Projection engineering (Jan 1932-Mar 1933)

Page 14 Dubbing By Eva Elie THE problem of dubbing or duplicating a film, which it is useless to set forth in this note, continues to arouse everywhere the liveliest controversies. It is a most admirable subject for dissipating apathy, reanimating discussion and proving to the readers of newspapers or cinema reviews that criticism is never asleep. What is it that its enemies charge against dubbing ? A serious accusation ; that the listeners hear certain words, while the lips of the actors seen on the screen are engaged in pronouncing others. This is true, but it is becoming less and less true. The progress of the sound film, due to the union of the cinema and the theatre, is continuous. There have already been screened films which satisfy all the demands of both sight and hearing from every point of view. The German version of a Metro Goldwyn Mayer film "Die Freunde Mutter," played by American artists, is an example, Wallace Beery and Marie Dressier play the leading parts, which, when dubbed, give, as far as the speech goes, the exact impression of listening to any Hamburg sailor or any German woman of the people. However the actors are seen, whether in closeups or long shots, the words pronounced in German by their doubles correspond perfectly to the lip movements of the personage on the screen talking in English. The difficult moments have been overcome by showing the actors in profile or making them speak from a distance. In his paper, "Informations Cinegraphiques," Jean Pascal speaks of another dubbed film which has succeeded perfectly, namely, "The Brothers Karamazoff," adding, however, that the dubbed film must always be considered an expedient to help out the momentary deficiencies of the French production. This point of view, though casting disapproval on the dubbed film, placing it on the level of a tolerable substitute, is more to the point than all the accusations and noisy protests used against dubbing which charge it with being a brain-muddling, incomprehensible mixture, a device insulting to the public, and so on. At any rate, I propose to plead the cause of at least one section of the public which desires that dubbing should continue. There comes to mind the case of that charming American actress with the sweet, gazelle-like eyes, who, through the sound film, in stead of allowing us to hear a musical voice such as her appearance would lead us to expect, startled us with a rough, rusty, almost timberless voice. The result was a martrydom even for the most indulgent section of the public, while for the artist, it was suicide, or at least moral suicide and as far as Europe is concerned for the actress's fame as a star. In this case, would it not have been much better to perform a work of charity for both listeners and artist, since, after all, art is a mixture of illusion and lies, and to dub her voice, lending her one such as the public wants to hear, and one suitable to her appearance and part? The process of dubbing, as I understand it, requires fine taste and an acute sense of physical and vocal accords. It requires great skill, also, because the public ought to be kept in ignorance of the subterfuge as it is of other film devices, and rightly so, since the purpose of them is merely to add to the attractiveness of the picture. It would now seem that anonymous dubbing is no longer possible, because the French Superior Cinema Council has decided that "no dubbed film can be allowed unless the work of post-synchronization has been carried out in a studio or studios situated in French territory and unless it is shown to the public "without any attempt to disguise the fact that it is a dubbed film, carrying the indication of the country where it was originally made, the names of the artists who acted originally in the picture and the names of those who dubbed the parts." In this fashion, the problem seems definitely settled, but not in the best way possible. Sub-Titles There is also the question of the subtitles or running comment printed at the bottom of the picture as was done, for instance, in "Sonny Boy," and as is still done with success in some modern films as "Girls in Uniform." I recognize that this method seems right when we are dealing with dramas or comedies of a typically national character, which cannot, without becoming ridiculous be taken out of their natural living framework. We cannot, for instance, imagine a Bancroft, in "Chicago Nights" speaking French, or any other language save the slang of Chicago bandits. Nor can we imagine a Napoleon speaking with the accents of a dweller in Whitechapel. A third system is to substitute some artists by others, and to make as many versions of the picture as it is desired to issue editions of the same. This method places in relief the various characteristics of the races, unless there is an attempt to secure a uniformity of style and a modeling of the successive artists on the actors who make the first ver PROJECTION ENGINEERING sion. The contrasts thus obtained are not without interest. In the film "L'Opera de Quat 'Sous." it is easy to define the points which divide two mentalities and two diverse methods of feeling and revealing such feelings. Charles de St. Cyr in "Semaine a Paris" — though we no longer see his name in connection with the piece — wrote a careful study on this film which went to show that while in the French version of Pabst's picture the two principal actors Prejan and Florelle accentuated the satirical side of the film, illustrating it in a French spirit, in the German version, the actors, taking their roles more seriously, gave a certain dramatic heaviness to the piece, which was much appreciated beyond the Rhine. We may classify with this type of film the "Arianne, Russian Girl," with Elizabeth Bergner in the German version, and Gaby Morlay in the French edition. The plot here could develop in any country, seeing that the little Russian student might go to any foreign university, and as a consequence, speak the language of the country where she was residing. It would have been a good plan to choose for the part of Arianne a real Russian girl, since it could not be supposed that either a French or a German actress could find in their spirits that indefinable sense of life of the Russian soul, which is generally referred to as Slav charm. Summing the matter up, if we cannot condemn outright the methods of dubbing at present in use, which after all permit us to see and hear foreign works of art which is an international thing itself and only capable of improvement by contrasts, we must at least exhibit great prudence in choosing the persons to carry out the dubbing. We should safeguard the national character of the films as far as possible, because it is one thing to translate a book, and a very different thing to present a film in a language different from the original language of its makers, when such a film has about it all the evidences of its originating country. Film adaptors ought to have much tact and a wide knowledge of ethnography and psychology. {Translated from the French.) International Review of Educational Cinematography. EXPORTS A STATEMENT from the Bureau of Foreign and Domestic Commerce, Washington, shows that exports of American made projectors and sound equipment for November, 1932, continued in some volume to Belgium, France, Italy, Portugal, Spain, Great Britain, Canada, Mexico, Colombia, Ecuador, India, China and South Africa.