Masaryk University

Faculty of Arts

Department of English
and American Studies

English Language and Literature

Jan Bradávka

Characters in Alienated Environments

Bachelor’s Diploma Thesis

Supervisor: Stephen Paul Hardy, Ph. D.

2011
 I declare that I have worked on this thesis independently,
using only the primary and secondary sources listed in the bibliography.

……………………………………………

2
Table of Contents

1. Introduction 4

2. The Virgin Suicides

3. Lost in Translation
3.1. Basic Information and Plot Description 15
3.2. Tokyo as an Alienated Environment 15
3.3. Social Criticism in the Film 18
3.4. Visual Aspects of the Film and the Use of Sound 19

4. Marie Antoinette
4.1. Basic Information and Plot Description 22
4.2. Alienated France 23
4.3. Allusions to Hollywood 28
4.4. Visual Aspects of the Film and the Use of Sound 30

5. Conclusion 33

6. Works Used and Cited 35

7. Resumé v češtině 38

8. Resume in English 39

3
1. Introduction

As of 2011, Sofia Coppola, the daughter of the famous American director

Francis Ford Coppola, has made four full-length films: The Virgin Suicides, a film

adaptation of a book of the same name by Jeffrey Eugenides, Lost in Translation, Marie

Antoinette and Somewhere. This thesis will focus on the first three films. In these first

three films, there is a recurring theme of a character (or characters) getting thrown into

an alienated environment. First, in The Virgin Suicides, the Lisbon girls get to know the

lives of teenage girls which include sex, smoking and drinking while, given their strict

parents, they are totally unprepared for such experiences. Second, in Lost in Translation,

Bob, an American actor, comes to Tokyo where he needs to focus on his work while he

is jet-lagged, does not understand a word of Japanese and has nothing to help him get

rid of the after-work boredom. Last, Marie Antoinette presents the harsh reality of a new

home. Marie Antoinette comes to the French court as a stranger to all the customs and

relationships while she is expected to be a perfect lady as she is the future queen of

France. As the result of these placements, all these characters need to cope with the

situations and deal with both inner and outer conflicts.

Therefore I argue that in her films, Sofia Coppola, takes one or more characters

and places them into alienated environments. Then, she presents the results of these

placements like culture shock, revolt and giving-in while, in order to do this, she makes

a clever use of music, sounds, lights and camera work. In addition, Coppola manages to

translate the stories into criticism of nowadays society.

In this thesis, I want to focus on these placements and the actions that the

characters of the films take as the result of these placements. I want to look at the

conflicts the characters face and how they deal with these. In addition, I want to explore

how her films translate into criticism of society we live in today and how does she use

4
the medium of a film screen to underline the messages of her films.

2. The Virgin Suicides

2.1. Basic Information and Plot Description

Sofia Coppola's first feature-length film, The Virgin Suicides, was released in

1999. It is an adaptation of Jefrey Eugenides' book of the same name released in 1993.

The film was made and produced by American Zoetrope, the studio of Sofia Coppola's

father, Francis Ford Coppola. The budget is estimated to have been six million USD.

Sofia Coppola wrote the screenplay and directed the film while Edward Lachman was

the cinematographer. The main roles are cast with James Woods and Kethleen Turner as

Mr. and Mrs. Lisbon and Kirsten Dunst as Lux Lisbon and Josh Hartnett as young Trip

Fontaine. ("The Virgin Suicides")

The story follows a group of boy schoolmates at a suburban school in Michigan,

who get obsessed with the Lisbon sisters, who are kept at home almost all the time. The

story starts when the youngest girl, Cecilia, unsuccessfully attempts suicide and follows

the boys who are trying to learn more about the strange, yet beautiful sisters. They are

especially fascinated by, Lux, who starts to transform into a rebellious daughter, who

starts to drink, smoke and have casual sex with boys from the school while she

disregards any rules set by her parents. This leaves the parents very little choice and

they forbid the girls to leave the house. The Lisbon sisters, unable to leave the house,

use the telephone to call the boys and they play records trying to express the feelings

they have at the time. The boys listen and play other records as replies. When the

telephone privileges of the girls are taken away, the sisters use flash-light at night to

converse with the boys. One night, they pass the message for the boys to come over. As

Lux tells the boys to wait and as the boys grow impatient and start to explore the house,

5
they discover all the girls have committed suicide. The parents soon leave the house for

good while leaving the boys never to forget their daughters. The whole story gets told in

a retrospective and happens twenty-five years ago while the boys (now grown men)

narrate the story as they remember it.(Coppola, The Virgin Suicides)

2.2. Differences between the Book and the Film

While the story of the film remains faithful to the book, there are some

differences. One of the most important difference is the role of the boys as narrators. In

the book, the boys act as narrators and guide the reader through their story of collecting

the puzzle pieces about the Lisbon sisters. However, the book also presents the boys as

if they want to tell the story at once so while both the film and the book start with the

suicide attempt of Cecilia and the boys think about the question “how Mr. and Mrs.

Lisbon had produced such beautiful children” (Eugenides 8), the film, unlike the book,

does not reveal that all the other girls commit suicide. (Eugenides 8) In the film, the

boys are moved into the background and while they still act as the narrators in the story,

they no longer come out of it as narrators of the story.

Connected to the this change of narration is the second biggest difference which

is the medium. In a way the boys lose their position in the film, in contrast with the

book, because of the difference between the mediums of a film and of a book. In the

book, the text follows what the author and hence the boys want to tell and the reader

must use his imagination while the film shows what the camera captures. Perhaps the

best example are the Lisbon girls. From the book, the reader gets the information about

the girls' names and age: “The Lisbon girls were thirteen (Cecilia), and fourteen (Lux),

and fifteen (Bonnie), and sixteen (Mary), and seventeen (Therese).” (Eugenides 7) In

addition, the boys describe their looks as “short, round-buttocked in denim, with

roundish cheeks that recalled that same dorsal softness.” (Eugenides 7) This description

6
gives the reader the possibility to imagine the girls as he or she wants them to look and

underlines the fact that the boys see the Lisbon girls as perfect – the obsession that

started the story twenty-five years earlier. However in the film the boys do not give this

description, they only introduce the girls as they get out of a car and then skip right for

the question of “how Mrs. Lisbon and Mr. Lisbon, our math teacher, had produced such

beautiful creatures.” (Coppola, The Virgin Suicides)

This difference between the text of the book and the dialogue in the films also shows the

difference between the two media. The book gives its reader the idea while the film

gives its viewer the picture.

In concordance with the movement from the boys is also the movement of the

film towards the story of the Lisbon girls omitting the boys' hunt for the puzzle pieces.

