American movies in Japan

[drainer at mpinet.net]

  It seems to be the same way in most foreign markets. In Brazil, movies are
subtitled in theaters, subtitled in video release (family movies are dubbed,
of course), and dubbed when played on TV (for obvious reasons, although on
the bigger networks they transmit it in SAP so you can get the original
dialogue).
  The general consensus is that something is lost in dubbing, which is true.
The closest example I can think of when relating it to Japanese film is by
looking at anime -- fans prefer subtitled releases over dubbed releases,
which they deem too commercial, ruined, etc...
   Now, about subtitling Japanese TV shows, I always thought it just served
as an aid in learning to read kanji... at least, that's how I learned what I
know.

-df


----- Original Message -----
From: "Michael Raine" <michael.raine at yale.edu>
To: <KineJapan at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, June 04, 2002 1:00 PM
Subject: RE: American movies in Japan


> Hello Eija,
>
> I'm not sure that this is "of course" true. Wouldn't you say that
Hollywood
> films are dubbed in most non-English speaking markets? Germany, France,
> Italy, for example. In Eastern Europe dialogue is apparently sometimes
> narrated by a single voice, in West Africa often not translated at all.
>
> There were, of course, attempts at dubbing: reports from the late 1950s
> indicate that dubbed sports films and westerns met with success in Asakusa
> (the class connotations are obvious). The reasons for the continuations of
> subtitling, and the use of dubbing on TV, are both technological and
social.
> I remember there was some debate over both aspects in late-50s film
> journals, which often incorporated a section or hosted special issues on
TV.
> In one of the first Anniversary volumes for the TV studios (I think it's
> Fuji TV) there's a story about trying to show a film with subtitles. They
> were unreadable on the "braun-kan" (cameras and receivers in those days
had
> far less resolution than contemporary TVs, though the signal was the
same).
> But it also strikes me that the TV audience, at least by the early 1960s,
> was broad enough that the dual distribution strategy of Japanese film
> studios wouldn't work on TV.
>
> Michael
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-KineJapan at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu
> [mailto:owner-KineJapan at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu]On Behalf Of Eija
> Margit Niskanen
> Sent: Sunday, June 02, 2002 4:03 PM
> To: KineJapan at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu
> Subject: Re: American movies in Japan
>
>
> Of course they are subtitled, as in most non-English-speaking countries.
> Why: because the majority of the audience cannot understand fast spoken
> American English.
> Movies for children, for ex. Disney films, tend to be dubbed. The local
> singers doing the Disney dubs (not only in Japanese but in any foreign
> language) have to approved by Disney, this happens through taped
> voice/singing samples.
> Eija
>
> At 03:52 PM 6/2/02 -0400, you wrote:
> >Is it a lot more common for American movies to be subbed or dubbed when
> they
> >are shown in Japanese theaters? why and why not?
>
>