America and foreign films.

We Americans, generally, hate to read. Because we loath reading, we refuse to read subtitles at the movies.

It's a shame - typically remade movies are terrible. The Grudge was awful, but Ju-on was great.

We Americans, generally, hate to read. Because we loath reading, we refuse to read subtitles at the movies.

It's a shame - typically remade movies are terrible. The Grudge was awful, but Ju-on was great.

Don't forget The Departed, directed by Martin Scorsese. Probably the best remake of all time.

It was at it's high with, The Ring, The Grudge, The Eye and all other Asian horror flicks, remade again and again one after another. While some titles survive (The Departed was an acceptable remake of the Hong Kong Infernal Affairs Trilogy) others are being lined up to be slaughtered.

I still find this strange for a nation that has such an impact on the world, that it's election campaign, debates and election night is broadcasted in even the smallest of countries, like mine. Not to mind the many great writers America has had, and still has.

I'm afraid the next generation of kid growing up here will also have the same attitude as many Americans have now.

I mentioned The Departed:



The Infernal Affairs Trilogy was an Honk Kong movie that you can only watch if you've had watched other movies before and are familiar with some of the Asian values etc. The Departed was mixing the 3 part trilogy in one movie, and they succeeded with an acceptable result.

The next generation will not have the same attitude - the next generation will be far more depraved. They are dull and empty. Typically, that is. As always, a few exceptions bounce around.

Too many drugs, too much television, too much ease, too much of everything that we can and should do without.

I think a lot of the problem has to do with the No Child Left Behind Act. You are starting to see children who have been trained to take tests for the majority of their schooling rather than learning basic skills and knowledge. Automatons they are....

I like a lot of movies that are in different languages,. like cinema paradiso (my favorite movie of all time) . I am also American, so I cannot really agree with the generalization.

Not meaning to be offensive but the original Mad Max movie had to be voiced over when shown in the United States because, our English here in Australia, including some of the accents were uncomprehensible. Mind you we do this the world over. I love the Japanese version of Mac Beth, starring Toshiro Mifune. All the world's a stage, so let the viewing screen.

I don't mind voice over but I prefer to read subtitles. I would prefer that any remake did not stray from the original but all the same everything is being removied, trilogied, computeredited or glossered in new colour, (now that was really bad English) all for our entertainment.

Strike it up as an argument to support the other side of the industry, although I could think of many reasons to do just that. (Sorry but you have to work this one out on your own.)

Yuck...voice overs. Nothing is more maddening that the words not matching the actors mouths. I remember being tortured in Spanish class in 8th grade to Raiders of the Lost Ark with Harrison Ford sounding like Cheech Marin speaking Spanish. Also, why do all of the men from Japanese movies and anime have to sound so feminine?

I found the wiedest thing with the movie Mongol. I have been told it is in its original form and that is, it is spoken in Mongolian, voiced over in Russian and subtitled in English. Strike that up for the books. I could not have watched Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon with voice over, it would have killed me.

I have a hard time with movies that take place in an historical setting, but the language is not right. The perfect English before English even existed seems rather stupid. It seems so fake and not that much different than movies with voice overs.

Characters from foreign countries usually speak english in a foreign accent instead of their native tongue in movies, because subtitles don't sit well with audiences. It's sort of a cop out, but not a big deal because there's an unspoken agreement between audiences and directors that states: "we, the audience, don't want to read and in return, we promise not to make a big fuss about you dumbing down society and culture."

I kept noticing that Americans in general don't like movies that are spoken in different languages.

I don't have much statistics for it and being European not to much air about the subject to state the fact, so my questions are rather blunt.

Anyhow I love movies whether they are American, British, German, Spanish, Polish, Chinese/Hong Kong, Korean or Japanese. The last three being the main victims of American movie-company's of which we all know the names.

This is how it works;
They buy the rights of an Korean/Chinese/Japanese blockbuster, remake later it, and put it on the American market.

The reason behind it being that the original version was not suitable for the American market. Many of these movies do have a somewhat non Western air about them, for the simple reason of them being Asian. But are not harder to watch than any American movie showing in the cinema now.

Many foreign movies in my opinion get slaughtered when remade to American standards, and for no good reason. I know Warner Brothers and others do this because the markets wants it, but why does the market insist on remaking it, or in the case of Anime use voice over.

Why does the average American watch the 2008 American remake of My Sassy Girl, while the Korean version makes more sense and is in every aspect better. Il Mare was of Korean decent too, but never made it in it's original form to America. The Lake House was the American version.

It was at it's high with, The Ring, The Grudge, The Eye and all other Asian horror flicks, remade again and again one after another. While some titles survive (The Departed was an acceptable remake of the Hong Kong Infernal Affairs Trilogy) others are being lined up to be slaughtered.

Guillermo del Toro made the Hellboy movies and many people watched it. At least enought to get a sequal. But his real gem El labertine del fauno and his work on El Orfornato (which have been title-translated into Pan's Lybrinth and The Orphanage) are ignored.

Long story short;

• Why does the American Market demands remakes of good movies, rather than watch the original and read the subtitles. Is this pure ignorance, a form of xenophobia or just laziness of the average American.
  

• And on a more personal level; do you feel you are part of that market. Ignoring foreign movies that are as good or as bad as American movies.
  

On a side note; this craze of "remaking" is slowly catching on in Europe with France and Germany using voice over on many movies, and The Netherlands on all the movies/programs targeted at children.