Kiki's Delivery Service (Blu-ray) Available for Preorder (1 Viewer)

[EddieLarkin]

The original Japanese is easier on the ear than all of them

 

[Lord Dalek]

Look people, if you really want the old Streamline/JAL dubs, go import the old Ghibli Ga Ippai dvds. They're the English option for Laputa, Kiki, Totoro, and Porto Rosso.

 

[Bob Cashill]

My daughter, who's just starting to read, has loved Ghibli movies since age 3, and I look forward to watching the subtitled versions of her favorites. Until then we're fine with the dubs, most of which are satisfactory; indeed Miyazaki said he prefers the dub of Howl's, because he couldn't find any Japanese actresses with voices as inimitable as Lauren Bacall's. I cherish her and Jean Simmons in that one.

 

[nara]

...The sheer [] in this thread Is astounding.

Maybe some of us just prefer Miyazaki to Disney.

 

[DaveF]

...The sheer [] in this thread Is astounding.Look people, if you really want the old Streamline/JAL dubs, go import the old Ghibli Ga Ippai dvds. They're the English option for Laputa, Kiki, Totoro, and Porto Rosso.

From a quick read in Urban Dictionary, I gather that's an offensive term, and not called for on HTF. So none of that. I've taken Moderator liberty and deleted it.

 

[DaveF]

http://5by5.tv/incomparable/194
The Incomparable had an enjoyable episode discussion Kiki's Delivery Service earlier this year. But I'm still puzzled over the English dub and Phil Hartmann's performance. This thread is touching on it, so maybe you all can explain it to me.

Note: spoilers follow. But there's no spoiler tool so, be warned:



SPOILERS
Basically, in the English dub, the cat, Jiji, goes silent at after Kiki regains her magic mojo. This I gather is contradictory from the Japanese. In the podcast, the speculate on the interpretative meaning of this. However, friends said it's much simpler: Phil Hartmann passed away before he finished recording Jiji's dialog. Rather than bring in a new actor for the end of the film, and in respect for him, Disney simply had Jiji be silent for the movies conclusion. I also have the impression that the Disney dub has some changes between the previous two DVD releases that may affect the cat.
SPOILERS OVER

What's the story on the differences between the English Jiji and Japanese Jiji?

 

[haineshisway]

In the original DVD dub from Disney, Phil Hartmann's quips were endless and occurred even when Jiji wasn't really talking. They were smart-assy "comic" quips - the Japanese Jiji is nothing like that.

 

[EddieLarkin]

Re Jiji:

Spoiler

You've got it backwards Dave. In the original Japanese, Jiji goes silent at the end of the film to indicate Kiki has matured. In the original Disney dub, Phil Hartman's Jiji spoke during this scene erasing the intended meaning. In the altered Disney dub, he now remains silent.

 

[haineshisway]

Yes, that was my memory of the original DVD dub - Jiji never shut up.

 

[haineshisway]

"Fanboys?" I'm not a "fanboy" of any kind, and yet I loathed the first DVD dub because it constantly dumbed down and subverted the original intentions of the film - you know, the FILM that Mr. Miyazaki made. Phil Hartman was a very talented person, but Jiji he was not. You can like the dub all you like, but to categorize with cheap shots those who think it is not in keeping with the film, is, well, cheap.

 

[DaveF]

Let's try and ease back on the indirect insults...and also allowing ourselves to be pulled into responding to such goading, whether intentional or not. This is an interesting thread, and I hate to see it get derailed and locked.

I'm really curious about the nuances around KiKi's dub for JiJi. I've seen the movie a couple times over the years, both dubbed and subbed, and enjoy it both ways. But given the disparate and conflicted explanations about the movie's treatment of KiKi...well, it's hopefully an interesting discussion point.

I take it, in Japanese, JiJi doesn't talk at the end, which conveys some significant meaning. In the English dub, he does talk, which conveys a very different meaning?

(I'm ambivalent about Hartman's JiJi, because I think it becomes too much at times Hartman's Troy McClure from that little cat. I've got similar reservations about Billy Crystal's fire demon in Howl's Moving Castle. But I do love as a whole that Disney has done top notch, if maybe imperfect, dubs for Ghibli films. They've made these movies more accessible to me and my wife and many friends who otherwise might never have seen them.)

 

[Edwin-S]

In the English dub, with Phil Hartman voicing Jiji, the increased voice chatter was intended to convert the character from a "familiar" into a "sidekick" ala the typical Disney sidekick that has been prevalent in Disney films over the last two decades or so. In the Original Japanese version, Jiji speaks only as required and acts as a cautionary conscience in counterpoint to Kiki's somewhat impulsive nature. Having Phil Hartman ad-libbing dialogue in order to make the character into a comedic sidekick was a poor decision on Disney's part. If you listen to the original English-subbed Japanese track, you quickly gather that Kiki's cat is not comic relief. When he speaks there is nothing particularly funny about his dialogue.

