American movies in Japan

[drainer@mpinet.net]

    This likely points to the idea that they are dubbed for the mass as Mark
mentions. And it also explains (to an extent) how movies do not make as much
abroad as the do in the US. As I said before, from growing up abroad,
general releases were subtitled in theaters, and subtitled in video stores,
with the exception of family and children's features which were often
dubbed. Of course, the illiterate mass didn't see the movies (I don't think
that was their priority to begin with...), and also, at the time, you must
also consider the fact that not everyone had a VCR. When they came on TV,
they were dubbed, and again, this support's Mark's idea. With the
introduction of satellite and cable TV, subtitling resurfaced on the TV
screen.

   From the anime fan's spectrum, it seems illogical that dubbing is the
economic solution for distribution, as you will notice that subtitled anime
costs more than dubbed anime (as such is the case on various other "classic"
films in the US). Anime fans tend to overlook dubbed releases (and in
general, most American releases as they're outdated) and consider dubbed
versions blasphemous products. For a factual analysis, I encourage you to
ask your students.

  About dubbed Japanese films -- I don't know if dubbing ensures commercial
success, but it certainly creates a "bad movie" cult following, as have
other dubbed foreign films. (I am sure "Tombs of the Blind Dead," "Return of
the Blind Dead," and many other dubbed movies from various countries would
be slightly less ridiculous had they been subtitled. Of course, these two
examples are extremes, but think of "Godzilla 2000" and the comedic aspects
of the dubbing.)
    I can't offer any concrete reason why studios favored dubbing. It may
just be a bad business strategy; after all, losing money is what production
companies excel at.


d/freire

----- Original Message -----
From: "Michael Raine" <michael.raine at yale.edu>
To: <KineJapan at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu>
Sent: Thursday, June 06, 2002 12:00 AM
Subject: RE: American movies in Japan



> That leads me to also have doubts about the "general consensus" too: if
fans
> prefer subtitles because dubbing is "too commercial" then why didn't
studios
> (both US producers and Japanese exhibitors -- eminently commercial
entities,
> surely) favor dubbing? For example, I think most anime on VHS is dubbed in
> the USA (on DVD, you get a choice). It seems to me that Japanese producers
> recognized that dubbing is important to commercial success. Iwasaki Akira
> claimed that there were only 40 cinemas in the USA that would show
Japanese
> films in the 1950s. Hence Gojira was remade (dubbed) as Godzilla for
> international distribution. I think it was Iwasaki who said that Japanese
> films would have to be dubbed if they were to do well abroad -- I seem to
> remember that he said this was impossible in Japan (for linguistic, not
> technological, reasons I suspect) so the work should be done in Hong Kong.
>