Analysis on the Translation of Lines in English Movies 第6页
In the world-famous film Forrest Gump, a sentence is much frequently referred by Forrest Gump, that is “…stupid is as stupid does”, and now the widely accepted translation is “蠢人做蠢事”or “傻人有傻福” to a great degree, either parlance is to Chinese people’s liking.
Example ﹙7﹚
Another touching sentence from Titanic “You jump, I jump”. The Chinese vision is“你跳我也跳”. Several classic syllables but saw the remarking popularity on the earth.
3.1.5 Harmony
This term can be defined as the lines of characters, the music and dynamic pictures in the film that are interconnected and interactional closely and harmoniously. They impact on each other and make complementarities to each other. Thus the body language of actors including nodding, shaking heads, gesture and so on, ought to be considered as a part of film language. As a result, the film language is divided into two groups, verbal language and nonverbal language, which stands out among the translation field. Yet the two groups are not independent, instead, the former lays the foundation for the latter, while the latter one refrains and reinforces the former. The following one can best explain that.
Example ﹙8﹚
Principal: I want to show you something,. Now, this is normal. Forrest is right here. The state requires a minimum IQ of 80 to attend public school. ﹙Forrest Gump﹚
The dialogue occurred when the young Forrest Gump was lead by his mother to the principle of the elementary school. A famous translator made it translated as “甘普夫人,我给你看样东西。你看,这个位置是正常的,福勒斯特。政府规定智商在80 以上的人才能上公立学校…”if only listen to the lines, the audience may be confused by “却在这”, however, when the principle talked with Mrs. Gump, he pointed at a certain place in the map hanged on the wall. So, that is to say, the harmonious integrity of the verbal language and nonverbal language could make the translation more convenient and effect naturally at the same time.
3.2 Cross-cultural Communication
Nowadays, it becomes apparent that translating films is not merely a linguistic issue but rather an activity that is "conditioned to a large extent by the functional needs of the receiving culture and not, or not just, by the demands made by the source films" (Delabastita 1990: 99). The Theory of Cultural Translation points out that target culture, determining most valuable information, is the key factor in translation. The translation “should not only convey the meaning of one language in another language, but clarify the new cultural and aesthetic system” ( Susan Bassnett 1990:25) According to Susan Bassnett, a noted English scholar of comparative literature, when the text translation is carried out, in fact, it is the translators’ recreation, which is of great practical use. And there is no doubt a great diversity between the target language and source language. Thus, how to achieve cultural function equivalence between target texts and source texts as well as how to realize the harmonious psychological reaction for target audience is always the essential task for translators.
Moreover, there is little wonder films can be a tremendously influential and extremely powerful vehicle for transferring cultural values, ideas and information. Different cultures are presented not only verbally but also visually and aurally, as film is a polysemiotic medium that transfers meaning through several channels, such as picture, dialogue and music. Items which used to be culture-specific tend to spread and encroach upon other cultures.
Furthermore, in recent years, along with the departure from the notion of melting pot, there has been a considerable rise in the interest in multiculturalism and national diversity. For several decades almost every country in the world has fashioned its own unique tradition of filmmaking as well as rendering foreign productions into the target language. Certain styles have come to be known and instantly recognized by viewers all over the world. Translation in the form of subtitling seems to go along those lines. While meeting and satisfying viewers' expectations and curiosity concerning other cultures, it ensures the originality and hence the foreignness of films. At the same time, unlike dubbing, it allows the original soundtrack to be retained and thus "the integrity of a holistic performance to be preserved" (Mera, 1999:75). And hence, the characteristic features of particular artists' style are maintained and insights into the characters can be gained "through the inflections of their voices". Yet subtitling is an excellent transmitter of culture since it stresses the foreign nature of a film and it is a source-culture-bound translation.
From the discussion above, it appears that subtitling can be considered that the crucial role of the source culture is stressed, foreign identity highlighted and the influence of the target culture minimized.
3.2.1 Focus on the Target Culture
We will directly understand this point from the following examples, chosen from the well-known films.
Example ﹙1﹚
The Duke: For goodness’s sake put them down。﹙Pirates of Caribbean﹚
This scene happened in the film, when the Captain, Mr. Turner and Elizabeth were surrounded by the official gunmen, the Duke Elizabeth’s father uttered. The phrase “for goodness’s sake” means “看在上帝面上”,“千万, 看在老天爷份上”， to Chinese people, no wonder the latter is more suitable, but if the language habits and culture image considered, “发发慈悲吧”may be preferable. So the example can be “发发慈悲， 放下武器吧”.
Example ﹙2﹚
Congressman A: I insist we give these Aliens a green card, making him proud of to be Americans.
Congressman B: Sir, when time like this, I would not stop asking myself, what can we offer to do? ﹙Monsters vs. Aliens.﹚
The dialogue comes from the latest introduced cartoon film released by Dreamworks Animation, Monsters vs. Aliens. The background is that because the government armies could not defeat the intruding Aliens that threatened to destroy the earth, then, the President was immediately holding an emergency meeting for proper solution. The dialogue occurred between the two congressmen. Amazingly, the official translated film in Chinese vision dealt it as follows:
议员A：给他发张绿卡，让他做个美国人。
议员B：先生，在这危急关头，我不禁要问自己，我们是否不差钱！
Here, “不差钱”heard the earth-shaking laughter among almost every cinema in China. Evidently, these three words made the audience feel close to the current life but fresh in the English movie. Another place in the same movie also accounts. That is, the translator frequently translated “Oh, Yeath” as “哎呀，我的妈啊” which also refreshed the audience with Northeastern Culture in China. During the playing of this movie, the audience also always met with such lines as：“这种武器，靠谱的人不会让它走火！”or “歇菜吧你，这能量场是无法穿透的.” or even “你以为这样就能吓得我跟你躲猫猫吗？我跟你躲猫猫的日子一去不复返了.”…These lines obviously feature the Chinese dialects, or distinctive language habits on a broad level.
Example ﹙3﹚
Forrest: I thought I was going back to Vietnam but instead they decided the best way for me to fight the communists was to play Ping-Pong: I was the first American to visit the land of China. Somebody said world peace is in our hands.﹙Forrest Gump﹚
The example is Forrest’s description about how to begin to play Ping-Pong in the film Forrest Gump. Forrest said, “They decided the best way for me to fight the communist was to play Ping-Pong. “Here the word communists can be translated into Chinese“共产主义者”, “共产党员”, “巴黎公社员”or“美国左翼活动分子”. As we know, the story took place during Nixon’s Ping-Pong diplomacy in the 1970s. So the word communists here means“共产主义者”, “共产党”,“共党”, “共党分子”or“中共政府”. Considering that China and U SA had not established the formal diplomacy, “共党”is the best choice, from which the Chinese viewer can understand the situation at that time. Then Forrest said, “Somebody said world peace is in our hands.” It can be t ran slated such as“有人说世界在我们的手里”, “有人说世界的和平就靠我们了” or“有人说我们手持和平之剑”. The last translation is the most suitable among them. Because the character 剑represents power and loyalty in Chinese culture such as“尚方宝剑”All these translations are right from the viewpoints of both literal translation and free translation. But in film translation another factor should be taken in to account, that is, the feeling of the target audience. So translation is the most suitable here.
Etc:阿甘: 我以为我要返回到越南, 但他们认为打击共党的最好办法就是乒乒球⋯⋯ 我是第一批访问中国的美国人。有人说我们手持和平之剑 (Fang,2000:76).
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