Rather than respond to a post and have my point get bogged down in the responses, I'm putting it here. I'm so sick and tired of people from other countries claiming that Americans are too lazy to read subtitles, illiterate, etc. I watch foreign movies all the time and they all have subtitles. I actually hate dubbed movies or remakes. So get over it! Not ALL Americans are the same. Get a brain!
shareI'm American, and I love foreign movies with subtitles. I hate dubbed movies...and re-makes.
Everyone I know likes subtitled movies too. So, yeah.
Stupid stereotype :\
This is kind of random, but I was in Spanish class the other day, and my teacher made us watch Anastasia...dubbed in Spanish.
That sucked.
Why couldn't we just watch a regular Spanish movie?!
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Subtitles are definitely better dubbed. I watched One Missed Call, the Japanese version, dubbed in English. There is nothing better than to hear a line in English with a very Japanese name. "Omigod, Yuku, that is so funny!"
I'm just a musical prostitute, my dear. -Freddie Mercury
I don't dislike subtitles, but I prefer horror movies to be in English so I can pay more attention to the movie than the words at the bottom of the screen. Not saying it happens often but occasionally I'll glance down and miss a creepy scene. Also, I feel as though subtitles sometimes break the immersion.
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LOL. I am American and i love foreign movies. Nothing makes me more angry than having to watch a dubbed film. I simply won't do it. Its not like i'm saying the majority of Americans aren't *beep* retards.
They mostly come out at night; mostly.
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I am the same; I often watch foreign films with subtitles, and prefer them over dubbed any time. I even watch a lot of English films with subtitles, but thats just because I watch with my family around all the time and get easily distracted xD.
share@OP... it's the 'stereotypes' that's giving us American's that image and is why i am sure people are saying that about us.
it's sort of like the stereotype of 'Teens craving action/explosions' to enjoy a film as we tend to think of your typical teen that can't appreciate a film that don't have lots of action even though they all ain't like that even though it 'appears' a moderate percentage are.
i don't mind reading subtitles myself (i am American) but obviously i prefer a film to speak English so i don't need them. because while i prefer subtitles over english dubbing (because of the whole actual voice from the real actor makes it feel better etc vs someone else's voice etc), it does slightly take you out of the movie if you got to read subs since your using your eyes to read instead of actually FULLY watch the movie like you do in English speaking films.
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While I, myself, prefer subbed originals to dubbed originals or cringe-worthy remakes. I have found that there are many Americans that just turn themselves off to Cinema that isn't in English. I think it has everything to do with the fact that Hollywood kind of spoiled Americans (so to speak) with remakes and horrible dubbed versions. I'm a really fast reader, so it's not much of a problem for me to read subtitles. In fact, when watching a subbed horror movie, I find it more scary because sometimes fear doesn't translate in the sound of your voice, and since I can't understand the language, a lot of it comes as a surprize. I find that especially true for when I'm watching Asian horror, because there's things that just pop out of nowhere anyway. On the other hand, you can tell in an American movie when something's going to pop out of nowhere because of the way the character's talking, the music build up, the "jump-out-of-your-seat-scare-every-five-minutes" rule. It's not rocket science.
lol, I even watch subtitles sometimes when the movie is in 100 percent English.
A few months ago, I was watching "Tale of Two Sisters" I believe, and my mom walks in, and goes "Why are you watching something in Chinese?" me: "It's not Chinese Mom, it's Korean. It's a horror film." Mom: *gives strange look* "ooookayy theeennn." *walks out of room*
No offense to my mom, I love her to death, but she is the perfect example of an American person who doesn't even bother to care about a movie, just because it's different. =/ It might arguably be one of the greatest films ever created, but many people will just turn away.
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I'm American, and I don't mind watching movies with subtitles, but I would never pay to watch a movie with subtitles.
shareI appreciate OP's opinion, but it's not the generel opinion for obvious reasons:
Clearly most americans are annoyed by subtitles, otherwise they would not make remakes of foreign movies. If you look at the 10-20 most known american remakes of foreign movies on IMDB, you will see that they usually have a much lower rating than the original movies. This means that the people only watching the remakes are watching rather poor movies instead of the excellent original movies (if they weren't excellent, nobody would make a remake).
I understand the argument with americans having 90% americanspoken movies and therefore seeing the little pile of foreign film as something 'different' which you might not need to see, but I have difficult accepting an adult person not being able to concentrate on the movie while watching the subtitles.
I live in Danmark where it's the opposite, here 90% of the movies are in foreign language, so doesn't really matter if it's american or spanish (but of cause, I would not watch an untitled spanish movie, since I don't speak spanish).
But when people are limiting them in a way, which says either "I'm a lousy reader" or "The rest of the world don't make interesting movies", then it's difficult to have much respect for that person.
I won't address the American thing because it is just stereotyping. I imagine a great majority of any population finds subtitles distracting- they are. You can't tell me that glancing up and down every few moments, and switching your brain in and out of "read mode" doesn't interfere with the enjoyment of a film.The English audio version of Das Boot, I feel, is a brilliant dubbing job. In cases like that, I'll go for the English version. If the dub job sucks, or there is no dubbing option, I'll go for the subbed version of course. It has nothing to do with reading ability, laziness or being an American.
If I told you that I don't find subtitles annoying you would call me a liar because of your attitude.
Nonetheless, to others, if you watch enough foreign films and accustom yourself to subtitles it just becomes the method of watching a film and second nature. The experience is little different from watching a film in your native language at some point.
I watch foreign movies with subtitles a lot. I'm not lazy in that way. The only reason I don't like to have to read them is cause I'm not able to look up at the movie and read the movie at the same time, so i feel like i might be missing something. But other than that I don't mind.
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