The Great Subtitle War: Subtitles or Dub?

Subtitles, hate dubbing.

Too many to name.

Many countries make good films, I don't want to pick just one.

I did watch a three part series (italian) that I liked, told you about it years ago now but I forget the name of it, and I don't use netflix anymore.

I figured you'd be a great defender of all Italian movies subtitled Osso.

At university (in the early 70's), we liked to watch foreign films with foreign subtitles ... if any of both was in English, French or Dutch, I had an advantage

I hear that Germany was notorious for dubbing most incoming English language films into German and the voice acting tends to be goofy and atrocious when coming out of characters that don't look like they understand German let alone know how to mimic it.

My wife and I watch English language movies with the subtitling on. It helps when the volume is too low to hear the dialouge. There have been moments where we think, "we're supposed to be able to hear that?"

If a movie's in Spanish we'll put the subtitling in Spanish, if it has the option, otherwise we'll put it in English.

Dubbed movies suck, in general.

I do that as well when I want to keep the TV volume low. I also have the subtitles when watching British TV series and movies where British/Irish/Scottish accents are a tad too strong/indecipherable.

I suppose, any foreign language will sound 'goofy' for someone who has just seen the original version - e.g. I mostly grin when I see German films in English.

When it comes to Disney and Japanese animated movies? They're very professional and they tend to use the best voice over actors available to dub the films into English. Other then English dubbed anime? Dubbed movies are horrible.

I looked up that tv series that was on italian tv here to see if I could find a post about it, but, nah.

I like subtitles for any language, used to see a lot of old french movies too, and some scandinavian, a few german, and at least one russian and (one czechoslovakian? or was it polish? a few spanish). And there are some movies I'd still like to see, an iranian movie maker, for example, name failing me right now but I'd recognize it. Some subtitles are better that others, re ability to see them on the screen, how well they're done, and so on. I swear, I could use subtitles for some english language speakers that talk fast in their different dialects.

Plus I've been hard of hearing for(at the least) ten years now, so even some videos are difficult to hear. Am apt to be getting that fixed soon, appointment on Oct. 3. Wish me luck..

I forgot japanese movies. How could I? I've seen many many many, as a friend would say, all with subtitles. No anime yet, though.

Dubbing sucks...big time.

I'm partially deaf...and when Nancy and I watch television, I almost always have the hearing impaired closed caption feature activated. So I am reading but-titles all the time...and have no problem with it.

Strange thing: I can be watching something without the closed caption on...and understanding damn near nothing. But the second the closed caption feature is turned on...every word becomes distinct.

Subtitles, always! I hate dubbed films. The voices rarely match up to the image one gets of the actors. Take Das Boot - a great film, but the dubbing was hideous.

The dubbed version -


With subtitles

I agree. The Das Boot dub is a terrible one. I own a copy of the DVD with both versions. It was one of my first DVDs I ever bought.

I will NOT watch a dubbed movie. Feh and pooh.

Back in the days when I frequented movie theaters, I used to see foreign films a lot. Yes, Das Boot was one of them. Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow, Two Women, etc.

I wanted to hear the emotion and nuances of the actual original actors.

Our consensus so far makes me wonder if dubbed movies still exist (probably, Texas still exists), and how they are sold/ordered/sampled relative to subtitled ones.

Subtitles, of course. What's the problem?


Of course I see subtitled films in cinemas....I'm going to one tomorrow. I don't often buy films for home, but if I do I don't give a rats if it is subtitled.

I don't have a favourite foreign film....offhand a few films I liked, Pan's Labyrinth, La Strada, Tree of Wooden Clogs, Cinema Paradiso.......too many to even think of...

Zuckerbaby was downright goofy when it was dubbed into English. It didn't make any sense.

Subtitles please.

Yeah, Tree of the Wooden Clogs, that one got to me.

You preaching to the converted. I'm refering to a decent percentage of Americans who openly ignore foreign language films because of the subtitle dilemma.

Below is the top 10 box office totals list of foreign language films in the US. Clearly these are not blockbuster numbers:
http://www.boxofficemojo.com/genres/chart/?view=openings&id=foreign.htm&p=.htm