Broken Flowers is a 2005 comedy-drama film directed and written by Jim Jarmusch and produced by Jon Kilik and Stacey Smith. It stars Bill Murray, Jeffrey Wright, Jessica Lange, Sharon Stone, Frances Conroy, Julie Delpy, and Mark Webber. It opened August 5, 2005 in limited release.

Plot:

The main character, Don Johnston (Bill Murray), receives an anonymous letter, allegedly from an unnamed former girlfriend, informing him that he has a 19-year-old son who may be looking for him. At the same time, his current girlfriend Sherry (Julie Delpy) moves out. Don has lived the life of an archetypal womanizer, a "Don Juan", and any one of several former girlfriends may have written the letter. He initially doesn't intend to do anything with the information, but his friend and neighbor Winston (Jeffrey Wright), a mystery and detective enthusiast, convinces him to visit the four possible mothers:

Laura (Sharon Stone) works as closet and drawer organizer and is the widow of a race car driver. She has a "jailbait" daughter, Lolita (Alexis Dziena), who flirts with Don and walks around the house completely nude in front of him.
Dora (Frances Conroy) is a realtor who hasn't yet let go of her past; once a flower child of the 60s, she appears very brittle and on the verge of exploding out of her confining life. Her controlling husband, Ron (Christopher McDonald), invites Don to an awkward dinner.
Carmen (Jessica Lange) works as an "animal communicator." Don recalls how she was formerly so passionate about becoming a lawyer, among other things. But "passion is a funny thing," she says. There are also hints that she may be involved in a lesbian relationship with her receptionist (Chloë Sevigny).
Penny (Tilda Swinton) lives in the country amongst blue-collar motorcycle enthusiasts. Having left Don years ago, she has no desire to reconcile with him now. When Don asks her whether she has a son, she gets upset; Don is beaten up by her friends as a result. He awakens the next morning in his rental car in the middle of a field. He has a nasty cut around his left eye as a result of the confrontation.
After the beating, Don stops at a florist to buy flowers from a friendly and attractive young woman named Sun Green (Pell James) who bandages his wounds. He leaves the flowers at the grave of another former girlfriend, Michelle Pepe, who Don originally thought might be the mother before finding out she had died five years prior. Earlier Don told Winston he had loved Michelle — his only mention of love throughout the film. As he kneels at her grave stone he softly says "Hello, beautiful."

Disillusioned, Don returns home where he meets a young man in the street (Mark Webber) who he suspects may be his son. He buys him food, but when he remarks that the young man may wonder whether Don is his father, the young man becomes upset and flees. As Don looks on, he notices a Volkswagen Beetle drive past. The young man in the passenger seat (played by Homer Murray, son of lead actor Bill Murray) is listening to music which Don himself listens to throughout the movie. This "Kid in Car" holds unblinking eye contact with Don while the car drives on and away. Don is left standing in the middle of the road.

Groundhog Day is a 1993 comedy film directed by Harold Ramis, starring Bill Murray and Andie MacDowell. It was written by Danny Rubin and Harold Ramis and based on a story by Rubin.

Plot:

TV Meteorologist Phil Connors, his Producer Rita, and cameraman Larry from the fictional Pittsburgh television station WPBH-TV travel to Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania (which, in real life, as in the movie, holds a major celebration for Groundhog Day) to cover the annual Groundhog Day festivities with Punxsutawney Phil.

After the celebration concludes, a blizzard develops that Phil had predicted would miss them, closing the roads and shutting down outside phone service, forcing Phil to spend an extra day in Punxsutawney. Phil awakens the next morning, however, to find it is again February 2, and the day unfolds in exactly the same way, over and over again. For Connors, Groundhog Day begins each morning with his waking up to the same song, Sonny & Cher's "I Got You Babe", on his alarm clock radio, but with his (and only his) memories of the "previous" day intact, trapped in a seemingly endless "time loop" to repeat the same day in the same small town.

