Sous-titre
Last night, I put in this dvd that I had received for Christmas like 2 years ago, Brotherhood of the Wolf (Le Pacte des Loups). I just hadn't gotten around to watching it yet. This is a French movie. However, when I turned it on, the default language was English. At first, I was confused. I didn't check any of the language settings on the menu, because I assumed it would be in French, possibly with English subtitles or possibly without. The first couple sentences they said I didn't understand -- I wasn't expecting to hear English. Once I realized what it was, I kind of screamed (very quietly, it was just a scream of shock) and dropped the remote I was holding. I recoverd quickly, and was able to change the language back to French.
I don't like dubbed movies, in any language. I've seen numerous movies in France that have been dubbed into French from their original languages. Besides the fact that I just understand English much better and much faster than I do French, I think you lose something when a movie is dubbed. The actor's intent, perhaphs. I saw Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon in French, in Boulogne-Sur-Mer with Peggy and Frédéric. When we left, they asked me if I had liked it, and I told them I didn't understand most of it. They said they didn't either, so maybe that wasn't a fault of the dubbing there. Even still, I would have prefered the original Chinese with French subtitles.
Maybe people prefer dubbing because they don't like to read the subtitles. I don't mind the reading. I read fast, so maybe I'm better able to keep up with the movie than others are, I don't know.
9 Comments:
i too prefer the subtitles as I get distracted by dubbing when their mouths are obviously not moving to shape the words I get fixated on that...I do better with reading and watching.
yes, there's that, too. It's incredibly distracting to have someone's mouth moving at a different time than they are speaking.
The funniest dubbed/subtitled movie I ever saw was this Kung Fu documentary I saw in Honduras. It had been dubbed into English from Chinese and had Spanish subtitles. I fell asleep.
I'm totally anti-dubbing, with one exception. The Hong Kong director John Woo, when he was still shooting in Hong Kong, always had these long, drawn out, incredibly painful music scene where the actress would sing Chinese pop music. It made me want to pull a van Gogh.
But in the dubbed version, they cut out all of the music and just stuck to the dialogue.
My nomination for movie most harmed by dubbing: La Femme Nikita.
I am not a fan of Chinese pop music myself, so I can see how dubbing in that circumstance would be helpful!
I loved "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" and I will only watch the subtitled version. The dubbed version is absolutely horrible and actually changes the meaning of some of the dialogue. This not only makes the movie a lot less touching and dramatic but it makes the dialogue seem cheesy (especially at the end of the movie) when in reality it is absolutely poetic. I don't even think they used the real actors voices in the dubbed version. I mean that is just silly as most of the actors speak English fluently. So if you have only seen the dubbed version of this movie, please do yourself a huge favor and see the subtitled version instead. It not only makes a lot more sense but the sound is a lot better too!!
I think you're right, I should see it again. Especially since the dubbed version I saw was dubbed into French.
I think you're right, I should see it again. Especially since the dubbed version I saw was dubbed into French.
Just say no to dubbing! I prefer movies in their original language. What you said about the actor's intent is absolutely right on. Though some actors like The Rock and Sylvester Stallon are better in French than English.
well, really, it would be kind of hard to make the Rock or Sly worse, right? :-)
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