanted.

Tom

It still is remarkable that it is nominated multiple times and you can walk into any video store in this country and get a copy. You still did not explain how Jackie Chan and Wong Kar Wai can get away with blatant negative racist images of westerners in their films but you actually think that that is permissible and this light hearted comedy is as bad as old Charlie Chan films.

Look if this film does not win it will because of it is only the film makers second film.

I honestly think you are going out of your way to find offensive content in this film in a martyrdom Christ complex.

There is a scene in this film where Bill Murray is taking a bath and talking to his wife. Here he tells her that he is sick of all the pasta and wants to eat more healthy food--like Japanese food. But, the film is racist and puts down the culture, right.
According to lostinracism.org, the American characters have no meaningful dialogue with the Japanese characters. Considering the title of the movie, the reason for this could become evident.
We do, however, see a "connection" with meaning when Bob is in the hospital and he and a woman are trying to communicate and the result is the two making each other laugh.
People need to lighten up.

The people who run lostinracism.org are self-rightious egotistical dicks.

Jesus, Jake. Settle down.

Until I read some of the details here, I was under the impression that maybe people thought it was racist because of the whole "lip my stockings" and "have a nice fright" thing, which anyone who knows much about the Japanese language would realize isn't racist. (For those who don't, the "r" and "l" sounds in spoken Japanese are interchangeable.)

I think it's regrettable that Tom Roman et al see Coppola's decision to focus on Japan's wonderfully bizarre pop culture, and the main characters' bafflement at it, as racist. Maybe they weren't paying attention to the doctors, the people in the hospital or the temple sequences. Maybe they don't think it matters that the Japanese were portrayed as almost universally patient and friendly. Or maybe they feel it's irrelevant that the film was shot in Tokyo by a mostly Japanese crew, with a cast of similar ethnic makeup. Or that the most asinine, irritating character was a blonde American actress who kept overpronouncing "karate".

At any rate, I think it's unfortunate that they're viewing a fish-out-of-water film set in Japan through a lens colored by decades of rabid anti-Asian racism in the U.S. It's a hell of a film, and I think that if it were set anywhere else, it wouldn't be nearly as interesting. (If it were set in Paris, for example, it would invariably be dismissed as another shitty Nora Ephron knockoff.)

I would also point out that American fascination with Japanese pop culture is at an all-time high, as it has been steadily permeating our own for the last few years. At the same time, it's fairly intricate as pop cultures go, and intimidating to be in the middle of if you don't understand it or the language it surrounds.

If Mr. Roman honestly feels that the film's portrayal of said pop culture is negative, I must ask if he's watched any Japanese TV lately. Or if he thinks the Tokyo Damage Report blog (http://www.harmful.org/homedespot/ADIARY.htm) is also racist.

As for Wong Kar Wai and Hong Kong movies in general, Jake, I'll paraphrase Dave Chappelle by saying that our entertainment is so saturated with positive portrayals of whites that a few negatives don't really matter.

Eveininja, for some reason, I can't go to the blog.

Our group, Asian Mediawatch's main goal is to promote fair and balanced portrayals of Asian/Asian Americans in American entertainment. Meaning to encourage entertainment industry to portray Asian American/Asian as human beings with emotion- joy, tear, anger, sense of humor and so on. Not only like one demensional ninjas or
kang fu masters. Compared to people with other background, you see less of "human" portrayals of Asian/Asian Americans in American entertainment. That's the fact.

We believe that in this situation, awarding such films as "Lost In Translation" will encourage other filmmakers to portray Asian/Asian
American in one demensional way. (And thinking that this is the way to go to win Oscar). Like I said in the previous letter, if there are more movies with "human" portrayals of Asians/Asian Americans. this movie wouldn't be an issue. But our feeling right now is, "not this time, not this movie"

Regards.

Tom Roman

Post Oscar Statement:

About three weeks ago we launched a small campaign called "Lost-In-Racism" to encourage Academy voters not to vote for Focus Features' "Lost in Translation." However with limited resources and time, we were unable to reach more than a small percentage of the
Academy. "Lost In Translation" is going home with only Best Original Screenplay due to the lack of competition. At least it is not going home with Best Picture or Director, where we think is the most inappropriate. However, because this film will now be a part of Oscar history, it is more important than ever that we let the entertainment community know we feel it makes a mockery of an entire nation and race. We would like to thank any Academy voters who listened and agreed with our complaints and also the volunteers in New
York, Los Angeles and San Francisco.

This campaign gave voters (who mostly are working professional in the industry) an opportunity to open their eyes to the issues Asian
Americans/Asians face in American entertainment. There are some progresses for the past few years especially in TV shows but this really should be an ongoing effort. Maybe next time when those people make movies or TV shows, they may remember this campaign and make more effort for better and balanced portrayals of Asian Americans/Asians.
If that's the case, I think we are indeed successful. This is not a one shot deal for us. Oscar is over. We are now resuming more
positive activities such as supporting our APA artists and facilitating media-related discussions that are important to the APA
(Asian and Pacific Americans) community while we continue speaking up against stereotypical portrays of Asian/Asian American in American
entertainment.

We look forward to films that we, as Asian Americans can feel truly proud of in future Oscar Race.

Tom Roman

Asian Mediawatch

Bullshit. I think you were making a big hissy fit over absolutely nothing and there is a big gold heavily coveted statue sitting on Ms. Coppola's mantel place that would not be there if there was a hint of racism in the movie. Lack of competition my ass.