I also really hated it when Disney applied their "wall-of-sound" philosophy to the film, even though they, at least, hired Joe Hisashi, the original composer, to create the additional BGM cues. Kiki's Delivery Service had long periods of silence that accentuated and supported what was occuring on screen and adding music to those scenes ruined them in my opinion. For example, in the scene where she was cleaning up and getting her living area ready there was no music while she swept and cleaned her room. It was just the visuals. The silence, while she swept and cleaned, counterpointed the empty space where she was working. It supported the "deadness" of the place before she started to bring some life into it. To me, the addition of music to that scene just ruined the atmosphere that had been created by the silence. They also swapped out the song that played on her radio early in the picture and their replacement was not an improvement

 

[nara]

The previous post nails it.Well done!

 

[EddieLarkin]

If you listen to the original English-subbed Japanese track, you quickly gather that Kiki's cat is not comic relief. When he speaks there is nothing particularly funny about his dialogue.

He may not crack jokes but I still found him hilarious. Especially this bit:

 

[Radioman970]

the answer is having both versions. I'd like the option.

I didn't even think about the "familiar" aspect. Very interesting...

 

[Vic Pardo]

In the English dub, with Phil Hartman voicing Jiji, the increased voice chatter was intended to convert the character from a "familiar" into a "sidekick" ala the typical Disney sidekick that has been prevalent in Disney films over the last two decades or so. In the Original Japanese version, Jiji speaks only as required and acts as a cautionary conscience in counterpoint to Kiki's somewhat impulsive nature. Having Phil Hartman ad-libbing dialogue in order to make the character into a comedic sidekick was a poor decision on Disney's part. If you listen to the original English-subbed Japanese track, you quickly gather that Kiki's cat is not comic relief. When he speaks there is nothing particularly funny about his dialogue.

I also really hated it when Disney applied their "wall-of-sound" philosophy to the film, even though they, at least, hired Joe Hisashi, the original composer, to create the additional BGM cues. Kiki's Delivery Service had long periods of silence that accentuated and supported what was occuring on screen and adding music to those scenes ruined them in my opinion. For example, in the scene where she was cleaning up and getting her living area ready there was no music while she swept and cleaned her room. It was just the visuals. The silence, while she swept and cleaned, counterpointed the empty space where she was working. It supported the "deadness" of the place before she started to bring some life into it. To me, the addition of music to that scene just ruined the atmosphere that had been created by the silence. They also swapped out the song that played on her radio early in the picture and their replacement was not an improvement

Both songs on KIKI's original Japanese soundtrack were song hits from the 1970s written and performed by Yumi Arai. (I hate to call them pop songs, because Arai, now known as Yumi Matsutoya, was so distinctly unlike reigning J-pop idols.) I have an album of Ms. Arai's which has both songs. Miyazaki also uses one of her songs in THE WIND RISES.

Re: KIKI's songs: I can't remember now if Disney simply couldn't get the rights to use them for the English dub (which sounds odd to me) or if they simply didn't want Japanese songs on the soundtrack, but they weren't used in the dub and were replaced with English songs, which I can't recall now if they were composed for the film or were existing recordings. Those of us who first experienced this movie in Japanese love the Yumi Arai originals and can't imagine the opening and closing sequences without them. I have nothing against the new songs but their insertion seems quite jarring to me.

At least when it came time to dub WHISPER OF THE HEART, they managed to keep the original song: John Denver's "Country Road" as performed by Olivia Newton-John. In English, of course. Part of the plot of the film involves translating that song into Japanese. When they did the English dub, it became something about rewriting the lyrics as a graduation message, IIRC.

 

[Steen DK]

[...] I loathed the first DVD dub because it constantly dumbed down and subverted the original intentions of the film - you know, the FILM that Mr. Miyazaki made. Phil Hartman was a very talented person, but Jiji he was not. You can like the dub all you like, but to categorize with cheap shots those who think it is not in keeping with the film, is, well, cheap.

We've had our disagreements over the years, but here you're practically writing my words. The way they changed Jiji's personality in the dub was a travesty.

And I'd like to take this opportunity to recommend the Hong Kong blu-ray, which has the same stellar transfer as the Japanese disc, the original Japanese language track, no English dub, and the correct subtitles. Or the Taiwanese edition, for that matter - it has the same.

 

[Kevin Lamb]

So will this new Disney blu-ray have the original Japanese audio with all the long silences and English subtitles? I've never seen Kiki but would prefer to view it with the original (and apparently preferred) audio.

 

[Jeff Adkins]

That was the Streamline dub, and is unavailable as far as I'm aware. The English subtitles on all DVDs/Blu-rays of Kiki are actually simply a transcription of the dialogue from the Streamline dub, rather than a translation of the original Japanese.

I'm not sure if that's totally correct, but honestly I haven't looked into it since 2002 or so. I own the DVD released in Taiwan by Buena Vista. I bought it because numerous comments on one of the Studio Ghibli fan sites stated it was the only version that used true subtitles instead of dubtitles. It also has an English dub, but I have no idea which version.

 

[haineshisway]

So will this new Disney blu-ray have the original Japanese audio with all the long silences and English subtitles? I've never seen Kiki but would prefer to view it with the original (and apparently preferred) audio.

Yes, it will have the Japanese audio and subtitles and that's the way folks should watch it - at least for the first time.