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> > My dad, brother and two cousins were like that too when we went to see "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" I loved it, while my cousins (both 16) didn't stay awake and my dad and brother thought that reading subtitles was too difficult. I have no idea where I got my genes.
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> Crouching Tiger was my first theatrical experience with subtitles. [Since then, i've seen one opera in Italian, with the translations on an upstage screen.] I enjoyed Tiger so much that i haven't been able to make myself rent the video, because i can't find it except with English dubbed over the voices. I guess i'm scared it'll seem too much like the old Kung Fu Theater things with somebody like John Wayne doing the hero's voice--great for a laugh, but a story as noble as CTHD deserves better.

I have seen both versions and the subtitled version is *much, much* better. However, the dubbed version is not disastrous or even bad; I thought it was very well done and not at all intrusive. Maybe I've already said this somewhere on the forum before, but I can't find it in a quick search, so I guess I'll risk repeating myself.

Having seen the subtitled version first, I noticed some minor alterations in the dubbed dialogue which I felt changed meanings too much. An example: when a character was asked what he would wish for, his answer was "To be back in the desert" (subbed) but "To return to the desert" (dubbed). It's a miniscule difference, but it changes the meaning. The first, to me, means that he wishes to erase the intervening time and events. The second is barely worth using up a wish on -- he just has to *go* there, for goodness sake, and there is apparently nothing stopping him from doing this.

If sufficient depth and complexity of meaning is lost in just one line like this, and in an exceptionally well-crafted production, it's enough reason for me to stick to subtitles whenever possible.

I've only once seen a subtitled movie where the subtitles were physically so difficult to read that I thought they detracted significantly from the movie. (This was "The Red Violin", and I saw it on video, so perhaps it made easier reading on the big screen.) There were far too many scenes where white titles appeared on a light or white background and were simply unreadable. No matter how good the movie and how well translated the titles, this sort of thing is what puts people off subbed movies. Like special effects, well-designed subtitles should be unnoticeable; you should look back afterwards and discover that you think of the movie with the characters *speaking* the lines. "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" did that to me.

Brunnen-"still loved The Red Violin, but the white subtitles drove me around the bend"G