Cinema Babel: Translating Global Cinema (Paperback)

by Abe Mark Nornes (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

The original foreign film—its sights and sounds—is available to all, but the viewer is utterly dependent on a translator and an untold number of technicians who produce the graphic text or disconnected speech through which we must approach the foreign film. A bad translation can ruin a film’s beauty, muddy its plot, and turn any joke sour.

 

In this wide-ranging work, Abé Mark Nornes examines the relationships between moving-image media and translation and contends that film was a globalized medium from its beginning and that its transnational traffic has been greatly influenced by interpreters. He discusses the translation of film theory, interpretation at festivals and for coproductions, silent era practice, “ talkies,” subtitling, and dubbing.

 

Nornes—who has written subtitles for Japanese cinema—looks at the ways misprision of theory translations produced stylistic change, how silent era lecturers contributed to the construction of national cinemas, how subtitlers can learn from anime fans, and how ultimately interpreters can be, in his terms, “traders or traitors.”

 

Abé Mark Nornes is associate professor of Asian languages and cultures and film and video studies at the University of Michigan. He is the author of Japanese Documentary Film (Minnesota, 2003) and Forest of Pressure (Minnesota, 2007).

Product Details

• Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: Univ Of Minnesota Press (December 27, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 081665042X
• ISBN-13: 978-0816650422
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.9 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.9 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,184,050 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A new view of cinema, June 28, 2008

By	Donpatchi (Japan) - See all my reviews

Unless you only watch your own country's movies (and maybe only Americans do that), a lot of our movie experience is about films from abroad. Cinema has always been a global art. But when we see a foreign movie, it is after it has passed through many translations. It is subtitled or dubbed, it is introduced and interpreted at film festivals, etc. These don't just show the movie as is. They interpret and shape it. But even though these translations always go on, many don't think about it. Nornes' book is a new view of cinema because it researches this important problem. It looks at the practices themselves and how they shape the film. Some countries like dubbing and some like subtitling, but they have histories and ideologies. We also have to ask about the ideology of not thinking about translation in cinema. Nornes does that.

1 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars incapable for the author to discuss the global thing, June 9, 2008

By	jack twain (etiopea) - See all my reviews

Although the book is readable enough, the author has less ability to discuss films in terms of the global position. Lots of parts of the book lack convincing discussions. The book has only a poorly interpreting power. You have to save your precious time and money not to get this book.