Why do people get upset about dubbing?.. (1 Viewer)

[Lars Vermundsberget]

Well, PAL speedup is an unfortunate side-effect, but not quite the same thing as deliberately removing the original dialogue. I'd say, for most practical purposes, the original sound is still there, even if it suffers from 4% speedup. So I wouldn't quite compare the two.

But it surely is a pretty questionable compromise, I won't deny that.

So, for that reason, I do in fact get most of my DVDs (90+%) from R1-land. I can't quite say that I "don't watch any dvds with PAL speedup". But I can say that they are a small minority.

 

[Lars Vermundsberget]

No doubt, hardly anyone would be able to learn a language from "a" subtitled film. But you might learn quite a lot from being exposed to the phenomenon for years.

 

[Cees Alons]

My children were rather fluent in English already when they were eight or ten. Learned it from watching subtitled films.
Don't forget you even have no subtitles at all when you learn your first language.


Cees

 

[Steve Christou]

I have no choice but to watch English films with the English subtitles on when I'm watching with Sandra, she's German and and her English isn't perfect, it helps her to see the words as they're spoken, her English has improved greatly over the years and I'm sure reading English subtitles was a bit of a help.



It is to me and PAL speedup is only detectable to some people who want to believe that NTSC picture quality isn't inferior to PAL, and to the few fawning Brits here who want to assure our American cousins that region 2 is evil and region 1 is good. I have many region 1 and 2 dvds and I don't detect any perceptible difference in voice pitch between the two especially on well known actors voices.

 

[george kaplan]

Well Steve, you're entitled to your opinion, but I find PAL speedup far worse to the integrity of a film than dubbing, and while there are a small number of dubbed films in my collection, there are zero with PAL speedup, and never will be any.

Someone was talking about double standards before. Complaining about dubbing while watching, for example, the directors cut of Das Boot in 12 fewer minutes than intended, is a double standard as far as I'm concerned.

 

[Cees Alons]

You're perfect entitled to your opinion too, George, but apparently now you don't know what you're talking about.

I own 1200+ VHS tapes with PAL-speedup, and most of them are replaced by NTSC DVD versions now, some by PAL DVD versions, so I think I can give a sound opinion (pun intended) about this. The effect of PAL-speedup really isn't a comparison at all to the complete disappearance of the original spoken voices.
(And did you know that PAL DVDs don't show the dreaded 3:2 jitter of NTSC discs? AND generally have a substantially - almost 20% - better vertical image resolution?)

Furthermore, playing a film faster or slower or louder or softer than intended, although perhaps unwise, isn't a attack to "the integrity" of the film in my book. Removing parts thereof is.


And I really would like people to stop about those perceived double standards "of our forum", when most of the time it isn't the same people who have those different opinions, and furthermore the perceived differences are heavily dependent on the weighing and judgement of the speaker.


Cees

 

[Steve Christou]

And therefore NTSC DVDs could be perceived as a bigger slap in the face to the "integrity of film" than barely perceptible PAL speedup.

 

[george kaplan]

Well, I don't know what kind of a set-up you guys have, but I have a video processor that eliminates things like jitter, and except for very badly done discs, I'm willing to bet that NTSC dvds on my system look a hell of a lot better than PAL dvds on most systems. If you're ever in San Antonio, bring some of your PAL dvds by, and we'll see if they look better unprocessed than my NTSC ones do processed. But be sure you have time, cause it takes a few minutes longer to watch NTSC dvds, than you may be used to Steve.

You can pretend that PAL speedup doesn't matter if you want, but you're never going to convince me that it's not as offensive as bad dubbing.

If you guys can't hear the difference, great. Lots of people can't see the difference between vhs and dvd, so great for them, too.

And as far as the integrity, not only is the sound running in fast forward mode (albeit only 4% fast), the picture is too. Bad dubbing could never ruin a silent movie, but PAL speedup sure can.

 

[Cees Alons]

Oh, come on, George. What kind of remark is that in a discussion like this.
Your system will probably look 'a hell of a lot' better than NTSC DVDs on most systems too.

And with a system that can adjust the frame rate of the display, like that, PAL DVDs aren't played with any speedup at all, but at a multitude of 24 frames / sec.
And then you WIN the higher resolution!