For instance, the film completely omits how the boys question Uncle Tucker who was

the only witness to see Mr and Mrs. Lisbon to leave early in the morning leaving the

area for good. (Eugenides 241) On the other hand, the film presents the event with a

description from one of the boys as that “Mr. and Mrs. Lisbon gave up any attempt

to lead a normal life” (Coppola, The Virgin Suicides) which is accompanied with the

Lisbon’s station-wagon leaving the driveway and going away.

The film also changes the ending. While the film shows only the parents leaving

the house forever in their station wagon, (Coppola, The Virgin Suicides) the book

follows the story of the house as it gets bought by a “young couple,” (Eugenides 241)

gets a new cover of Kenitex, (Eugenides 241) and slowly decays in the years to follow

which is shown by the layer of Kenitex falling down from the walls. (Eugenides 242)

Another difference is in the timing of the girl's suicides. The book presents one suicide

at the time, starting with Cecilia and ending with Lux near the end of the book.

However the film presents only two suicides. First Cecilia alone and then, near the

7
ending of the film, a mass suicide of the other four girls.

2.3. Lisbon Girls in an Alienated Environment

The alienation in this film is the result of the a three-way conflict between the

Lisbon sisters, their parents (especially their mother) and the rest of the world

(represented mostly by their school and schoolmates and by the encounters with the

boys narrating the story).

The film gives life to an idea that the process of growing up alienates the girls

from the rest of the world, or as Hoskin puts it “the Lisbon sisters die while everyone

else grows up.”(Hoskin 215) This shows the gap between the Lisbon home and the rest

of the world and it also shows that as the kids grow, the gap gets bigger. The Lisbon

girls have a steady home, there are no changes, their mother keeps everything in order,

the way it is supposed to be. However, the girls do not stay at home all the time. They

encounter the outside world and this outside world is changing – their schoolmates grow

up, they acquire different tastes in life, there come new styles in fashion. The world is

changing and the girls cannot keep up. It is obvious that there has to be a breaking point,

that this cannot keep forever. Hoskin puts it as that the boys grow up (Hoskin 215) -

they go with the stream of other kids into an adulthood with everything that comes with

it and twenty-five years later they tell the story. However, the girls face the gap that

comes between their life at home and their life in the rest of world; and the gap is

growing. At the end of the film they take on the only possible way out – a suicide. There

might have been the possibility to run away, but where to? Girls unprepared for the life

on their own, without any money, where could they go? Also the mother would be

looking for them, on her own and with the help of the authorities. Would it be even life

with somebody chasing them only to lock them up again? While suicide is the most

8
final solution to any problem, the girls take it as there truly seem no other way out of

their situation, no other way to seal the gap between the home and the world. Alvarez

claims that “suicide is, after all, the result of a choice” (Alvarez 75) However, the

Lisbon girls do not have a choice. On one hand there is the tyrant mother. On the other

hand there is the conventional world in which Cecilia is treated by a doctor who asks

questions like: “What are you doing here, honey?” hinting why did Cecilia try to

commit suicide. Immediately following with: “You're not even old enough to know

how bad life gets.” to which Cecilia replies: “Obviously, Doctor, you've never been

a 13-year-old girl.” (Coppola, The Virgin Suicides) This treatment of something that

cannot be treated brings the question of sanity when it comes to a suicide. Alvarez says

that in England you mus not commit suicide, on pain of being regarded as a criminal if

you fail and a lunatic if you succeed (Alvarez 44). Since Cecilia is only thirteen and she

cannot go to jail (figuratively) she is sent to a psychiatrist while she is completely sane –

after all her reply “Obviously, Doctor, you've never been a 13-year-old girl.” comes

quickly without much of a hesitation. This underline another Alvarezes' claim: “Suicide

is a closed world with its own irresistible logic” (Alvarez 105)

The suicide also offers a symbolic punishment for the girls' mother, who is a

devoted Christian. The mother believes that there was a lot of love in her house, yet her

daughters commit suicide, the ultimate sin any Christian can commit. Alvarez says that

“like divorce, suicide is a confession of failure.” (Alvarez 87) In this case it is the failure

of the girls' mother to see and agree with changes that are happing outside the windows

of her house.

The alienation of the girls is further emphasized by the environment – the suburb

of Grosse Pointe in Michigan. The suburb is shown as a peaceful, easy-going

neighbourhood. In the first scenes exemplify this: there is a lady watering her lawn,

9
people are walking a dog and a boy playing outside his house with a basketball while

his father prepares a grill for a barbecue. Yet, in this perfect American neighbourhood, a

tragedy happens – a girl tries to commit suicide.

Using the theme of an alienating gap between the two worlds and the tragic

ending, the film offers insight into the mainstream and consumer society, just as Alvarez

says that when it comes to a suicide “no doubt the fault does partly lie with a society

which takes as little notice as it decently can of the elderly, the sick, the unstable, the

foreign and the drifting.” (Alvarez 85)

In the film, the girls are still the same, raised by a conservative mother who is trying to

shield them from the bad in society. Yet, the girls encounter consumerism and are

attracted to it, especially Lux. After all, the boys (especially Trip Fontaine) are, to a

certain extend, the representation of the mainstream. The boys do what the boys of their

age should do: they learn to drive, they are interested in football, they are interested in

girls. Trip Fontaine is the opposite of the Lisbon house. He smokes pot, wears cool sun-

glasses and drives a shiny red muscle car. Just his presence is enough to create an

environment that is new and alienated for the girls.

The home environment of the Lisbon sisters is a conservative American

household. The father, Ronald Lisbon, is a teacher and a man of respectable position.

The mother, Sara Lisbon, is a devoted catholic and a housewife who takes care of their

daughters. The boys even wonder how come, that they can have such beautiful

daughters (Coppola, The Virgin Suicides) However throughout the film the parents are

shown not be that great. The father seems to lose touch with reality and becomes

ignorant to what his wife is doing to the girls. The mother of the Lisbon sisters could be

described as the main villain in the film. She restricts her daughters and even locks them

in the house while claiming that “none of my daughters lacked for any love. There was

10
plenty of love in our house.” (Coppola, The Virgin Suicides) Both parents do not seem to

understand what is really happening while they fight against it, or as Hoskin puts it “the

parents are more victims of the limits of maturity and thus doomed never to understand

the excessive teenage passion and angst of their children.” (Hoskin 219) With their

ignorance, the parents actually widen the gap between the environment of their house

and the environment of the rest of the world.

To a certain extend, the girls and Lux especially, can be perceived as spoiled

girls. They do not have to worry about their everyday lives. While they are too young to

have mortgages or worries if there is enough food for their dinner, there seems to be no

cap on things. The girls' basic needs are taken care of by the parents and the girls try to

take advantage of their worry-free lives – Lux experiments with alcohol and cigarettes

and later in the film, she has many sexual encounters on the roof of her parents' house.

She acts as if there were no consequences of her actions. Lux's wilderness gets

transmitted to the other sisters and this again leads to bigger alienation, this time the

other way around, the girls start to alienate their own home.

