| 1. | (4 posts) | Rage Against the Mouse: Part I |
| 2. | (5 posts) | Rage Against the Mouse: Part II |
| 3. | (5 posts) | The Trouble with Translations |
| 4. | (6 posts) | Studio Ghibli Films in the UK |
| 5. | (4 posts) | "Marco" on DVD |
| 6. | (12 posts) | Understanding Comics and Nausicaa |
We looked at 81 posts by 47 different contributors.
Do you know what a "fanboy" is?
Ahh. . . nothing refreshes like a good rant. Jeff Wicks' brick of a post contained vitriol by the half-ton. Joe Monson replied to most of the points. (thankfully, Joe summarized Jeff's points in his reply. Thanks Joe!). (Jeff = Midnight Blue), (Everyone else = brown):
> I'm always...looking...for miyazaki's movies...in japanese and not a disney hack and slash versons
[...]
PM had the theme song redone and the women's work song translated into English. Since both of these used the original music, there wasn't a huge difference, and I actually enjoyed the quality of the translations.
Kiki had some sound effects and a little extra music added. The opening and ending theme songs (which were in Japanese in the original) were redone to make the movie more widely marketable, and Disney did a rather good job on those songs, too (IMHO).
[...]
>[I] can't stand to sit through a movie that has been
>butchered so cruely in the prime of its life.
Like I said above, the two movie released so far have not been butchered at all. They are intact, and they have been approved by Studio Ghibli. If Miyazaki and/or Takahata approve of them, that's good enough for me. Ghibli (actually Tokuma) chose Disney for several reasons, one of which was probably Disney's financial ability to produce good stuff. Disney has the money to "do it right", and so far they've hit two bull's eyes.
>...to disney i hope you all can't sleep at night for
>knowing the wrong you have done to us poor miyazaki fans!!)
So far, they haven't done anything except release excellent Kiki and Mononoke videos. I'm sure they are sleeping soundly. (^_-)
Lee Johnson followed with, "I don't like Disney as much as the next person, but the simple fact is that when they [eventually] release Studio Ghibli's works they will be allowing millions more people to view them. Millions more people will be able to see Studio Gibili's wonderful movies.
The only changes (allowed by contractual agreement, under supervision of the original creators) are to the Soundtrack. And if you don't like that you can easily import the Japanese VHS/DVD. I may even replace my 10 year old TV recorded video tape of Laputa with a Disney dub...
Jeff's reply (with curious subject) to the messages of the previous thread started another one. As before, I'll let the repliers in the thread do the quoting for me. Chris Meadows wrote:
> Hi thanks a lot joe for pointing out that different companies did
> some of those other dubs. I do like kiki though I thought some of
> the translations came out kind different. In totoro some of what
> they did with things like the dustbunnies or sut sprites didn't make
> much sense.
Actually, I think they made a great deal of sense. Most American kids--heck, for that matter, most Americans _period_--don't know enough about Japanese culture to put the susuwatari into any sort of context without a lot of explanation that couldn't be fit into such a dub. Translating words is only part of a translation; where there are not equal concepts between cultures, a translation should try to come as close as reasonably possible.
> To disney many appologies I've been misinformed. Though I still love
> the mouse and all the rest of the gang I hope that all of ghibi
> doesn't let them hurt the movies much
Are you aware that Disney (Buena Vista) owns the distribution rights to the Ghibli films _in Japan itself_ as well as in the rest of the world? So one way or another, they _will_ be producing stuff in Japanese. And since the great hue and cry caused by their intent to release Mononoke in English only, I suspect they've learned their lesson.
> I could have sworn that in mononoke there was a part where it
> actually show the women singing which I think is pretty cool because
> then it makes things fit more.
As you can see from the DVD, the movie is precisely the same in both versions. It's not surprising, though, that you might remember differently. Human memory is imperfect, and a lot of people remember things differently sometimes than they actually were. (I know I do.)
Jeff also tossed around the idea of (shudder) Fandubs (shudder).