Initially, Connors takes advantage of learning the day's events and the information he is able to gather about the town's inhabitants, and that his actions have no long-term consequences. He revels in this situation for a time: seducing beautiful women, stealing money, even driving drunk and experiencing a police chase. However, his attempts to seduce his producer, Rita, are met with repeated failure. He begins to tire and then dread his existence. He commits suicide several times -- we see him electrocute himself and fall from a tall building (other attempts are alluded to) -- but mere death cannot stop the day from repeating. After he dies, he simply wakes up listening to Sonny & Cher in the same bed again. In a vain attempt to break the cycle, he kidnaps Phil the Groundhog, and both rodent and man die after a police pursuit; but the loop does not stop.

He opens his heart to Rita, and her advice helps him to gradually find a goal for his trapped life: as a benefactor to others. He cannot, in a single day, bring others to fulfill his needs but he can achieve self-improvement by educating himself on a daily basis. After seeing an elderly homeless man die, Phil vows that no one will die on "his" day and performs many heroic services each and every day, including performing the Heimlich Maneuver on a choking man and saving a little boy from falling from a tree. Though the film does not specify the number of repetitions, there is enough time for Connors to learn to play jazz piano, speak French fluently, sculpt ice, and memorize the life story of almost everyone in town. He also masters the art of flipping playing cards into an upturned hat, which he offhandedly suggests takes six months (director Ramis has stated Phil repeats the day for about 10 years, though the original script had February 2 repeating for thousands of years.)

Eventually, Connors enhances his own human understanding which, in return, makes him an appreciated and beloved man in the town. Finally, after considerable improvement to his personality and world-view, he wakes up on February 3 -- though again to "I Got You Babe." Yet it is a new day, and Phil and Rita decide to move to Punxsutawney, though Phil says, "We'll rent to start.

Lost in Translation is a 2003 comedy drama film. It was the second feature film written and directed by Sofia Coppola.

The film centers on Bob Harris (Murray), an American action movie star on the downward slope of his career, who has come to Tokyo, Japan to film a Suntory whisky commercial. He meets Charlotte (Johansson), a young woman married to a self-centered celebrity photographer, and the two share an unconsummated romance, perhaps more of a friendship, while exploring the cultural life of Tokyo.

On its surface, Lost in Translation is a movie about culture shock between East and West, yet this reveals itself as a metaphor for more existential themes of alienation and loneliness and, alternatively, companionship. The film explores how these themes combine at certain stages in life, against the background of highly modern Japanese cityscapes.


Plot:

Aging action-movie star Bob Harris (Bill Murray) has arrived in Tokyo, Japan to film a Suntory whisky commercial (a reference to real-life Hollywood actors who do foreign celebrity advertising, including Sofia Coppola's father, Francis Ford Coppola, who did Suntory commercials with Akira Kurosawa during the filming of Ran. Harris' marriage has cooled off decidedly - his wife contacts him frequently to complain or to get his opinion on trivial things. Harris finds himself annoyed with his wife, and embarrassed about making the commercial for monetary reasons.


Charlotte (Johansson) and Bob (Murray) share a quiet moment outside a karaoke room.Charlotte (played by Scarlett Johansson) is a recent philosophy graduate of Yale University, and the wife of a celebrity photographer (Giovanni Ribisi) on assignment in Tokyo. Often left behind by her husband when he goes to his photo shoots, she begins to wonder about her direction in life, and who this man is that she married. Her absentee husband has more time for his work and assorted young starlets than for her. Bob and Charlotte, both lonely and stricken with jetlag-induced insomnia happen upon each other in the lounge of the hotel where they are staying, and strike up an unusual friendship.

Drawn together by their mutual dissatisfaction and alienation, the two experience the stranger side of Tokyo nightlife, playfully exploring the foreign city and finding comfort in relating to each other when nothing else in their lives seems to fit. Against the expected movie stereotype of man meets woman, the friendship is denied the chance to bloom into romance, and yet their fleeting time together makes a strong impression on both characters.


