Funny / Lost in Translation (2003)

• The opening shot of Charlotte's behind in somewhat sheer panties might raise a chuckle.
• Bob standing in the hotel lift at the start of the film, battling his terrible jetlag to stay awake.
• The scene with the escort in Bob's hotel room. His reactions swinging from confusion to exasperation. She is trying to roleplay as being ravaged by Bob so whenever he tries to lift her from the floor she pulls him down, once making him faceplant on the bed.
  Escort: Please, let me go!
  Bob: With pleasure.
• At the hotel bar, Bob introduces himself to Charlotte by interrupting her drink order with the catchphrase he had been saying all day at the Suntory whiskey commercial shoot (he'd been getting grief about his delivery of the line during the shoot). The waiter even joins in! When Charlotte smilingly orders something else instead, Bob looks a little put-out.
• When he's sitting at the bar and Bob turns around and his tuxedo is held together by clips down his back.
• Bob on the out-of-control elliptical machine, crying for help in an empty gym. The following morning he has a slight limp.
• Bob and Charlotte arrive at the hospital and are stymied by the departments on the floor map.
  Bob: Let's try 'Mixed Internal'.
• While waiting for Charlotte to get x-rayed Bob strikes up a chat with an elderly local lady who asks him how long he has been in Japan. Since he cannot understand her he just repeats everything she says and does, cracking up both her and the background extras.
• Bob sitting up in shock when the hotel rooms curtains automatically open to wake him up on his first morning in Tokyo.
• Bob's snarkery during the photo shoot:
  Photographer: Could you hold your hand across your face?
  Bob: [does so] I don't usually get this close to the glass unless I'm on the floor.
• Bob points out that the 'whisky' is iced tea.
  Bob: You want more mysterious? I'll just try and think, "Where the hell's the whiskey?"
  Photographer: Are you drinking?
  Bob: Am I drinking? As soon as I'm done here.
• The commercial sequence is made even better with the Bilingual Bonus if you understand Japanese, and how it reveals how things literally get lost in translation (Japanese transcript):
  The Director: (in Japanese, to Bob's interpreter) The translation is very important, okay? The translation.
  Interpreter: (in Japanese) Yes, of course. I understand.
  The Director: (in Japanese, to Bob) Mr. Bob-san. You are sitting quietly in your study. And then there is a bottle of Suntory whisky on top of the table. You understand, right? With wholehearted feeling, slowly, look at the camera, tenderly, and as if you are meeting old friends, say the words. As if you are Bogie in Casablanca, saying, "Here's looking at you, kid,"—Suntory time!
  The Interpreter: (In English, to Bob) He wants you to turn, look in camera, okay?
  Bob: ...Was that all he said?
  The Interpreter: Yes, turn to camera.
  Bob: Does he want me to, to turn from the right or turn from the left?
  The Interpreter: (in Japanese to the director) He has prepared and is ready. And he wants to know, when the camera rolls, would you prefer that he turn to the left, or would you prefer that he turn to the right? And that is the kind of thing he would like to know, if you don’t mind.
  The Director: (in Japanese) Either way is fine. That kind of thing doesn't matter. We don't have time, Bob-san, okay? You need to hurry. Raise the excitement ("tension"). Face the camera, look straight at the camera. Slowly, with passion. It's passion that we want. Do you understand?
  The Interpreter: (in English) Right side. And, uh, with intensity.
  Bob: Is that everything? It seemed like he said quite a bit more than that.
  The Director: (in Japanese) What you are talking about is not just whiskey, you know?! Do you understand? It's like you are meeting old friends. Softly, tenderly. Gently. Let your feelings boil up. Tension is important! Don't forget.
  The Interpreter: (in English) Like an old friend, and into the camera.
  Bob: Okay?
  The Director: (in Japanese) You understand? You love whiskey. It's Suntory time! Okay?
  Bob: Okay.
  The Director: (in Japanese) Okay? Okay, let's roll. Start.
  Bob: For relaxing times, make it Suntory time.
  The Director: (in Japanese) Cut, cut, cut, cut, cut! Don't try to fool me. Don't pretend you don't understand. This is Suntory's Hibiki, it's expensive you know, so it's like Suntory's No. 1. Now do it again, and you have to feel that this is exclusive. Okay? This is not an everyday drink, you know.
  The Interpreter: (in English) Could you do it slower and-
  The Director: (in Japanese) With more ecstatic emotion.
  The Interpreter: (in English) -more intensity?
  The Director: (in English) Suntory time! Roll.
  Bob: For relaxing times, make it Suntory time.
  The Director: (in Japanese) Cut, cut, cut, cut, cut! God, what are you doing!
  • Doubly funny as the director, who doesn't speak English, is criticising Bob's use of vocabulary.
• Bob and Charlotte meet Charlie and mutual friends in a strip club of all places. When Charlotte suggests they go, Bob hastily agrees. As he leaves he gives a gyrating pole-dancer a quick 'thank you' to whichever body part is nearest.
• While John and Kelly are shamelessly flirting in front of Charlotte, he eventually introduces her and tries to pull her to her side. Charlotte subtly but firmly pushes him away again.
• Bob recounts to Charlotte ordering a shiatsu massage for some tightness in his shoulders.
  Bob: The tightness has gone and been replaced by...unbelievable pain.
• Bob's wife sends him a box of carpet samples with a note saying that she prefers burgundy. He pours out the near-identical dark red swatches onto his hotel floor and contemplates them for a moment for before wondering out loud which one is supposed to be burgundy.
  • Gets funnier later on when Bob calls his wife after a drunken night out and tells her she was right and the burgundy was so much better than the others.
• Charlotte teasing Bob for his choice of lurid camo pattern t-shirt for their 'escape':
  Charlotte: You really are having a midlife crisis.
• While changing, Bob brags about his room being messier than Charlotte's. Which is impressive since Bob has been out of his room working but Charlotte has been in her room for long periods of her stay.

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