Lost in Racism is imbued with arrogance if they think they had any hand in keeping "Lost in Translation" from winning the Best Director or Best Picture Award. "Lord of the Rings" won on it's own. Its winning had NOTHING to do with thier little witch hunt. "Rings" was the better film. Plain and simple. Nice to see that "Lost in Translation" did win best screenplay.

By the way, I have seen accusations that "Rings" was a racist film as well. Guess Lost in Racism lost their fight in the end anyway.

Before people demonize something, they should really look and see if the racism they are exposing is in fact in where they are searching for it or if within themselves.

No, we didn't lose the fight. We had no money, time and all we had is manpower who campaigned at voter screenings plus flyers. Still we were able to stop LIT's Oscar win with only one category. Best Screenplay which was a cakewalk for them. There was no competition.

On the other hand, Focus Feature spent much more time and money compared to the other nominees, even more so than LOTR. It's very obvious given the number of ads appeared in trade paper for "for your consideration." With this much campaigning, it should have won at least one more category such as Best Actor or Director and it didn't. So actually it is a defeat for them.

Tom Roman

Yes you did loose. There were thousands of original screen plays made into movies the last year and Ms Coppola beat every single one of them in the minds of the professionals in the movie industry. They actually know what they are talking about and they did the right thing by giving her the Oscar that she deserved. So get of the cross you are not impressing anyone.

No, he didn't lose.

The only reason why that movie was even up for Oscar was because Daddy Francis bought wines to voters and threaten them to make them sleep with fishes.

Even Bill Murray knew the movie sucked. He knew why he lost. He knew about the campaign and he knew what kind of mess he got into.

Why do you react as if your life is on the line when it comes to LIT? You must be working for Coppola.

Greg I seriously suggest you stop smoking crack before using the Internet.

hahaha, my nickname is "crackhead". I don't have that nickname for nothing.

Why can't you give him a credit for standing up for something he really believes in? That's a rare kind in this time of age, ya know?

Greg

Because he is wrong. He strongly believes he is righteous but he is still 100% wrong. Actually I think that idiots who are 100% sure of their beliefs to be a dime a dozen these days.

I didn't think it was racist. As the movie went on it seemed the characters were starting to enjoy themselves in Tokyo more and more.

Besides, Japanese culture is vastly different from American culture. How can you not point out these differences with people who are in an unfamiliar place with unfamiliar people?

I agree with many of the above comments. I can certainly appreciate eveyone's viewpoint about the racism subject. As I have lived in Japan for the past 5 years now, the subject of racism is pretty close to me. Maybe I could share some thoughts.

I can see how the film can be considered a subtle and artsy slam on the Japanese/Asian community. However, I do hope that anyone involved in the "LostinRacism" movement has spent more than a traveler's amount of time here. Basically, the movie is my life over here (to some extent). Many of the Japanese people portrayed in the film, I know personally (and consequently, most, if not all, of the situations in the film I am still living today).

I think it just depends on how you perceive the film, if you're looking for racism. And thanks for those people whose job it is to make sure racism doesn't happen. The comment above "This campaign gave voters (who mostly are working professional in the industry) an opportunity to open their eyes to the issues Asian
Americans/Asians face in American entertainment" could and maybe should be applied vice versa over HERE. Talk about racism! Some of the most racist people I know are Japanese. You should see some of the prime time TV shows they have over here depicting (for lack of a better word) the "stupidity" of non-Japanese people (mainly in reference to Japanese language ability and knowledge of customs). BUT, it's all in good fun.

LostinRacism has a valid yet somewhat ridiculous claim on their hands. Racism is a pretty crappy thing, but seems as though the movie wasn't. Look at all this discussion and emotion created.

Thank you for your time.

Sorry to post again so soon. Just saw this comment above from the LostInRacism site (I suppose...?)

"Coppola shows us Japan solely through the eyes of her characters, who see the Japanese as cartoonishly infantile, infatuated with asinine TV shows, karaoke and silly video games."

At first I was quite livid to see this. But there is some truth to it. Coppola does NOT show us the agricultural (or NON-Tokyo) side to the country. Many of the people I know in the "hick" areas of Japan are not interested in silly video games or are cartoonishly infantile. Coppola, to her unfortunate discredit, did not portray a global picture of all aspects of Japanese personalities.

Yet in Tokyo and many large cities, a great majority of the population is like that. In Shibuya (filiming location) on any given street there will be at least one karaoke bar, or an arcade, or a place to take little tiny pictures of yourself. That's what people do there. After every drinking party, there's an 85% chance of 2hours at karaoke.

So speaking of unfair stereo-types, are all upcoming super-stars as ditzy as that Britney Spears wanna-be character? Are all 20 year old's as lost as Scarlett? Are all semi-largely famous B movie actors cheating on their wives in a foreign Asian country?

Coppola was making a movie, not a documentary on Japanese society. However, from my humble experience here in Japan, anyone "heartless outsider" (as non-Japanese people are affectionatly called in Japan) would be D!%M hardpressed to find 10 random people who DIDN'T like Karaoke.

And they called that show "asinine". This coming from the country that so thankfully brought us "The Real World" and "Survivor" (apologies to said show fans).

Wow, thats some really insightful stuff. I really thought Sofia did a great job of what she set out to do, make a great movie, and after watching the behind the scenes stuff on the DVD its really apparent she has a great deal of respect for the Japanese.

I wonder if any of these people have actually seen Japan like you have?