The ending of the story is therefore the result of the girls staying in the middle

between the two environments of the Lisbon house and the rest of the world. On one

hand, the girls are too spoiled, and to some extend naïve, to live in the real world which

is just too alienated from what they know. On the other hand their wilderness alienates

their own home from them. The result is that the Lisbon girls are not accepted in wither

of the environments and see no way out other than by committing suicides as they

cannot live half-way between the two worlds and must end tragically.

However, the social criticism of the film goes further. The party scene with the

theme of asphyxiation can also be seen as a form of social criticism. While the book

makes it clear that it is a dress-up party, the film does not. In the film there are only cuts

11
into the house hosting the party where everyone is happy, seems to be wearing

expensive clothes and drink expensive alcohol. The green colour does not only mean the

asphyxiation which represents the lack of fresh air in the rotten society but also

represents the green colour of money and capitalism which “has resulted in material

well-being but spiritual bankruptcy” (Eugenides 231) This translates into criticism of

the American way of life in which conventions are more important than a human life.

On one hand there is party while young girls in the same neighbourhood commit

suicides while the same conventions force the parents into “stringing Christmas lights”

(Eugenides 175) instead of mourning their loss.

2.4. Visual Aspects of the Film

There are two interesting points that should be mentioned when it comes to the

visual aspects of the film. First, there is the idea of 1970s when the story takes place.

For this, the set of the film seems to be built with the attention on the 1970s and the

conservativeness of the suburban location. The lawns are mown, the life fences cut to

geometrical shapes, nothing eye catching like statues. In addition, people rake the leaves

from their lawns, have their barbecues and drive their station-wagons. Also the clothing

is kept conservative, for example, the kids at school wear uniforms and the boys are

often seen wearing shirts even for the most casual activities.

The second point is of the visual side of the film is the play with the colours.

Throughout the whole film, there are scenes in which the picture seems to be

manipulated into looking brownish. This makes the picture look oldish and evoke the

feelings of the era of 1970s which further underlines the feeling of the past.. Other

scenes include other colours: the hospital and psychiatrist's office get a scent of blue

colour so the doctor’s tie is not shiny red but takes a scent of something else. Also the

12
last scenes of the film rely on the colours heavily: the last walkthrough of the Lisbon

house shows it half-empty and devoid of life, yet the house if flooded with blue glow

which reaches all rooms in the house. In contrast, the scene in the party house are

showed in green. These colours add the feelings of the surreal experience of the past, or

as both Eugenides and Coppola put it “the fever dream.” (qtd. in Hoskin 216)

The use of both techniques of a retro-look and the use of colours is after all

nothing new for the Coppola family. Sofia Coppola's father, Francis Ford Coppola, has

put both these techniques to use in his films like the Godfather and Apocalypse Now!

The Godfather and The Godfather II rely heavily on the retro-look combined with the

use colour filters. The first Godfather was made in 1972 (“The Godfather”) while the

story takes the viewers back into late 1940s and early 1950s showing old cars and

clothing of the time and underlining it with the use of the brownish looking picture. The

same techniques are used in The Godfather II. In both storylines of the second

Godfather there is a heavy use of props looking like from the time the story happens

(the most seen are again cars and clothes) and also the use of the brownish picture. In

this film, the brown colour of the picture even helps the viewer to distinguish the two

timelines in which the story is happening: Michael Corlene's time gets a brown similar

to the first Godfather film while the time of Vito Corleone's arrival in America gets a

brown of a different shade to further underline the difference.

While the two Godfather films rely on the brown only, Francis Ford Coppola's

film Apocalypse Now!, in which the picture changes colours throughout the film to

further enhance the viewer's experience. Some of the colours are used in order to bring

the conditions in the scene closer to the viewer. For example the when the helicopters

land to unload the troops the picture gets a scent of orange to further enhance the dust

which is being whirled all around the scene. (Coppola, Apocalypse Now) On the other

13
hand Francis Ford Coppola also uses the colours to enhance the emotions and feelings.

The green jungle gets contrasted with blue colour which makes it look even more

strange. The mentioned orange colour also brings a feeling of tense situations, first

during the battle for the beach (the famous scene in which col. Kilgore confesses his

love for the “smell of napalm in the morning” (Coppola, Apocalypse Now)) and again

near the ending of the film when capt. Willard finds the renegade colonel Kurtz and has

to deal with him and also with his followers. (Coppola, Apocalypse Now)

Using the work with colours in her father's films, Sofia Coppola presents her

version of the fever dream: “Jeffrey [Eugenides] calls the Lisbons the fever dream of the

boys. I wanted to make the movie a fever dream.” (qtd. in Hoskin 216) The fever dream

Coppola describes gets shown in the scene from the party near the end of the film. The

book describes a party with the theme of Asphyxiation held by a local girl named Alice

(Eugenides 234) and its guests wearing strange costumes like gas masks or a diver's

suite. (Eugenides 235) On the other hand, the film does not show any costumes, the

guests wear formal clothes but the entire scene is shown to have a strong scent of

unhealthy green colour, representing the theme of asphyxiation in its original meaning

and in its shifted meaning of society poisoned with greed.

The visual side of the story is also supported by the voice-over given by the

boys. The voice-over is used to connect the viewer with the film as it does not only

comment on the action in the picture but also speaks to the viewer and together with the

tone of the voice-over underlines how obsessed with the girls the boys were.

14
3. Lost in Translation

3.1. Basic Information and Plot Description

Sofia Coppola's second film, Lost in Translation, continues with the theme of

characters in an alienated environment but unlike The Virgin Suicides, it puts the

alienated environment into the foreground. In addition to directing, Sofia Coppola wrote

the script and also took on the role of a producer. The camera work was done by Lance

Acord. The entire film was shot on a relatively low budget of about four million USD.

The main two roles are cast with Bill Murray as Bob Harris and Scarlett Johansson in

the role of Charlotte. (“Lost in Translation”)

The plot of the film revolves around Bob, an American actor who comes to

Tokyo to shoot an advertisement for a brand of Japanese whisky. As he cannot sleep at

night because of a jet-lag, he meets Charlotte, a lonely wife of a photographer. While

her husband works, Charlotte is left in the hotel alone and suffers from boredom in the

same manner Bob does, as he does not know what to do after he finishes shooting for

the day. As neither of them understands Japanese language or environment, Bob and

Charlotte keep each company during the long nights. As they try to escape boredom,

they wonder through the streets of Tokyo, attend a house party and visit a karaoke bar.

After Charlotte catches Bob with another woman, a singer from a bar, in his room, they

have an argument but reconcile later that day and express that they are going to miss

each other when they leave Tokyo. As the film nears its end, on his way to the airport

Bob sees Charlotte on the street, they say goodbye to each other one more time and Bob

whispers something into Charlotte's ear. Afterwards, Bob leaves for the airport.

