Lost in Translation Filming Locations: Daikanyama Air and Nakameguro
Throughout the film, Bob Harris (Bill Murray) and Charlotte (Scarlett Johansson) spend most of their nights at the New York Bar in the Park Hyatt, but they did venture out of the comfort of their five star hotel on at least two occasions to explore Tokyo’s nightlife.
On their first night out Bob and Charlotte make an initial stop at the night club ‘Air’ in Daikanyama, a hipster enclave adjacent to Shibuya. At Air they meet up with Charlie Brown (Fumihiro Hayashi) and make friends with several club goers (perhaps friends of Charlie’s) — most of whom are actually up-and-coming (at the time) Japanese influencers, actors and artists. Bob flirts with Akiko Mono, a Japanese actress and model and also speaks with Hiromix (Hiromi Toshikawa) a famous Japanese photographer and artist. As the night progresses, Bob tries to communicate (poorly) in French with Akimitsu Naruyama, owner of the contemporary art gallery ‘Gallery Naruyama’ in Kudanshita.
Soon after Bob chats with Akimitsu, Charlotte sits on a couch next to Hiroshi Fujiwara, a famous fashion designer, musician and influencer who is considered the “godfather” of Ura-Harajuku street fashion (e.g., A Bathing Ape, Good Enough and Fragmented Design) and is credited with introducing Hip Hop to Japan in the 1980s. Fujiwara is also one third of ‘HTM’ (along with former Nike CEO Mark Parker and legendary sneaker designer Tinker Hatfield), an avant-garde research and development group of Nike which produces cutting edge shoes and reinterprets existing Nike designs. The HTM group was responsible for the Nike Air Max 1, Air Trainer 1 and various Jordans. They also produced the distinctive Nike HTM Air Wovens that Bill Murray wears throughout the film.
Air was located at 2–11 Sarugakucho in Shibuya Ward, just along the JR Yamanote line tracks headed towards Ebisu, and was about a ten minute walk from Shibuya Station. The club first opened in 2001 and while it was much smaller than some of the more famous clubs in the area such as Womb in Shibuya’s Dogenzaka district or Unit in Daikanyama, Air managed to draw some notable acts over the years including Calvin Harris, m-flo, DJ Jazzy Jeff among others. The club ceased operations in 2016 however the space remains in operation as ‘Space ODD’, a concert hall and event space (rather than night club). The subterranean layout of Space ODD remains generally the same as it was when it operated as Air: a small main dance floor on the B2 floor with a lounge on the floor above. The only significant difference to the interior since Air shuttered was that the small sofa / lounge area on the main dance floor level (where Bob chats with Akimitsu Naruyama and Charlotte sits next to Hiroshi Fujiwara) has been walled off and is now a staff area / changing room for artists.
When Charlie, Bob and Charlotte are chased out of the club after Charlie instigates a fight with a bartender, bouncers pursue them with BB-guns and shoot at them in the street. This sequence was not actually shot in Daikanyama, but on a street along the train tracks in Nakameguro, one station southwest from Daikanyama. The street remains more or less the same as it was in the film, though there has been considerable renovation of the restaurants lining the side of the street that abuts the train tracks. Several of the restaurants seen in the film on this street still exist, including the Yakitori restaurant Bettako, a sign for which can clearly be seen in the film.
Fleeing the BB-gun, Bob and Charlotte duck into a pachinko parlor and run through rows of noisy pachinko machines before escaping onto the street and into a waiting taxi, which takes them to Charlie’s friends apartment before they head to Karaoke-kan in Shibuya. The pachinko parlor they run through was a small parlor named ‘Botan’ which was located at the West exit of Nakameguro Station. The space occupied by Botan has since been renovated and is now an Aoyama Flower Market and adjoining restaurant/café.
Pachinko is a type of arcade game that originated in Japan and is immensely popular among the working class and older Japanese citizens. Pachinko machines are similar in size to slot machines however users must drop small metal balls into an array of pins that resembles a vertical pinball machine. As the ball falls down the array of pins, there may be bumpers or other devices which redirect the balls to other parts of the array. The goal is to have the balls enter into several “catcher” holes on its way down without falling into the final hole at the bottom. Points are awarded in multiples for balls that enter into the catcher holes and other targets/sensors that are activated as the balls pour down the array. The points are redeemable for more balls, which can either be played in the machines or redeemed for “prizes”.
Since gambling is illegal in Japan, pachinko parlors are not allowed to reward their winning patrons with cash. To get around the legal requirements, the players are awarded prizes (often in the form of small fragments of gold or other valuable metals or even more mundane items such as lighters or ball point pens) that are then traded at a neighboring shop (called a ‘TUC Shop’ — which stands for Tokyo Union Circulation — the company that oversees these shops) for actual cash. This elaborate scheme allows the pachinko parlors to operate in a legal ‘grey’ zone and skirt Japan’s gambling laws.
Japan’s ethnic Korean population (zainichi Korean) have been heavily involved in the pachinko business as after World War II many of them found it difficult to obtain ordinary jobs due to systemic discrimination (which continues to exist in Japan to this day). Accordingly, ‘grey’ businesses like pachinko parlors were some of the few opportunities that were open to them. Pachinko parlors can be found on almost every corner in Japan, and the industry makes approximately USD 200 billion per year, an astronomical number that surpasses the amounts spent in Las Vegas and Macau each year. By some reports, the pachinko industry accounts for 4% of the Japanese GDP.
Although almost exclusively popular in Japan, the game originated from the United States — called ‘Corinthian Bagatelle’ — and was imported from Chicago to Japan in 1924 as a candy store game for children. Japan’s first pachinko parlor opened in Nagoya in 1930 before the game exploded in popularity after the gambling potential was realized, with the number of parlors rising to nearly 400,000 in 1953. In the latter half of the 20th century many of these smaller pachinko parlors closed or consolidated, and now a handful of large entertainment corporations (mostly headed by zainichi Korean residents) operate the vast majority of pachinko parlors in Japan — as of 2018, there are now almost 10,000 pachinko parlors in Japan and approximately 8 million pachinko players in the country (6% of the population). The massive facilities operated by these conglomerates resemble factories rather than gaming parlors and can be found in some of the most remote areas of Japan. The Japanese love of pachinko and the high number of pachinko addicts has the Japanese government concerned about liberalizing Japan’s gambling laws. Nevertheless, a reform bill was passed in 2018 which will permit the establishment of several casino integrated resorts in Japan.
Space ODD Website: http://spaceodd.jp/
Gallery Naruyama Website: http://www.gallery-naruyama.com/
Maruhan Pachinko Website: https://www.maruhan.co.jp/
Soundtrack from the nightclub scene at Air:
