# Films in English that have been subtitled for an English-speaking audience
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/films-in-english-that-have-been-subtitled-for-an-english-speaking-audience/583443
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [May 27, 2011, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/films-in-english-that-have-been-subtitled-for-an-english-speaking-audience/583443 "2011-05-27T16:30:10Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@manx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/manx)
#### Post date: [May 27, 2011, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/films-in-english-that-have-been-subtitled-for-an-english-speaking-audience/583443/1 "2011-05-27T16:30:10Z")
Apparently Attack the Block (UK film about south London estate kids taking on aliens which did well at SXSW recently) is going to be subtitled for a US audience. We were having a chat about this at work, and a friend of mine was quite indignant about it, on the grounds that it was pandering to an assumption about the intelligence of American filmgoers.
I though she was being a bit, I don’t know, dramatic, maybe. I remember seeing Ken Loach’s My Name is Joe in the theatres in NZ, and it was subtitled. I was grateful for them – there were points when I simply could not understand the Glaswegian accent to hear what was being said.
Dopers, have you come across this before? No one at work had, but they’re mostly Brits. Aside from my Name is Joe, I couldn’t think of any other films that have had this treatment.
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### Author:  [@Peremensoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peremensoe)
#### Post date: [May 27, 2011, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/films-in-english-that-have-been-subtitled-for-an-english-speaking-audience/583443/2 "2011-05-27T17:10:08Z")
I’ve seen it a few times. I really prefer to be forced to pay close attention, if it’s an unfamiliar accent, so that I learn it. I feel like I _should_ understand my own language in any accent.
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### Author:  [@Biggirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biggirl)
#### Post date: [May 27, 2011, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/films-in-english-that-have-been-subtitled-for-an-english-speaking-audience/583443/3 "2011-05-27T17:16:05Z")
I was very happy for the subtitles that came with my rented copy of [The Commitments](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0101605/), but I am a dumb American.
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### Author:  [@footballisplayedwithyourfeet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/footballisplayedwithyourfeet)
#### Post date: [May 27, 2011, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/films-in-english-that-have-been-subtitled-for-an-english-speaking-audience/583443/4 "2011-05-27T17:16:53Z")
I’ve heard Snatch was undertitled in the US. Not seen it mind, just heard about (probably on the dope as well).
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### Author:  [@Jack\_Batty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jack_Batty)
#### Post date: [May 27, 2011, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/films-in-english-that-have-been-subtitled-for-an-english-speaking-audience/583443/5 "2011-05-27T17:26:15Z")
I’m pretty sure that \*Trainspotting \*was not subtitled but re-dubbed for the American audience to cut back a little on the thick Scottish.
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### Author:  [@Jack\_Batty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jack_Batty)
#### Post date: [May 27, 2011, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/films-in-english-that-have-been-subtitled-for-an-english-speaking-audience/583443/6 "2011-05-27T17:27:28Z")
> [@footballisplayedwithyourfeet](#):
>
> I’ve heard Snatch was undertitled in the US. Not seen it mind, just heard about (probably on the dope as well).
I don’t think it was, but the DVD comes with the option to translate the Pikey-speak into English.
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### Author:  [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)
#### Post date: [May 27, 2011, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/films-in-english-that-have-been-subtitled-for-an-english-speaking-audience/583443/7 "2011-05-27T17:32:00Z")
_Snatch_ was not subtitled, but _The Acid House_ was. Good thing, too, because it would otherwise be completely unintelligible.
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### Author:  [@Baron\_Greenback](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baron_Greenback)
#### Post date: [May 27, 2011, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/films-in-english-that-have-been-subtitled-for-an-english-speaking-audience/583443/8 "2011-05-27T17:39:36Z")
> [@manx](#):
>
> I though she was being a bit, I don’t know, dramatic, maybe. I remember seeing Ken Loach’s My Name is Joe in the theatres in NZ, and it was subtitled. I was grateful for them – there were points when I simply could not understand the Glaswegian accent to hear what was being said.
I live an hour and a half away from Glasgow, and I had a bit of trouble with some of the dialogue in _My Name is Joe_. It wasn’t incomprehensible, by any means, but it was tricky at times. There’s no shame, or “dumb foreigner” excuse, needed here.
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### Author:  [@HeyHomie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HeyHomie)
#### Post date: [May 27, 2011, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/films-in-english-that-have-been-subtitled-for-an-english-speaking-audience/583443/9 "2011-05-27T17:41:44Z")
> [@Jack\_Batty](#):
>
> I don’t think it was, but the DVD comes with the option to translate the Pikey-speak into English.
And to get all meta on you - there were scenes in the movie where the Englishmen in the movie couldn’t understand the Pikey. Which was even _more_ meta because an American was playing him.
Think about it: an American, playing an Englishman, whose English accent is so thick that other Englishmen can’t understand him.
My mind is blown.
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### Author:  [@PeskiPiksi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PeskiPiksi)
#### Post date: [May 27, 2011, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/films-in-english-that-have-been-subtitled-for-an-english-speaking-audience/583443/10 "2011-05-27T17:43:35Z")
> [@Jack\_Batty](#):
>
> I’m pretty sure that \*Trainspotting \*was not subtitled but re-dubbed for the American audience to cut back a little on the thick Scottish.