3.2. Tokyo as an Alienated Environment

The first sign of alienation comes right away in the first scenes of the film when

15
Bobs travels through the streets of Tokyo in a taxi. While the streets look similar to any

big city in the world – all with their blazing neons and advertisements – all the sign

seem strange as these are written in Japanese. Through the familiarity of the lights

comes alienation of the messages these lights send. If Bob travelled into an European

country he might have encounter a language at least written using the same letters as

English. However Japanese signs are so strange for this American actor he cannot even

start to guess what they mean (unlike with any European language). The alienation of

the place is also supported by the time. The difference between the time in Tokyo and in

Los Angeles is seventeen hours (sixteen in summer) (“The World Clock”) which means

that Bob has to face the question of how to deal with the fact that his night is a Japanese

day and vice versa. What further enhances the alienation of Bob from Tokyo, and Japan,

are the people he works with and for. First there is Bob's arrival into the hotel, there are

many people who want to give him a present or at least to shake his hand. There is also

a welcoming party whose members also shake Bob's hand, give him presents and

business cards. Yet the next scene clearly shows Bob in his room just sitting at the side

of his bed alone. (Coppola, Lost in Translation) Second there is the crew on the set of

the advertisement he is making. As Bob does not speak a word of Japanese, he must rely

on the crew to speak English. The photographer seem to know some English, however,

it seems to be a mix of English and Japanese (he pronounces the name of the famous

film Rat Pack as “Lat Pack”) and the poses Bob makes seem to be a result of Bob's

intuition rather than of the photographer's commands. (Coppola, Lost in Translation)

In addition, Bob's comments and request on the set seem to be ignored by the crew. At

one moment he complains that the whisky in his glass he advertises is not even a real

whisky but a glass of ice tea. (Coppola, Lost in Translation)

Bob's alienation is further enhanced by the lack of care for his work. In Jim

16
Murray's Whisky Bible Suntory gets quite high marks. The twelve years old Hakushu

Suntory received 95 points out of possible 100 and the seventeen years old Hibiki 89

out of the 100. (Murray) Despite these high marks, which are usually reserved only for

the best Scotch whisky, Bob does not seem to taste the whisky at all which makes it

harder to work with it as Bob makes an advertisement for something he does not know.

At the end of the day, Bob is alone with Charlotte being the only companion.

The alienation of Charlotte seems to take a similar direction. She spends her

days alone in a hotel without anything to do. In a way, Charlotte's fate is similar to Nora

Helmer from Henrik Ibsen's The Doll's House. They are both provided for, Nora by her

husband Torvald, (Ibsen) Charlotte gets what she needs from her husband. As both

stories progress, Nora wants to get her independence and leaves her husband. (Ibsen)

Similarly, Charlotte is getting more unhappy in her marriage and presumably would be

willing to leave her husband as well. However, while Nora can leave her husband,

Charlotte cannot at the time which leaves only to befriend Bob. (Coppola, Lost in

Translation)

The film also draws parallels to the Coppola's first film, The Virgin Suicides. Just

as the Lisbon sisters start to experiment with their alienated environment of the outside

world which includes smoking, drinking and sexual encounters, so do start experiment

Bob and Charlotte. They spend their free time in bars, attend a house party sing in an

all-night karaoke bar. (Coppola, Lost in Translation)

However, unlike her first film, Lost in Translation does not end tragically. Still

though, the film does not offer a happy ending either. While Bob leaves crying Charlotte

on the street it is clear that they both felt something for someone who is now gone.

17
3.3. Social Criticism in the Film

The alienation of both Bob and Charlotte help the film to criticize several

aspects of society. The two goodbyes in the film criticize the social boundaries. During

the first goodbye in the hotel lobby, it is obvious that Charlotte expects more than a

plain goodbye while Bob wants to express something more than the formal hotel lobby

allows. To truly express himself, Bob and Charlotte need to meet in the middle of the

street, which is full of people. Yet as it seems to be the only place that offers enough

solitude to express what they want to express.

The character of Bob evokes the statement from Eugenides' book The Virgin

Suicides how capitalism “has resulted in material well-being but spiritual bankruptcy”

(Eugenides 231) Bob certainly cannot complain about his material well-being. He

seems to be a famous actor, for shooting the advertisement he receives gifts and a lot of

money. In addition, he wears what appears to be an expensive suit and a watch. As far as

physical world is concerned, Bob could not be happier. However, Bob feels miserable,

spiritually bankrupt. He does not enjoy his work and after finishing his working day, he

is drinking alone in bars as he has nothing better to do. Bob is not happy until he meets

Charlotte. To a certain extent, the film shows that it is not money that make people

happy, company of relate-able people is. In the film, It is not the language barrier that

keeps Bob and Charlotte together – Bob had the opportunity to meet some businessmen

in a bar yet they were only interested in him as an actor and not in him as a person.

(Coppola, Lost in Translation)

Another target of the film's criticism is Bob's reason for being in Tokyo – the

advertisement. The criticism can be seen in several scenes. First is the welcoming party

in the hotel. The moment they see Bob, they want to shake hands and give him presents.

However, these presents are immediately followed by business cards so that they can be

18
in contact. After all, it is good for business to have a “friend” actor who is willing to sell

his face. Second, the film criticizes the shallowness of advertisements. Presumably, Bob

does not even know how Suntory whisky tastes, yet he makes an advertisement for it.

For the company, it is not important what the actor knows or does not know about the

product as long as the advertisement helps to sell the it. Third, the film shows how are

the advertisements flooding the streets. In the first scenes of the film it is night, yet the

streets are lit with neon lights making easy to see people walking through the streets as

if it was not dark but more of a gloomy day.

3.4. Visual Aspects of the Film and the Use of Sound

The imagery used in the film contrasts two kinds of spaces which might even be

called as two Tokyos. The first Tokyo is represented by the streets full of people and

laminated by tall skyscrapers full of advertisements. The second Tokyo shrinks to the

single rooms of Bob and Charlotte. Both of these Tokyos make no sense to the main

characters – the streets are full of people and texts in a strange language while the only

companion in the hotel room is the television with programmes offering no

entertainment (Coppola, Lost in Translation)

Lance Acord, the cinematographer for the film, used an Aaton 35mm camera,

which is rather small. This allowed him to take shots of streets of Tokyo from the car.

