Friday, October 27, 2006
Lazy Listening
Is there ever a justification for subtitling English dialogue in a movie using English text, for an English-speaking audience?
This is precisely what one old lady, Patricia (not her real name) repeatedly demanded of director Mira Nair at a post-screening Q&A session with her, last Friday. Nair was here to receive the Dartmouth Film Award for 2006 and the Dartmouth Film Society honoured her with a tribute that included an advance screening of her upcoming film "The Namesake." The movie is based on Jhumpa Lahiri's novel and you can find out more about it at the usual websites. For the present discussion, all you need to know is that the central characters are a Bengali couple, settled in the United States but maintaining strong ties with their family in Kolkata, and their two American-born children. The film is set in Kolkata and the US.
This setting and the story naturally call for three kinds of dialogue: (1) dialogue spoken in Bangla, (2) dialogue spoken in heavily Bangla-accented English and (3) dialogue spoken approximately in American Standard English. Given what I have told you so far, and putting yourself in Nair's shoes, which of these kinds of dialogue would you subtitle?
I hope there is no disagreement that dialogues of the first kind need subtitles and those of the third kind don't. Dialogues of the second kind are trickier, in that logic does not lead one to a clear decision. One must appeal to aesthetics. Nair made the aesthetic choice of not subtitling such dialogue. I cannot speak for the 1000-strong audience at the screening, but the 150-odd who showed up for the post-screening Q&A seemed to have had no difficulty following along with the Bangla accent. Except, that is, for the aforementioned Patricia. Stridently, and repeatedly, she asserted with complete conviction that those pieces of dialogue were "unintelligible" and that they ought to be subtitled. Putting aside the issue of her tactlessness and recalcitrance, do you agree with her that subtitles were warranted?
My own judgment is in line with Nair's, who responded that there is "something condescending" about subtitling English dialogue in English. I would add that the condescension is twofold: such subtitles imply that (1) the audience is incapable of figuring out an accent or will listen too lazily to do so and that (2) the speakers (and, by extension, the group of people they represent) are incapable of communicating comprehensibly in a language they have clearly internalised. Such condescension would have caused serious aesthetic damage to the film, IMHO. Bravo, Mira Nair!
I am interested in hearing your opinions and any anecdotes you have on this issue of understanding an unfamiliar accent. In lieu of the recently-closed blog comments feature, please send me email. If you are a regular reader, you know how.
PS: Nair managed to disentangle herself from Patricia's heckling most wittily: she suggested that Patricia watch the movie in nearby Canada, with French subtitles!
This is precisely what one old lady, Patricia (not her real name) repeatedly demanded of director Mira Nair at a post-screening Q&A session with her, last Friday. Nair was here to receive the Dartmouth Film Award for 2006 and the Dartmouth Film Society honoured her with a tribute that included an advance screening of her upcoming film "The Namesake." The movie is based on Jhumpa Lahiri's novel and you can find out more about it at the usual websites. For the present discussion, all you need to know is that the central characters are a Bengali couple, settled in the United States but maintaining strong ties with their family in Kolkata, and their two American-born children. The film is set in Kolkata and the US.
This setting and the story naturally call for three kinds of dialogue: (1) dialogue spoken in Bangla, (2) dialogue spoken in heavily Bangla-accented English and (3) dialogue spoken approximately in American Standard English. Given what I have told you so far, and putting yourself in Nair's shoes, which of these kinds of dialogue would you subtitle?
I hope there is no disagreement that dialogues of the first kind need subtitles and those of the third kind don't. Dialogues of the second kind are trickier, in that logic does not lead one to a clear decision. One must appeal to aesthetics. Nair made the aesthetic choice of not subtitling such dialogue. I cannot speak for the 1000-strong audience at the screening, but the 150-odd who showed up for the post-screening Q&A seemed to have had no difficulty following along with the Bangla accent. Except, that is, for the aforementioned Patricia. Stridently, and repeatedly, she asserted with complete conviction that those pieces of dialogue were "unintelligible" and that they ought to be subtitled. Putting aside the issue of her tactlessness and recalcitrance, do you agree with her that subtitles were warranted?
My own judgment is in line with Nair's, who responded that there is "something condescending" about subtitling English dialogue in English. I would add that the condescension is twofold: such subtitles imply that (1) the audience is incapable of figuring out an accent or will listen too lazily to do so and that (2) the speakers (and, by extension, the group of people they represent) are incapable of communicating comprehensibly in a language they have clearly internalised. Such condescension would have caused serious aesthetic damage to the film, IMHO. Bravo, Mira Nair!
I am interested in hearing your opinions and any anecdotes you have on this issue of understanding an unfamiliar accent. In lieu of the recently-closed blog comments feature, please send me email. If you are a regular reader, you know how.
PS: Nair managed to disentangle herself from Patricia's heckling most wittily: she suggested that Patricia watch the movie in nearby Canada, with French subtitles!