There was at least one subtitled part…when they’re in the club and Tommy and Spud are yelling at each other to be heard. That’s probably in all versions, though, and more about the volume of the music than the accents…
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### Author:  [@Baron\_Greenback](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baron_Greenback)
#### Post date: [May 27, 2011, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/films-in-english-that-have-been-subtitled-for-an-english-speaking-audience/583443/11 "2011-05-27T17:50:11Z")
> [@PeskiPiksi](#):
>
> There was at least one subtitled part…when they’re in the club and Tommy and Spud are yelling at each other to be heard. That’s probably in all versions, though, and more about the volume of the music than the accents…
Yeah, the whole “Football!”, “Shopping!” bit was subtitled.
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### Author:  [@Tom\_Scud](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Scud)
#### Post date: [May 27, 2011, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/films-in-english-that-have-been-subtitled-for-an-english-speaking-audience/583443/12 "2011-05-27T17:56:34Z")
There’s always _Airplane!_
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### Author:  [@HeyHomie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HeyHomie)
#### Post date: [May 27, 2011, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/films-in-english-that-have-been-subtitled-for-an-english-speaking-audience/583443/13 "2011-05-27T17:57:29Z")
> [@Tom\_Scud](#):
>
> There’s always _Airplane!_
Chump don’t want no help, chump don’t get no help.
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### Author:  [@Argent\_Towers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Argent_Towers)
#### Post date: [May 27, 2011, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/films-in-english-that-have-been-subtitled-for-an-english-speaking-audience/583443/14 "2011-05-27T17:58:50Z")
_Mad Max_ was dubbed (not subbed) into American-accented English for the American audiences who presumably couldn’t decipher the thick Australian accents of the originall. This version is absolute shit.
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### Author:  [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)
#### Post date: [May 27, 2011, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/films-in-english-that-have-been-subtitled-for-an-english-speaking-audience/583443/15 "2011-05-27T17:58:51Z")
> [@HeyHomie](#):
>
> Think about it: an American, playing an Englishman, whose English accent is so thick that other Englishmen can’t understand him.
I thought the Pikeys were Irish.
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### Author:  [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)
#### Post date: [May 27, 2011, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/films-in-english-that-have-been-subtitled-for-an-english-speaking-audience/583443/16 "2011-05-27T18:00:26Z")
> [@HeyHomie](#):
>
> Think about it: an American, playing an Englishman, whose English accent is so thick that other Englishmen can’t understand him.
Hey, take it to the Pitt!
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### Author:  [@Larry\_Mudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Mudd)
#### Post date: [May 27, 2011, 6:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/films-in-english-that-have-been-subtitled-for-an-english-speaking-audience/583443/17 "2011-05-27T18:29:47Z")
> [@Jack\_Batty](#):
>
> I’m pretty sure that \*Trainspotting \*was not subtitled but re-dubbed for the American audience to cut back a little on the thick Scottish.
The first english-language movie I ever saw which was subtitled in English was _That Sinking Feeling_, a really great movie about a young ne’erdowell in economically-depressed early-eighties Glasgow with an unlikely and not altogether well-thought-out plan for a profitable heist.
I saw it in a “club” theatre that screens foreign films that haven’t been rated by the BC Motion Picture Classification Office, and was gobsmacked by the subtitles, which seemed largely unnecessary and constantly distracting. (The “translator” paraphrased practically all idiomatic expressions, even when their meaning was transparent from context. Very annoying.)
I was even more annoyed years later, when I picked up a VHS copy and found that the dialogue had been completely re-dubbed to make it more easily comprehended by people who have never looked up from their own navels. It wasn’t necessary to subtitle the movie in English, and it sure as shit wasn’t necessary to dub it.
Subtitles are great if the movie is in a foreign language, but English subtitles for English dialogue is absurd, unless it’s for a scene that takes place in a noisy club or something. Dubbing English dialogue into a more homogeneous English is beyond stupid.
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### Author:  [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)
#### Post date: [May 27, 2011, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/films-in-english-that-have-been-subtitled-for-an-english-speaking-audience/583443/18 "2011-05-27T18:32:50Z")
I was watching a documentary type show about snake handlers (you know, the snakes as part of religion folks) here in the US and one of the southern men who was speaking was subtitled. He happened to be speaking English at the time…
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### Author:  [@Gordon\_Urquhart](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gordon_Urquhart)
#### Post date: [May 27, 2011, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/films-in-english-that-have-been-subtitled-for-an-english-speaking-audience/583443/19 "2011-05-27T18:40:44Z")
Bill Forsythe’s [Gregory’s Girl](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0082477/) was redubbed (still with Scottish accents, but less Scottishy) for its original release in America in 1981. The DVD has some clips of the original version; they’re nigh unintelligible. I still had to turn on subtitles to understand the redubbed version.
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### Author:  [@Promethea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Promethea)
#### Post date: [May 27, 2011, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/films-in-english-that-have-been-subtitled-for-an-english-speaking-audience/583443/20 "2011-05-27T18:43:28Z")
Was The Long Good Friday given subtitles for the US release? I thought I read that somewhere once but can’t remember where and can’t find any confirmation doing a quick look about now.
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