(McDonald A6) Using this technique, the first scenes of the film – the ride through the

streets flooded by neon lights - make a very strong impression of what a strange place

Tokyo is, or as Acord says: “for Coppola it was essential that the camera convey the

impressions of the foreign landscape in the same way the characters were seeing and

experiencing it.” (qtd. in McDonald A6) Acord himself was “inspired by the French

New Wave” (McDonald A6) and says that “part of the way to obtain that intimacy [of

19
the film] is to keep the overall scale (of the production) down.” (qtd. in McDonald A6)

About the result he says that “You feel as though you had visited Japan.” (qtd. in

McDonald A6)

Bob's alienation is underlined by the, often muffled, sounds of the environment

and speeches of the actors. This is illustrated by the scene in which Bob is being

photographed by the Japanese photographer. The Japanese language of the photographer

gets muffled by his camera as he speaks from behind it and Bob's reaction to the

photographer's comment are more of personal sighs than clear answers. This hardly

eligible non-mutual conversation leave the viewer on his own to think what these two

are saying with Bob's poses, and how he changes them, being the only clue to the

conversation. This non-mutual conversations deepen Bob's loneliness and further

alienates him from the rest of the environment.

The alienation of main the two main characters is also supported by the music.

In her review, Alice Lovejoy mentions how the “ethereal electropop” (Lovejoy 11)

music contrasts with “industrial hum” of “underneath of Tokyo hotel scenes.” (Lovejoy

11) The music combined with the ambient noise create a place for the characters for

their “quiet alienation.” (Lovejoy 11)

There is also a scene in which silence plays an important role – the second

goodbye on the street when Bob whispers something into Charlotte's ear but the viewer

does not know what.

In addition to the video and audio in the film is accompanied by excellent

performance of the two main actors: Scarlett Johansson in the role of Charlotte and Bill

Murray in the role of Bob Harris. As reviewer Steven Aoun puts it: “Coppola elicits

remarkable performances from her two leads and both actors emerge with characters

that transcend mere 'performance'. Whilst the audience will also feel a palpable sense of

20
loss at their parting, we also get the feeling that they leave with a part of each other”

(Aoun 190)

21
4. Marie Antoinette

4.1. Basic Information and Plot Description

Sofia Coppola's third film, Marie Antoinette, was released in 2006. Coppola

again took the roles of the director, screenwriter and producer. The lead role went to

Kirsten Dunst who had played the role of Lux in The Virgin Suicides. The role of the

cinematographer went again to Lance Acord. Unlike the previous two films, Marie

Antoinette had a considerable more generous budget of forty million USD. The main

cast includes Kirsten Dunst in the role of Marie Antoinette (Kirsten Dunst played Lux

Lisbon in Coppola's first full-length film The Virgin Suicides) and Jason Schwartzman

in the role of Louis Auguste (later Louis XIV). They are supported by Asia Argento in

the role of Comtesse du Barry, the king's mistress and Judy Davis in the role of

Comtesse de Noailles. (“Marie Antoinette”)

The plot of the film follows the life of Marie Antoinette. As a young princess

Marie Antoinette leaves her home of the royal court of Austria-Hungarian Empire and

travel west to be married to Louis XVI, the future king of France. At the the border

between Austria-Hungarian Empire and France, she is stripped naked, every possession

is taken away from her and on the French soil, she continues as a “new” lady to meet

her husband to-be. After the introduction, Marie Antoinette is taken to Versailles, her

new home. At the beginning, Marie Antoinette struggles to learn all the necessary

protocol while she needs to manoeuvre among all the members of the royal court as

well as the king's mistress. However, soon, she starts to enjoy her new life without any

worry for expenses. When the king dies and Louis XVI is crowned, Marie Antoinette

becomes the new queen of France and she continues the wild life of parties even more.

In addition to her spending, she also supports her husband in war efforts which lays

further burden on the state finances. As the time goes on, the people of France are fed

22
up with their poverty while looking at the rich life of the court and the revolution breaks

out. Soon the palace in Versailles is surrounded by a mob and the monarchy ends with

the royal couple being driven away in a carriage. (Coppola, Marie Antoinette)

However, the film is not nor tries to be a historic documentary. While some of

the events did happen during the reign of Louis XVI, many aspects of the film are

purely fictional, after all, Marie Antoinette never said “her” famous “let them eat cake”

(Covington)

4.2. Alienated France

The film presents very little from the background of Marie Antoinette. The

viewer learns that she is the daughter of the king the Austria-Hungarian Empire and that

she has been chosen to be married to Louis Auguste, the future king of France. As the

result she moves to France “at the age of fifteen” (Cobban 113) to live at Versailles and

became the future queen of France.

As she travels to France, the scene of passing the borders between Marie

Antoinette's homeland and France shows the differences between the two courts. (Name

of the countess) bows to Marie Antoinette in the expectation of mild reaction from the

princess. However the princess puts her dog aside into arms of one her companions and

hugs the Mistress of the household much to her surprise. (Coppola, Marie Antoinette)

This action, which might look like an book example of a faux pas from the princess, the

fault is not on anybody's side. Marie Antoinette does not perform the action in order to

embarrass herself or the Mistress. She only reacts in good faith and open-heartedness of

her. After all, the Mistress is the first member of the French court Marie Antoinette

encounters while she has no understanding of the customs at the French court.

The strict ways of the French court are revealed later in the forest scene. This

23
forest scene presents a tent which was build for the hand-over, as the Mistress of the

household explains to Marie Antoinette: “This structure for the hand-over ceremony has

been build precisely astride the borders of two great lands, you have entered on

Austrian soil, will exit on French as the dauphin of France.” (Coppola, Marie

Antoinette) During this scene Marie Antoinette gets stripped naked, all her possessions

are taken away including her dog Mobs and she is told that from now on she will travel

by a French coach as she is told by the Mistress of the house: “Now you must bid

farewell to your party and leave all of Austria behind.” (Coppola, Marie Antoinette)

This scene is based on the true facts from the life of the real Marie Antoinette: “On an

island in the Rhine near Strasbourg [Marie Antoinette] exited the Holy Roman Empire,

was symbolically and also literally stripped of her Habsburg apparel, passed over to new

French ladies-in-waiting to be robed as a French princes, and stepped on the soil of

France [as] the dauphine.” (Cobban 113)

For the development of the story and of the character of the film Marie

Antoinette, this plays a vital part in her dealings with the French environment. The way

Marie Antoinette is stripped of everything foreign, the French give her a clear message

that from now on she has to act according to the French rules. This cleansing however

forgets that the princess has still a different mindset which will bring more awkward

moments in the future. In other words, stripping Marie Antoinette and dressing her into

French dress does change the look of Marie Antoinette, but does not change the way she

thinks or acts. For example, as Mobs the dog is taken away, Marie Antoinette is told that

she can have “as many French dogs as [she] like[s]” (Coppola, Marie Antoinette) Marie

Antoinette takes on the offer and has a few dogs running around her chambers, but is

never seen to be so close to any of them as she was to Mobs and tries to pull the strings

to get Mobs back to her. (Coppola, Marie Antoinette)

24
An example of the strictness and strangeness of the rules at Versailles is the morning

dressing ceremony. As Marie Antoinette is finally dressed she proclaims “This is

ridiculous.” To which the Mistress of the household proclaims “This, madame, is

Versailles.” This exchange of opinions presents the strangeness of the environment.

