ITALIANO wrote:As an Italian, I definitely consider dubbing an important - and VERY expressive - element of filmmaking. If well used, of course, it can add a lot to a film, and it's true that the movies of not only Fellini and Pasolini, but also of the most inventive and talented grade-B directors, would have never been made - or would have never been so good - without it. Wonderful faces without acting experience suddenly speaking not only Italian but, when needed, Italian with any kind of accent, Roman, Sicilian, Milanese... And foreign actors, of course, who became Italians - and often, again, accented Italians - and very believable ones, if only for that one hour and a half. So Burt Lancaster became the most convincing Sicilian prince ever - the magic of cinema, really. But this is why we go to the movies.
Because, ok - did the sound in these dubbed movies perfectly match the movements of the lips? No, true. And did we care? No, but not because we were superficial. We just knew, I guess, that movies aren't real life, and shouldn't be expected to be, but rather a parallel world, wonderful but not necessarily realistic. Or yes, realistic maybe - but not REAL. Now we don't dub our movies anymore - and by cohincidence Italian cinemas is much less interesting and lively.
As for foreign movies, I hate subtitles if I don't know the language the actors speak at least I bit. American, English, even French or Spanish movies are ok with subtitles - I don't have to read everything, so I'm not too distracted. But honestly, I'd lose too much of the visual aspect of the movie if I had to see, say, a Korean movie with subtitles - and does it really matter if I miss the way an actor pronounce a certain word? Not really, especially as I will never know what that certain word means, and even the tone of voice of the actor, in that cultural context, can have a completely different meaning than it'd have in Europe. Plus, we often read books translated in our language - and in novels the style, the choice of words, the rhythm of the prose are the writer's VOICE.
Isn't it fascinating, how not only the way we evaluate movies, but also the way we judge and score the way movies should be evaluated, is in perfect correlation not only with who we are as individuals but maybe even more so with the way we were trained as moviegoers.
And when it comes to the issue of dubbing, there couldn't be two more different kinds of experience than one you were having, Marco, growing up in Italy and what I was having here in Israel. Growing up, associating cinema and Hebrew seemed to be a very far fetched notion – the very few Israeli made films were usually not that good and no foreign film was ever dubbed, so for me, it was a given that while the cinematic language may be a universal one, the actual language spoken in films was a foreign tongue to me and subtitles were such an obvious necessity. Even Israeli films had Hebrew subtitles – partly because too often the technical quality of the soundtrack wasn't good enough and partly because this was an immigrant society and many viewers needed this tool to fully get spoken words (the way Americans would sometime seem to need subtitles watching what is for them a heavily accented English speaking film). Those printed lines on the bottom of the frame were just always there and we were totally oblivious to them once we could read them – as a little child there was that anticipation to be old enough to be able to read them hence being able to fully experience what film watching is all about. It was such an integral part of the movies that when I eventually did see films without subtitle it was rather strange at first – something was missing.
I guess this way of watching films might make some moviegoers be unaware of the spoken word, but on the other hand, for others it's an opportunity to learn to listen more carefully – once the spoken word is not taken for granted and one must consciously pay attention to it, there's a possibility for a more nuanced sensibility to evolve. Language is not only about meanings. It's about sound, rhythm, a certain kind of music – all as essential as the contextual content of a dialogue, and at times, even not less important than the visuals. Angi Vera was the first time I saw a Hungarian speaking film. Since it's such a unique language, I remember very well it took me quite a while not only to be able to connect the tone and the intonation of the actors with the written translation, but even more so to fully accept that the sounds I heard were indeed a viable way for people to express themselves. The same can be said about Asian films, Turkish, Iranian – you name it. But once you're able to do so, there's a very enriching extra layer for you to have which I believe is missing with dubbed films. And for me, as a younger person, speaking Hebrew and a little bit of English, so were Italian movies, but I'm happy I was given the chance to watch Rita Pavona singing and shouting in her own voice thus getting her full vivid persona, even though I had to struggle as a child with the subtitles in order to get the deep meaning of her films.
Can we really "objectively" decide which way is better? Am I more fortunate for being able to see all these films in their original, "pure" form or was I condemned to be dependent of a distracting, even alienating devise which prevented me from experiencing cinema in its full, "pure" visual glory? Is my nitpicking approach to dubbing the result of my cinematic up bringing or does it have to do a lot with me being an extremely anal person? Who knows. I guess, like mostly everything else in Life, it has a lot to do with the way we were conditioned, and that a lot of what we believe to be very well thought, intellectually structured reasoning and evaluation methods have a lot to do with these conditionings. So who wins? I do, once we accept my point of view, you do, once we accept your equally, if not better, based one.
On the other hand, I have lived my life since I was 5, fully aware of the uniquely charming and delicious voice of Glynis Jones, of which you knew nothing until you turned 30, even though you did see quite a few of the films she made. You loose.