Cees

 

[george kaplan]

Actually I never thought about being able to adjust the frame rate and get rid of PAL speedup. I'll have to see if that's something that can be done on my system or not. I think somewhere I have some Chaplin dvds that have PAL speedup. I bought them without realizing that, and once I discovered it, I threw them somewhere, so I might be able to find them and test it out.

 

[Cees Alons]

Yes.

The point being that the 30(60)fps and 25(50)fps characteristics of NTSC and PAL are only linked to TV-sets and anything derived thereof. But they're not essential. I wonder what all DVD playing programs on PCs do.

...And now we need to stop hijacking this dub/sub thread!


Cees

 

[Lars Vermundsberget]

I really can't agree to that, but that's no problem - since we aren't forced to pick one of the two.

 

[Geoff_D]

Back to the whole dub/sub thing: both are a compromise in terms of translation, no arguments there. Paraphrasing and outright simplification of what's being said is common, and seemingly only the most canny translators can pick out the more localised sayings & phrases and present them in a recognisable Western form & within the limited amount of subtitle/dialogue time available.

I say that because I've been watching Stand Alone Complex recently, and the subtitle translation has Western sayings & phrases scattered throughout. How accurate that is, I cannot say, but it certainly gives the translation a texture that it would otherwise lack and rises above the 'George Lucas Dialogue Syndrome' (i.e. waaaaay over-simplified with no emotion or feeling) that translations can suffer from, whether subbed or dubbed.

But 99 times out of 100 I can't stomach different language dubs, no matter how good they are. To have the performances overwritten like that, even by the original actors, just feels wrong to me - and that includes anime. So subs have always been my choice, and they've become pretty transparent over the years because I don't even notice I'm reading them. And I'd rather they (briefly!) obscured the image rather than have an essential (IMO) part of an actor's performance completely replaced.

There are a few grey areas, sure, like the not-shot-with-sound Hong Kong movies made before the early '90s. But even though the dialogue was dubbed in later, usually by completely different people, it's still indicative of what was actually said by the actor so the unique cadences and inflections in the language are preserved. For me, part of the experience of watching a foreign TV show or film is hearing that language intact - not so with a dub in an alternate language (even Cantonese to Mandarin annoys me, even though I'm still gonna be reading the subs!).

To be honest, I don't care if an English dub gives me a 'better' translation and the subs give me the bare bones George Lucas version, as long as the subs are concise, well-timed and grammatically correct. If a subtitle translation is somewhat thin, then there's still something that can be inferred from the entire performance that's in front of me. That's how I see it anyway.

There is one exception: the English dub of Sammo Hung's The Prodigal Son. Why? Well, the subs are atrocious on Fox's R1 DVD and the R2 Hong Kong Legends DVD has an iffy picture (I keep that edition for Bey Logan's excellent commentary). I also grew up watching this movie with the dub on TV, unlike most of Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan's more popular output which usually gets very good treatment on UK TV. So that one I can live with, not least because all the Chinese Opera sequences are presented original language anyway (a legacy of these singing sequences being cut from the original Western version; they weren't dubbed in the first place). But anything else? It's gotta be subbed with an original language soundtrack or I ain't watching it.

 

[MarcoBiscotti]

What do you guys think of the Miyazaki dubs?

I first saw Princess Mononoke at a film festival two years ago during a week-long retrospective on the director and it was my introduction to his films. This was the first feature I viewed and unfortunately, prior to screening, the theatre manager came out to inform us that Disney had sent them the English dubbed version after requesting the original language print, and sending it back to the studio, they again resent a dubbed print. They apologized and offered refunds to whoever wanted. Obviously nobody went to the extreme of walking out. Anyways, I watched the film and was absolutely blown away. I found the blatant American accenting of Asian characters in the film somewhat distracting, especially during dialogue scenes which really took the characters out of context by contrasting their appearance, persona and voice/accent/tone. However, I had to say that for the most part I was really impressed. I found the narration really effective and most of the character/voice actors offered really fitting performances. I found out later that Miyazaki was somewhat involved himself in the dubbing process and gave his seal of approval. Anyways, immediately after the screening, I returned home and jumped onto the internet to buy all of the Studio Ghibli films available on DVD because I was so blown away by what I had seen. I ordered this limited edition R3 box-set from Play-Asia which had some 12 or 13 or so films in 2-disc sets with English subs and even came with some bonus lobby cards and artwork. I did a thousand searches for comparisson reviews prior to ordering and in all instances, these pointed to the highest pq and image/audio quality. I must admit however, that after watching PM at least in it's original soundtrack with English subs, that I think (though memory could be faint), I found the English dubbed version to be more powerful. Often times the subtitles had taken me out of the film at climactic parts and scenes that I'd remembered seeing in theatre and been totally encompassed and drawn in. I watch many foreign and Asian cinema and am used to subtitles, especially on classic Japanese films like Kurosawa and the like, but in this case I have mixed feelings. I'm considering purchasing the Disney R1 version of Princess Mononke just to compare and see if my feelings hold up. I was a little dissapointed during the last screening of this movie. Powerful narrative scenes which previously pulled me into the magic and mysticism of the film lost much of it's effect in written text. What are your opinions of the Studio Ghibli animated titles as far as original tracks vs. director-approved English redubs?