Bob (Murray) struggles to fit in with Japanese culture.A scene in the film illustrates being "Lost in Translation" quite literally. Bob, a director (played by Yutaka Tadokoro), and an interpreter (Akiko Takeshita) are on a set, filming a whisky commercial. The audience witnesses several exchanges where the director speaks several sentences, with passion, followed by a pithy translation. At one point a slightly exasperated Bob asks "Is that everything? It seemed like he said quite a bit more than that." The scene is played without subtitles, so those viewers who don't speak Japanese feel as lost as Bob does. Motoko Rich of The New York Times translated the scene in a 2003 article.[2] One of the exchanges translated by Rich illustrates the scene in general:

Bob: Does he want me to, to turn from the right or turn from the left?
Interpreter (in formal 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.
Director (very brusquely, in colloquial Japanese): Either way is fine. That kind of thing doesn't matter. We don't have time, Bob-san, O.K.? You need to hurry. Raise the tension. Look at the camera. Slowly, with passion. It's passion that we want. Do you understand?
Interpreter (In English, to Bob): Right side. And, uh, with intensity.
A key moment finds Bob, Charlotte at a karaoke studio performing karaoke. They take turns singing various numbers. Charlotte sings "Brass in Pocket", by The Pretenders, as Bob watches, transfixed by her. A good deal of their emotional connection in the film is unspoken, and this scene makes it clear that there is something going on beyond simple playfulness. Indeed, it appears Bob truly falls in love with Charlotte at this point. The scene concludes with Bob singing to Charlotte an uncontrived version of Roxy Music's melancholic hit "More Than This".

From this point on, Charlotte's outlook begins to brighten up, due to her new companion in Bob. They begin to do more and more activities together, generally having fun together, from visiting the hospital due to an injury on Charlotte's toe to laughing at Kelly singing karaoke. At the same time though, Bob begins to accept the Japanese culture, clear from an exchange on the phone with his wife where he demands to eat Japanese food at home. The two begin to bond more when Charlotte asks Bob about parenting, who proceeds to talk about how fantastic parenthood is, at the sacrifice of your personal life for it.

Meanwhile Bob also appears on a popular Japanese TV programme where he once again appears to have no clue as to what is going on and fails to find any assistance from his translator. When he watches this at a later point on TV he realises that he looks like a bit of a fool. Realizing this, he enters the bar to drink and try to forget his problems. However, at the bar, he suffers a lapse in character and falls for the bar's Western singer. They go back to his room together later and have sex.

Charlotte comes to find Bob later on in his room, yet he doesn't let her in as he has the singer in his room. Bob himself is not polite in asking Charlotte to leave him alone and the pair seem to have a brief falling out. When they meet at a resturant later, they have yet to have made up and then Bob informs her that he will be leaving Japan soon, even though he is keen to now stay. Yet they later meet up again and make up, agreeing that the meal was particularly bad. Bob still doesn't wish to leave, yet he has no choice. At this point, they part ways.

Later on, John, Charlotte's husband, sends Charlotte a fax illustrating a form of affection towards her, although it is not clear if she has seen this, as Charlotte meets Bob downstairs shortly afterwards. As Bob is leaving the hotel, he decides to call Charlotte and ask for his jacket back, at the same time suggesting that he wants to see her one last time. However, it appears that he gets her answering machine. Yet as he is leaving she appears with his jacket and they part ways on good terms, however it is clear that they both still want each other's company.

As Bob is in his taxi to the airport, he sees what he thinks is Charlotte in a crowded street. He gets his driver to stop and he gets out and runs after Charlotte. Reaching her, they face each other and hug. At this point, he whispers in her ear something that was unscripted and which Bill Murray has declined to repeat when asked during interviews. They part one last time now kissing on the lips and Bob gets back into his taxi and leaves. The last shots of the film are made up of the city landscape.