volver?
i'm taking this spanish class, just to keep up with my language skills, and during the first class, the teacher said that she will bring in a movie each week, and we will watch it. someone asked if we could watch volver.
volver is supposed to be a great movie, and ms. cruz is getting plaudits left and right for her performance and mr. almodovar is as well. but thinking about it on my way home last night, i had to ask myself a question:
why is it that we, as english-speaking americans, call the movie volver? obviously, that's the name the filmmakers gave it, but don't we usually translate titles? cidade de deus became city of god, Wò Hǔ Cáng Lóng became crouching tiger, hidden dragon. these were popular foreign films, in foreign languages, subtitled in english, titles translated into english.
probably to draw in viewers. is pedro almodovar a big enough draw to not have to translate the film's title? is penelope cruz? i mean, she's pretty, but her films, as far as i know, have not exactly been blockbusters, and she's possibly most well known in the us for having dated tom cruise.
the only other two films that came immediately to mind with untranslated titles were amorres perros and y tu mama tambien (aside: i did not get the hype about that movie, i just did not think it was that good, and not even gael garcia bernal can change my opinion on that).
i don't think i really have an answer for this question...unless...we're all so busy being scared of arabic-speaking islamic terrorists that spanish (obviously, in carried here by illegal aliens bent on stealing our jobs) are less of a threat...
volver is supposed to be a great movie, and ms. cruz is getting plaudits left and right for her performance and mr. almodovar is as well. but thinking about it on my way home last night, i had to ask myself a question:
why is it that we, as english-speaking americans, call the movie volver? obviously, that's the name the filmmakers gave it, but don't we usually translate titles? cidade de deus became city of god, Wò Hǔ Cáng Lóng became crouching tiger, hidden dragon. these were popular foreign films, in foreign languages, subtitled in english, titles translated into english.
probably to draw in viewers. is pedro almodovar a big enough draw to not have to translate the film's title? is penelope cruz? i mean, she's pretty, but her films, as far as i know, have not exactly been blockbusters, and she's possibly most well known in the us for having dated tom cruise.
the only other two films that came immediately to mind with untranslated titles were amorres perros and y tu mama tambien (aside: i did not get the hype about that movie, i just did not think it was that good, and not even gael garcia bernal can change my opinion on that).
i don't think i really have an answer for this question...unless...we're all so busy being scared of arabic-speaking islamic terrorists that spanish (obviously, in carried here by illegal aliens bent on stealing our jobs) are less of a threat...
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