 

[Michael Elliott]

Whenever possible I go for the subtitles if it's a "serious" film ala Bergman or something of that nature. If it's a stupid film like GODZILLA VS HIS MOTHER then I'll take the dub since the bad dubbing actually adds a few laughs to a film I might already find rather horrid.

However, after I've seen the movie with the subtitles and once I know the story, I sometimes go back and watch the film in its original language without any subs. If anyone here knows the name Jess Franco you'll know that he has around 180 films and I'd say around 100 aren't available in English dub or subs. Since I plan on watching all of his films in some cases I've had to view them without any English. I had seen the English version of COUNT DRACULA countless times but never enjoyed it until I watched it in Spanish without any English subs. I could follow the story, knew what was going on so the subs weren't needed. I did the same thing with THE PASSION after seeing it with the subs in the theater. At home, it's a film I can watch without the subs.

Also, for horror fans, when they get outside the mainstream and into the foreign/cult titles, many of these films were shot without sound. Whatever country bought the film would have to make their own dubs, which can certainly take away from the film, or what the director originally intended but since there wasn't ANY sound it's rather hard to know what the director was actually going for.


As far as the PAL thing, George how many PAL discs have you seen? I've probably seen around 200 and I personally can't see the difference, although I know one is there. I'm not sure if it's because I've seen so many that my eyes have adjusted to the speedup but even in the start I couldn't really tell.

 

[Dome Vongvises]

If only it actually existed.

 

[Lew Crippen]

And even as serious as Bergman is considered, he still made a dubbed version of one of his most serious movies, Cries and Whispers, using (for the most part) the onscreen actors for the dubbing. In this case, one can hardly argue that the director's intent is being subverted by dubbing, as the dubbed version (in English) was his intent.

And as the writer, it is hard to argue with his translation as not being accurate.

Check out both the dubbed and subtitled versions on the Criterion DVD.

 

[Michael Elliott]

But would the making of more money have a big reason Bergman did an English dub for that film?




One day. As a recent example, I always enjoyed SON OF GODZILLA but recently I viewed it with the Japanese track w/English subs. Without the laughs from the bad dub, the film really didn't have me as entertained.

 

[TheLongshot]

Well, I haven't listened to too many of the dubs, but it is probably a mixed bag. Princess Mononoke has some stuff I like, and some stuff I didn't care for. I think Billy Crudup as Ashitaka and Minnie Driver as Lady Eboshi really nailed their parts. Billy Bob Thornton took me out a bit. The only voice I didn't like in the original Japanese was Moro, who sounded to masculine to my ears.

The dub they did for Nausicaa was pretty good, tho Patrick Stewart's voice is a bit too recognisable for me. I also liked the dub for The Cat Returns. Cary Elwes was wonderfully cast as Baron.

While the part completely changed for the dub, I think otherwise, Phil Hartman did a good job with what he was given in Kiki's Delivery Service.

Jason

 

[Lew Crippen]

Given the nature of Cries and Whispers, I doubt very much that Bergman's motives had anything to do with making additional money. In fact it is a curious question, as with a few exceptions such as Fanny and Alexander and Scenes from a Marriage (a TV series shown here on PBS), Bergman's films have always been pretty much confined to the art house curcuit, where patrons are used to subtitles.

When our home rennovations are complete and I again have my TV, DVD player, etc. out of storage along with my copy of Cries and Whispers, I'll check out the notes and commentary and see it the reason is given. At this point, I have no idea--but I am quite certain that extra box office would be far down the list--if on it at all.