I liked Lost in Translation as far as it went, but otherwise I’ve never been a huge Sofia Coppola fan. But now I am. Last night I saw Somewhere (Focus Features, 12.22), an existentially arid Michelangelo Antonioni-ish art film. For me it contains the same “traces of feeling” that Antonioni said he was aiming for in L’eclisse (’62).

At last September’s Venice Film Festival, Indiewire‘s Anne Thompson asked Coppola, “[Given] the stately pace, are you a fan of Antonioni? Were you thinking about that kind of approach? There’s that element of taking your audience to the edge of your character’s boredom.”

And Coppola answered, “I love some of his films, he always made an impression…and Antonioni does do that. I mean, I must know that from watching his films. But I wasn’t thinking that directly.” However indirect the suggestion, Somewhere definitely has that mood of elegant contemplation, that sense of things being anxious and slightly corroded under the surface, that unhurried way of taking it all in.