If there is one thing that students fear going into their final year, it is writing the dreaded dissertation. Fortunately, you can write it on whichever subject you wish, so long as you choose the right topic. I chose to write about French subtitles for iconic British films, seeing whether or not they effectively communicate our unique culture and sense of humour.

To my surprise, much of a film needs to be altered in order for it to make sense in different languages. For example, in comedy films, such as Pegg and Frost’s Hot Fuzz, a lot of dialogue needs to be changed so that the puns and wordplay still work. Most of the time, this is inconsequential to the plot, for example, instead of ‘upsetting the apple cart’ and receiving backlash for buying into the British stereotype that all country folk sell apples, Nicholas’s character ‘fait un fromage’, buying into the French stereotype that all country folk make cheese. However, at other times this means changing much bigger aspects of a film, such as place and character names. The detectives, both named ‘Andrew’ have to be called ‘Colin’ in French, as the joke that they are called ‘the Andies’ only works as ‘les collines’ [the hills] in French.

Furthermore, references to other pop culture needs to be clarified or altered so that audiences from other countries will understand it. For example, in Paul, Paul likes eating Reese’s Pieces, a nod to Sci-Fi classic E.T. However, due to Reese’s Pieces not being well known in France, they are subtitled as ‘les bonbecs d’E.T’ [E.T.’s candy]. Furthermore, many references to classic science fiction films in Paul are lost in the French version due to the quotes being translated in a different way to how they are translated in the original films – which is a shame.

The main aspects of these films which I felt did not shine through in the French subtitles were the different accents and dialects. Paul contains a lot of jokes about the protagonists being British, as it is set in the United States. This means characters exaggerate their accents and vocabulary choices throughout the films to demonstrate the difference between the two dialects. The very British ‘pop it on the table’ contrasts with the very American ‘you guys going on road trip?’.

However, the subtitles are all written in standard French, and we lose this aspect of the humour. This loss is felt all the more in Hot Fuzz, which is set in the West Country, and London-born Nicholas struggles to understand the villagers. Although they speak with strong accents, their lines are all subtitled in standard French, meaning a French audience could not appreciate the joke.

As multilingual media becomes more popular across the world, we need to understand how films appear differently in each language. If you read or watch a translated version of a book or film, you are reading or watching an altered version of the story. Carefully selected vocabulary and turns of phrase become lost in translation, wordplay and puns must be changed. You will not be able to see the book or film through the eyes of a native speaker.

Freya Richold