There are strict rules regarding who dresses the princess, everybody has a specific role

in the process and the roles shift from person to person according to who is available. To

Marie Antoinette, who is surprised to experience such a treatment, a thought comes to

her mind – from her point of view it is ridiculous that she, as the princess and future

queen, cannot reach for anything (like a towel or her shoes (Coppola, Marie Antoinette)

especially when she is not used to such a treatment. On the other hand the Mistress of

the household believes this to be not only the proper but also the only way a dauphine is

dressed in the morning. However when the Mistress replies to Marie Antoinette's

comment with her “This, madame, is Versailles,” (Coppola, Marie Antoinette) she

cannot give the princess anything more of an explanation. These are the rules the

members of the court abide by, there is no explanation of these rules given by the

Mistress to the princess why she, the princess, cannot reach for anything. Simply, there

is no reason. And for the princess, there is no other way than to play by the Versailles

rules.

To a certain extent the rules by which the Versailles abides can be seen as “over

the top.” In the eating scene around the twenty seventh minute of the film, Marie

Antoinette is presented with a glass of water. After she drank the some of the water, she

puts the glass on the table. (Coppola, Marie Antoinette) This action is what a reason

dictates: there is some water left and if you want to drink it later, keep the glass in your

vicinity. However, in Versailles the princess is expected to return the glass to the tray to

be carried away. This creates another awkward moment for Marie Antoinette as she is

25
unaware of the custom of returning the glass.

However as the environment of Versailles presents itself by strict rules, it also

presents a freedom for the princess in terms of worries about everyday life. The food is

provided, bedrooms are provided, companions are provided.

As the film progresses and the daily rituals repeat themselves, Marie Antoinette

starts to get used to the rules of Versailles. In addition she starts to change her opinions

and Versailles changes her personality. At the beginning Marie Antoinette put resistance

to the rules of the French court. However, as the story progresses, she gives in and starts

to enjoy the life of the highest society. She start to attend parties, gets herself luxury

goods and expensive jewellery. At the end, she gets completely absorbed by Versailles,

she is a part of it and as the result she refuses to leave Versailles when the French

revolution breaks out. (Coppola, Marie Antoinette) In other words, Versailles becomes

more important than own life. This decision that the environment of Versailles is more

important than anything else , however brings a fatal consequence to Marie Antoinette's

life.

In contrast with the environment of Versailles where the members of the court

live in luxury, there is an other environment that is not described directly, yet it plays an

important role on the story. This environment is the whole state of France. Versailles is a

part of France and Louis and Marie Antoinette rule the rest of France from there.

However the gates of Versailles are not one-way in the direction from Versailles to the

rest of France. The France, represented by all the people living there, has also its say. As

the film nears its end, the French revolution breaks out and the roles of environments

start to shift. First Versailles changes its role into a guarded safe-house while the lay-

people protest outside. Second, as Marie Antoinette is too dependent, or connected to

Versailles, she forgets about the whole picture, that France is not just the royal court at

26
Versailles but that there is much more. Near the end, when the revolution breaks out, she

is reminded but is unable to acknowledge the full France environment in the way it

needs to be done. This is shown by her proclamation when the news of bread shortages

reach Marie Antoinette's ears. She calls “let them eat cake” (Coppola, Marie Antoinette)

unaware that the “them” the lay people of France do not have the luxuries of Versailles,

that they cannot afford to eat cakes. At the end it is not Versailles but the whole France

that brings death to Marie Antoinette as the the result of her forgetting that while

Versailles is France, France is not Versailles.

The portrayal of Marie Antoinette's money spending bears similarity to Nora

Helmer from Ibsen's The Doll's House. Right at the beginning of the first act, Nora is

shown to be reckless with money and spending it easily. She goes even so far that asks

her husband to borrow some money as soon he will have a “big salary and earn lots and

lots of money” (Ibsen) Also Nora does not have plan what to buy, she just ”buy[s]

something with it.” (Ibsen) Similarly, Marie Antoinette spends money easily on

everything she sees. Borrowing money has, however, consequences. As the film nears

the end, there is a portrait of Marie Antoinette with a slogan “Queen of Debt” written

over it. Also Ibsen's Nora gets into problems with Krogstad. For the money problems of

both ladies, there is a solution which is the to break their “virtual confinement” (Usuda

56) Both ladies live in a house in which they spent almost all their time, they can leave

whenever they want and go wherever they want. Nora is in a tougher position as leaving

the house for good means obtaining at least some money beforehand while Marie

Antoinette, as the queen of France, can leave for wherever she wants. Yet at the end of

both stories, Nora leaves her doll's house and finds her freedom but Marie Antoinette

cannot bring herself to leave.

27
4.3. Allusions to Hollywood

While the two previous films offered a criticism of society, Marie Antoinette

aims at much more smaller groups of people- Hollywood and its stars. From Coppola,

this may be seen as an attack towards her own ranks as, for the film, she got a budget of

forty million USD (“Marie Antoinette”) and her father named a wine after her (Cook

and McGill) and yet she criticizes the Hollywood lifestyle.

The setting of Versailles is presented as the ultimate destination for a princess.

Versailles is large, there are no compromises, the members of the court have servants for

everything, they get the best goods from all around the world (like the Chinese tea,

Marie Antoinette drinks). From the point of view of an unknowing person Versailles is

the perfect place to live.

However, from the inside, it is not as perfect as it may seem from the outside. As

Marie Antoinette comes to Versailles, she is rather naive (after all she hugs the Mistress

of the household in the forest during the hand-over) as is faced with all the challenges of

the Versailles residents. There are strict rules about who dresses her in the morning,

there is a strict dress-code and Marie Antoinette must wear heavy clothes. She needs to

adapt to the habits at the Versailles lunches, like when she cannot keep her glass of

water at the table.

All these situations show the Versailles as an allusion to Hollywood and the

story of Marie Antoinette to a young aspiring actress who comes there. Just as Versailles

is the ultimate destination for princesses, Hollywood is the ultimate destination for any

actor or actress. The film then can be viewed in the following way.

Young actress Marie Antoinette, a fifteen-year-old (Cobban 113) and rather

naive girl, comes from her home to Hollywood. In the film, her home is the Austria-

Hungarian court but it is not specified what it is like to live there. Only thing the viewer

28
learns is that Marie Antoinette's mother is very keen on Marie Antoinette's success.

