iMEDIABUZZ team provides 8 Great Movies About Loneliness for all entertainment genre. A variety of films explore these themes by using various methods that include disconnection from the world, fighting their demons, or being trapped in a space that is far away. In a few films, viewers see how lonely characters are mixed with others frequently and with the same outlook.
1: Lost in Translation
Lost in Translation is a 2003 film starring Bill Murray and Scarlet Johansson. It is the story of an American film actor, Bob Harris (Murray), who is sent to Tokyo to participate in an alcohol commercial shoot. While he’s already over his peak, he is given this lucrative endorsement due to the fame his name is associated with.
Amid a luxurious hotel, he gets to know a fellow American known as Charlotte (Johansson); she is a fresh Yale philosophy student at a hotel in Tokyo along with her husband, a photographer. Like Bob, she’s somewhat “lost” about the things that have happened in her life. She is convinced that she should have a break and relax.
The thing that makes this film appropriate for people who feel feelings of loneliness and isolation is the acting of the two actors. The two leads, Harris and Charlotte, feel trapped, making them likable. Moving to a new country where nobody seems concerned about your identity or what you do causes you to ask, “Have I been living the way I want to?”
2: Her
Here is a film that tells the story of a man who spends most of his life alone. The film features Joaquin Phoenix as Theodore Twombly and Scarlett Johansson as the AI system Samantha.
The script was written by, directed and directed by Spike Jonze. The idea for the story came from an idea Jonze got after reading an article on the internet about instant messaging and Artificial Intelligence.
The film is set in Los Angeles, where Twombly lives as a lonely, depressed person who is a professional writer for those who cannot write their letters. Because of his isolation, He purchased an operating system with an assistant virtualized with artificial intelligence. He names her Samantha.
Theodore begins to develop a feeling of love and dependence towards Samantha. Incredulous at how much the AI can learn about the world, his feelings grow stronger following a sexual encounter with Samantha.
Infatuation transforms into love since Samantha appears to be someone honest and capable of expressing emotions. But Theodore eventually realizes that Samantha isn’t capable of experiencing genuine emotions.
3. Repulsion (1965)
Roman Polanski’s debut English language film, Repulsion, is a psychological horror film released in 1965. It stars Catherine Deneuve; the plot is about a young woman’s descent into psychosis when she is left to her own in her sister’s home.
Repulsion is the debut film of the dark ‘Apartment Trilogy’ from director John Polanski and, in our opinion, is the most effective.
Carole Ledoux (Deneuve) is a manicurist living with her elder brother in London. Beautiful yet awkward socially, Carole would not appear out of place in any of Hitchcock’s films.
When her sister is forced to take a trip with her husband, disoriented Carole starts her descent into a state of insanity, revealing the full extent of her psyche that is demented.
Cracks transform into craters, the voices expose rapists, and every sound shows a tragic result in the delusional mind of this emotionally and physically left-behind young lady.
A gory and claustrophobic tale of sexual repression, isolation and sexism, Repulsion is a mysterious and unsettling journey de force that is sure to be remembered as one of the greatest films in the genre.
4. Le Samourai (1967)
Jean-Pierre Melville‘s unfailingly incredible crime drama Le Samourai is a masterpiece of minimalistic excellence. The lead actor Alain Delon is full of confidence and aplomb. The result is a blend of style excellence and captivating suspense, making Le Samourai an elegant yet captivatingly engaging masterpiece.
Jef Costello (Delon) is a cult man living in a stark one-room apartment in Paris with nothing except a tiny bird that is kept in a cage. In a state of utter silence or emotion, Costello is the personification of the lone wolf.
With a quiet, stoic voice and a skill with a poker face that can frighten the statue. As the authorities begin to appear and a complex game of cat and mouse is played, we watch the effects of loneliness build up into a genuinely captivating end.
Le Samourai is a straightforward tale with a fairly basic plot that will have you riveted as the events unfold. Like the subject we discussed, Le Samourai is a very low-key but incredibly captivating performance worthy of its praise.
5. Silent Running (1972)
His directorial debut Douglas Trumbull brought us the fantastic, underrated and intriguing sci-fi thriller Silent Running.
Bruce Dern brilliantly plays Freeman Lowell, the only outsider on an astronaut crew on the spaceship that has been assigned the task of restoring plant life forms kept in domes attached by space freighters.
Even though he’s been given this crucial and significant task, Lowell is the only person on the crew who displays any interest or emotion in their work of restoring the remaining parts of the planet’s plants.
But, when they receive an order to dismantle the domes before returning to their home, Lowell faces a massive choice that he views as a sacrifice to his greater purpose.
Although it is more than forty years old, the film has survived through the ages and continues to be amazingly creative. A moving and insightful film Silent Running is sci-fi but with a twist.
6. Solaris (1972)
The legendary Andrei Tarkovsky directed the film; 1972’s Solaris, an iconic Russian sci-fi film considered one of the greatest space films ever created. Another movie with little movement, Solaris excels as a slow-burning psychological drama with striking visuals, thought-provoking scenarios and signature Tarkovsky long-takes.
Solyaris can be described as an oceanic world that the Russian space station orbited for many years, which has been trying to investigate the phenomenon.
In the absence of advancement and reports of strange events, psychologist Kris Kelvin is handed the task of investigating the strange happenings aboard the station.
If Kris arrives, he is met with hostility. The psychologist sets out to inquire about the events only to be confronted by similar circumstances to his own.
After being confronted by a traumatic event from his past, Kris finds himself trapped by his emotions of isolation and feeling of loneliness.
7: Cast Away
If you’ve ever thought about what it would be like to be a survivor of a plane crash and to survive on an island without a single person, then you’re looking forward to a great time with this film.
The Cast Away is a survival-drama film that stars Tom Hanks, Helen Hunt, and Nick Searcy. It won Hanks a Best Actor in a Motion Picture Drama category award at the 2001 Golden Globe Awards. It also earned Alan Silvestri the Best Instrumental composition award at the 2002 Grammy Awards.
8: Into the Wild
Into the Wild is another survival-themed movie; however, it doesn’t have an accident. It tells the story of Christopher McCandless, also known as Alexander Supertramp. He travelled across the North American mountains and entered the Alaskan wilderness in the late 1990s.
McCandless was always looking for peace. After he graduated from college, McCandless decided to travel and believed that this was the only way to attain the ultimate level of happiness. He continued his journey until he arrived in the wilderness of Alaska.
