On balance, where exactly, then, does Lost in Translation sit in the wider independent/Indiewood spectrum? There is, perhaps, no single or one-dimensional answer. Some aspects of the film lean towards the Indiewood pole, particularly at the industrial level and in the centrality of a major star such as Bill Murray both to the film itself and the manner in which it was sold. More distinctly indie qualities also remain to the fore, however, and play a central part in establishing the particular resonances of the film, notably in the formal dimension, most obviously the low-key nature of its narrative framework. As much as anything, though, I would argue that the kind of close analysis of the various dimensions of the film conducted above demonstrates the different degrees in which qualities associated with the indie sector are often found, either more broadly or within an individual example such as this.

It is possible to suggest an overall leaning towards a particular kind of balance between the relatively mainstream-conventional and the relatively distinctive, as I have sought to do in detail in each of the chapters of this book. Lost in Translation can quite clearly be distinguished from both the core Hollywood mainstream, on the one hand (even if that remains itself a less one-dimensional phenomenon than is sometimes suggested), and the more alternative or lower-budget end of the indie spectrum, on the other (itself subject to numerous variations). The hybrid space it occupies is distinctive in its own ways, and became a significant part of the American film landscape from the late 1990s and into the 2000s, but remains far from monolithic in its own qualities or in the nature of its potential appeal to viewers.