Marie Antoinette comes to Versailles not knowing any local customs and is confronted

with the harsh reality which is very similar to modern Hollywood. The Hollywood of

today is a hard environment to get by in. Although the stars are rich and spoiled, for

every one star there are dozens of drop-out who did not make it and who struggle in

auditions for small time roles while trying to survive in the expensive city of Los

Angeles. A lot of wannabe actors comes to Hollywood with the naïve idea of fulfilling

their dreams of rich lives just as Marie Antoinette comes to France to play the role of

the future queen of France. As the story progresses so does the life of Marie Antoinette,

she eventually “makes it” to be the queen of France just as some actors and actresses

make it to be the stars, and she starts to enjoy the money and the fame. For Marie

Antoinette nothing forbidden – wild parties, expensive jewellery, extravagant hairstyles,

beautiful dresses to wear. In the similar manner a Hollywood star behaves like this:

expensive dress, a limo with a driver, endless parties.

However the story does not end with the happy ending. It is said that when a

man reaches the top he cannot go anywhere else than to the bottom again. This holds for

Marie Antoinette and holds true for most of the Hollywood stars. In the film, Marie

Antoinette's rich life soon starts to get to her. She is called the “Queen of Debt” and her

life is not as it used to be. As the film nears its end she still eats her dinner in a hall full

of servants but outside of the windows people are rioting in disgust of the Versailles

court. Similar story can be said for today Hollywood. Many stars make it to the top only

to fall back to the bottom because of drugs, alcohol, affairs or just because somebody

better comes along. Many stars are forgotten while their films occupy the bottom

shelves of cheap stores as the public has moved on other forms of entertainment.

At the end, just as Marie Antoinette drives away towards the guillotine in 1793

29
(Cobban 130) the sunset can be seen over the Versailles. This scene can be interpreted

as the end of Hollywood. In the recent years with rise of the Internet, people are no

longer forced to see films in cinemas, they can choose to see whatever they want.

Similarly new film-makers and actors do not have to search for the “Hollywood Grail.”

In many respects the film may as well predict the way Hollywood ends: on the

guillotine made by disgust people who no longer want to be dictated what to watch.

It may seem strange for Coppola to attack Hollywood, after all, her father is one the

Hollywood's prominent figures. However, “there are unmistakable parallels between the

director's experiences as a celebrity member of one of Hollywood's royal families and

Marie Antoinette's situation as a target for xenophobia, malice and envy in pre-

revolutionary France.” (Cook and McGill)

4.4. Visual Aspects of the Film and the Use of Sound

The fact that Marie Antoinette is not a true historical film but that the story

serves as a carrier for other themes and topics is underlined by Coppola's use of sound,

picture and also by the use of props. The first scenes of the film misleads the viewer

while it says almost nothing about the film. There are credits – pink font on a black

background – and a scene in which Marie Antoinette (who the viewer does not know

yet) gets a foot massage while digging her finger in a strawberry cake. All this is

accompanied by a soundtrack heavily relying on electric guitars. (Coppola, Marie

Antoinette) Nothing says that the film is happening in France in the 18th century. It can

easily be a film about a beauty parlour which offers “a cake of the day.” Ferris and

Young see this scene as a prequel to “an ordinary caught up in extraordinary

circumstances.” (Ferris and Young 101) In other words, they agree with Coppola's own

claims that Marie Antoinette was a “real girl” (qtd. in Ferris and Young 100). Coppola

30
also claims that Marie Antoinette was a “lost girl, leaving her childhood behind” (qtd. in

Ferris and Young 100) which Ferris and Young describe as a “vulnerable young girl.”

(Ferris and Young 101)

On the other hand Marie Antoinette is not the innocent character: “While

obviously a sympathetic portrayal, Coppola's film does not entirely let Marie Antoinette

(played by Kirsten Dunst) off the hook. Instead it remains true to the contradictions that

make her an ambiguous figure. The sequences of her enjoying a chic 'rustic' lifestyle at

her well-appointed country retreat Le Petit Trianon, or consuming exquisite pastries and

buying extravagant designer shoes (some of Manolo Blahnik's most exotic creations),

have an ironic distance that is absent from other scenes. “ (Cook and McGill)

In connection to the guitars in the title scene, Ferris and Young claim that the

music of the whole film is intended so that the main heroine connects with the modern

viewer: “the film's self-conscious identification with contemporary viewers is most

obvious in the use of a late twentieth- and early twenty-first-century musical score. Pop

music is incorporated not only as non-diegetic element, but as a diegetic one.” (Ferris

and Young 101) Ferris and Young show this in the scene of the masked ball as the guests

of the party “dance in a humorous conflation of an eighteen-century minuet and a

Hollywood-musical-production to a '80s pop band Bow Wow Wow's 'Aprodisiacs.'”

(Ferris and Young 101)

Another visual aspect of the film is the use of the Sun. Throughout most of the

film, the weather is beautiful, it sunny and people are playing in the grass. However,

when the revolution begins, the lights go out. There is the scene of Louis XVI and

Marie Antoinette eating their supper in the dark. The next first Sun that can be seen is in

the last scene when the fate of Marie Antoinette is already sealed.

The film's visual aspect is presented as “phantasmagorical world of Versailles

31
that relies greatly on the artifice of visual excessiveness (colours, splendour, luxury

etc.)” (Usuda 57) In other words, the absurdity of the situations, especially from the

beginning of the film, are underlined by the use of dresses in absurd sizes and shapes.

For example the dress Marie Antoinette wears for her weeding with Louis XVI. While

the colour is rather decent white, the width of the dress makes Marie Antoinette three

time wide. (Coppola, Marie Antoinette) The dresses used in the film (and only the ones

of Marie Antoinette) are also accompanied by the hairstyles which further underline the

absurdity of Versailles. Also the dresses are not worn only by women members of the

court but also but men members and all the staff are wears their uniform, which are

often colourful and richly decorated. (Coppola, Marie Antoinette)

32
5. Conclusion

In conclusion, the main aim of this thesis was to show characters in alienated

environments in the first three full-length films of Sofia Coppola. Her first film, The

Virgin Suicides, focuses on an American tragedy in which in a perfect American suburb,

five girls commit suicide as the result of them being unable to cope with their placement

outside of their home, into the real world and then finding their way back to their home.

As the result, the Lisbon sisters stand on the border of two incompatible environments

of they want to be part of both. This results in their suicide. In addition the film serves

as a social critique of the growing consumer society in which money are worth more

than a human life as the cry for help of the Lisbon girls goes unanswered.

The second film, Lost in Translation, focuses on the alienation of a place.

Coppola's Tokyo is portrayed as a strange place in which Bob and Charlotte have only

each other. Their relationship is however not meant to last, as the business system takes

Bob away while Charlotte stays crying. The film again offer insight into the “money

before people” system with the focus on advertisements and their shallowness of as long

as it glows and has a famous name on it, it is good.

The third film, Marie Antoinette, shows the alienated environment of Versailles

from the point of view of a young Austria-Hungarian princess who comes there in order

to get married and spend the rest of her life there. Just as Marie Antoinette starts to

enjoy her queenie life, the film starts to criticize the ways of nowadays stars in

Hollywood who enjoy their high standard of living and all-night parties while regular

people have to get up early for work. For Marie Antoinette, however, the life is not

meant to last as the French revolution ends her life prematurely.

For all three film there are also examples of how Coppola uses the medium of

the film to evoke emotions or feelings. In case of The Virgin Suicides, it is the uses of

33
colour filters to further enhance the scenes with either retro-look or transforming them

into the dream-like sequences. Lost in translation relies heavily on the strange feeling of

something different – Tokyo is filled with people who speak a strange language and the

walls are covered with strange symbols. And in Marie Antoinette Coppola plays with

the richness of the dresses wore by the princesses as they run through Versailles just as

the people of France have problems to feed their children. In addition to the visual part

of the films, Coppola also uses audio to enhance the viewer experience and to connect

with him like in the Marie Antoinette the modern songs while in the background there

dance people dressed in 18th century clothes or the contrast between the Tokyo above

and below ground, the former playing easy sounds while the latter contrast with

industrial music.

34
Works Used and Cited

Alvarez, Al. The Savage God: A Study of Suicide. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson,

1971. Print.

Aoun Steven. “LOST IN TRANSLATION.” Metro: Media & Education Magazine 141

(2004): 189-90. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 20 April 2011.

Cobban, Alfred. A History of Modern France 1, Old Régime and Revolution 1715-1799.

Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1963. Print.

Coppola, Francis Ford, dir. Apocalypse Now. Perf. Marlon Brnado and Martin Sheen.

American Zoetrope, 1979. DVD.

---, dir. The Godfather. Perf. Marlon Brando and Al Pacino. Alfran Productions, 1972.

DVD.

---, dir. The Godfather: Part II. Perf. Al Pacino and Robert Duvall. Paramount

Pictures, 1974. DVD.

Coppola, Sofia, dir. Lost in Translation. Perf. Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson.

Focus Features, 2003. DVD.

---, dir. Marie Antoinette. Perf. Kirsten Dunst and Jason Schwartzman. Columbia

Pictures, 2006. DVD.

---, dir. The Virgin Suicides. Perf. Kirsten Dunst and James Woods. American Zoetrope,

1999. DVD.

Cook, Pam and Hannah McGill. “Portrait of a lady: Sophia Coppola.” Sight & Sound

XVI.11 (2006): 36-40, 68-69. International Index to Film Periodicals. FIAF.

Web. 15 April 2011.

Covington, Richard. "Marie Antoinette." Smithsonian 37.8 (2006): 56-65. Academic

Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 16 April 2011.

Eugenides, Jeffrey. The Virgin Suicides. London: Bloomsbury, 2002. Print.

35
Ferris, Suzzane and Mallory Young. “Fashion, Third-Wave Feminism, and Chick

Culture.” Literature/Film Quaterly 38, 2 (2010): 98-115. Academic Search

Complete. EBSCO. Web. 16 April 2011.

Hoskin, Bree. "Playground Love: Landscape and Longing in Sofia Coppola's 'The

Virgin Suicides'." Literature Film Quarterly 35.3 (2007): 214-221. Academic

Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 13 March 2011.

Ibsen, Henrik. The Doll's House. Project Gutenberg. Project Gutenberg, 13 Dec 2008.

Web. 20 November 2010.

Leitch, Thomas. Film Adaptation & Its Discontents. Baltimore: The John Hopkins UP,

2007. Print.

Lovejoy, Alice. "TWO LOST SOULS ADRIFT IN TOKYO FORGE AN UNLIKELY

BOND IN SOFIA COPPOLA'S 21ST CENTURY BRIEF ENCOUNTER." Film

Comment 39.4 (2003): 11. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 12 March

2011.

"Marie Antoinette." The Internet Movie Database. IMDb, 1990-2010. Web. 15 April

2011.

McDonald, Kathy A. "Lance Acord." Daily Variety 282.10 (2004): A6. Film &

Television Literature Index with Full Text. EBSCO. Web. 12 March 2011.

Murray, Jim. Whisky Bible 2011. Wellingborough: Dram Good Books, 2010. Print.

"The Godfather." The Internet Movie Database. IMDb, 1990-2010. Web.

17 April 2011.

"The Virgin Suicides." The Internet Movie Database. IMDb, 1990-2010. Web.

15 April 2011.

“The World Clock.” timeanddate.com. Time and Date AS, 1995–2011. Web. 25 March

2011.

36
Usuda, Kohei.. “The Voice of Marianne Faithful: Portrait of a lady: Sophia Coppola.”

Cineaction 75 (2008): 54-57. International Index to Film Periodicals. FIAF.

Web. 15 April 2011.

37
Resumé

Ve svých prvních třech celovečerních filmech, Smrt panen, Ztraceno v překladu

a Marie Antoinetta, americká režisérka Sofie Coppolová, dcera slavného Francise

Forda Coppoly, umisťuje hrdiny do cizích prostředí kam nepatří, ať už geograficky či

psychologicky. Cílem práce je poukázat na konflikty mezi postavami a prostředími do

kterých jsou umístěny a také poukázat jak se tyto postavy s takovými umístěními

vyrovnávají a co je výsledkem těchto umístění.

Práce se také zaměřuje na kritiku společnosti, nebo jejích částí, na které se

jednotlivé filmy svým dějem snaží upozornit. Na tyto problémy tak upozňoují právě

postavy, které se setkávají s konfliktem mezi něčím co znají a něčím novým a je pouze

na nich jak se s problémem vyrovnají.

Vzhledem k tomu, že režisérka má podíly i na produkci svých snímků, je pro ni

možné se oprostit od vlivů vydavatelských společností a poukázat tak i na nepříjemné

problémy ve společnosti.

Jako poslední bod si práce klade za cíl prozkoumat jak režisérka těchto tří filmů

používá možnosti filmu jako média. Tímto zaměřením na audiovizuální stránku filmů

tak práce získává další možnosti pro interpretaci postav a jejich počínání v těchto

filmech.

38
Resume

In her first three full-length films, The Virgin Suicides, Lost in Translation and

Marie Antoinette, an American director Sofia Coppola, a daughter of the famous

director Francis Ford Coppola, places her main characters into alienated environments,

where they do not belong from either geographical point of view or psychological point

of view. This thesis aims to shows the conflicts between such characters and the

environments they are placed into as well as the process of characters dealing with the

environments and the results of these placements.

The second goal of this thesis is to show the social criticism which translates

from the films. These issues are shown by the characters who encounter something new

and strange while they need to deal with the conflict between the known and the

strange.

As the director backs her films also from the role of a producer, she can allow

herself to point out these issues without having to compromise in order to satisfy any

other producer.

The last goal is to show how the director of these three films uses the

possibilities of the film – how she uses the audiovisual component to evoke certain

feelings or emotions in order to bring the characters and their conflicts closer to the

viewer.

39