Lost in Translation: Tokyo and Kyoto

Bob is a fading American movie star who has come to Tokyo to appear in advertisements for Suntory's Hibiki whiskey. The film shows him jet-lagged and driven through the dazzlingly candy-coloured neon streets of Shinjuku, even staring up at a billboard of himself advertising the whiskey. The opening scene was shot on Yasukuni-dōri in Kabukichō, the entertainment district nicknamed the "Sleepless Town".

Location precision: The film shows Shinjuku's neon streets without naming a spot; the pin marks Kabukichō, where its production notes place the opening scene on Yasukuni-dōri.

The hotel is the film's home base. Bob stays here, miserable over his twenty-five-year marriage and a midlife crisis, while Charlotte, a recent graduate married for two years, is equally disillusioned. They keep crossing paths until they connect in the hotel bar. Coppola began forming the story during a stay here, and the production was allowed to use the New York Bar, the spa and the Olympic-size pool with its full-length windows. Public areas could only be filmed after 1 or 2 a.m.

Visitor guidance: The hotel fills floors 39 to 52 of Shinjuku Park Tower.

Bob and Charlotte wade into the famed intersection on their way to explore the city, where animated dinosaurs walk across the glass fronts of the skyscrapers. Shibuya Crossing, inaugurated in 1973, was one of the real places the production filmed in. On public streets the crew had no filming permits and relied on bystanders as extras, at a crossing where as many as 3,000 people cross on a single green light.

Visitor guidance: As many as 3,000 people cross on a single green light, so allow for crowds.

Charlotte invites Bob into the city to meet some local friends, and together they experience the city nightlife. On a night out, Bob and Charlotte end up in Karaoke Kan Shibuya, and the evening finishes with singing at a karaoke box. The branch is located in a tower, and the private rooms the pair use, 601 and 602, have windows looking down onto the neon-lit city.

Location precision: Focus Features names the Shibuya branch and rooms 601 and 602 but gives no address; the pin marks one Karaoke Kan in Shibuya.

Visitor guidance: Rooms 601 and 602, if you can book them, have windows looking down onto the neon-lit city.

Halfway through her stay, Charlotte takes the bullet train to Kyoto to visit several famous sites. Unsure about her future, she goes alone. Parts of the film were shot on Kyoto Station's Shinkansen platforms, which are elevated above the platforms for the Kintetsu Kyoto Line. Today a single 15-story roof covers the station along with a shopping mall, a hotel, a cinema and a department store.

Visitor guidance: The Shinkansen platforms are on the elevated level of the station.

Charlotte wanders the grounds of Nanzen-ji and climbs the steps to the Sanmon Gate, where she glimpses a young couple in a traditional wedding party making its way down the temple path. Emperor Kameyama established the temple in 1291 on the site of his detached palace. The gate was destroyed in 1369 and reconstructed in 1628, and it still has stairs up to an elevated viewing area.

In a brief, sentimental scene Charlotte reads her fortune and ties her omikuji, a fortune-telling paper slip, before returning to Tokyo. In the garden she crosses the pond by skipping across its stepping stones. The shrine is a partial reproduction of the Heian Palace, planned for the 1100th anniversary of Heian-kyō, and its large red entrance gate reproduces the Outenmon of the Chōdōin.

Visitor guidance: The garden ponds are filled with water from the Lake Biwa Canal.