I think I'll move on to Kari Lehikoinen who wrote about subs/dubs in Europe, "Many of the larger central European countries (i.e. German) have had a habit of dubbing most of it movies, while the northern countries (Sweden,Finland,Norway etc.) dub only children's shows. Russia, on the other hand, has tendency of using a single actor to speak over the lines during the whole show (the original voices can still be faintly heard). . . Miyazaki is a recognized director, so his movies might be labeled as 'art' and subtitled (happened in Finland some years back; Totoro and Porco were shown subtitled on TV). "
The final thread from Jeff's first post revolved around Neil Gaiman's translation choices in "Princess Mononoke". Chris Kuan didn't like the "donkey piss" line, "I've always thought this was not a good example. "Weak as dishwater" would have conveyed the meaning and intent just as well, although in English it might have had to have been delivered with a bit more force."
Todd Ramsey added, "i have to say that i agree entirely with this. the donkey reference is not so much as insulting as it is crude. the main reason jigo was considered rude and insulting had more to do with his familiar and straightforward manner of speaking which would be all but impossible to convey to an american audience where such an attitude is the norm."
Even more info from Ryoko Toyama, "It was not soup, but porridge that Jigo was eating. Jigo was complaining about the thinness (hence, the stinginess of the vendor) of the porridge, not the taste of the soup. So, translating it as "this tastes like water" of course wouldn't carry the meaning of this line. . . I was unfortunate that Gaiman chose the word "donkey piss," since it caught the attention of the press. Of course, "there is no such thing as bad publicity," but Mononoke had enough catch other than "donkey piss," IMO."
A counterpoint from Stefano Marone, "the italian adaptation changed whole paragraphs, turned the "prostitutes" into "servants", and made Jigo say a ridicolous "It seems that this time the good has won" as the last sentence of the film.:-P (and Eboshi said : "oh, now I understand how nature is sacred and should be treated well" argh :-P ) But I liked it all the same, I'm just happy that I have the (region 1) DVD... :)
Anyway, the italian version was: "This is the worst soup that I have ever tasted".
Quite plain, but , it seems, a nice adaptation. maybe the only one :)"
Good news for Studio Ghibli fans in the UK, a caravan of Ghibli films is making its way to the UK later this year. Joe Curzon wrote, "2001 and is the year of the Japan Festival, and wanting to promote Japanese culture they have decided to show the "complete retrospective" of Studio Ghibli films.
They are set to be screened at London's Barbican
As yet I do not know if the films will be dub, sub or a mixture of both. Personally I believe it will be the latter.
"
The press release and a (preliminary) list of films can be found on the 2001 Festivals page.
Nausicaa.net is mentioned in the press release, Joe explained the inclusion, "I think it is because of your reputation for accuracy amongst other things. The Japan 2001 Festival is run by various Anglo-Japanese organisations. The Japanese Embassy in London is co-ordinating most of the events I sussepect they have been are aware of Nausicaa.net for a long while." Joe also included this caveat, "There is no information currently there on the retrospective. The press release is all they are letting out at the moment. It will be a while before they start the publicity for this event."
Marc Hugon posted an interesting DVD find, "This is in fact a montage of a tv show by isao takahata (from 1976), but I find it interesting to be able to see something this old by takahata. This movie is region 3 encoded, in japanese with english subtitle. I haven't received mine yet, but I found a good review (in french) of the dvd. . . This dvd is available in many online hk resellers at very low price"
Chris Meadows wondered, "The question is, though, is it "legit"?"
Marc replied, "This is a totally legit dvd (that's why I was mentioning it). The hk editor is "Universe laser & Vido Co. Ltd", wich is a famous hong kong dvd producer.
You may have been surprised by the very low price of the dvd, but it seems to be something very usual in hong kong, because there are a lot of legit dvds at this price in many hong kong dvd resellers.
I'm aware of the pirated versions of many japanese movies on dvd (including the myazaki ones), but this one is definitely not illegal...
Enrico Casarosa added, "the layouts from "3000miles in search of mother" are from Miyazaki San !! They are really neat ... They really captured the feel of Genova , where the story starts ... They went location scouting for it .... and it shows ... I was born in Genova (Genoa in english) and lived there for 20 years, so it was especially interesting for me ..."
Nausicaa.net information on the series.
This discussion about the differences in style between comics and manga started with Chris Kuan writing, "Scott McCloud did a very interesting analysis (in "Understanding Comics") of the differences in frame transitions between Japanese and American comics. . . I seem to recall that Tezuka's work showed a marked increase in weighting towards scenes that were narratively "disjoint", that is, not direct depictions of the chronological continuation of the previous scene."
Russell Watanabe posted a list of panel transitions mentioned in "Understanding Comics".
IronMouse added, "America comics tend to have a rather cluttered framework compared to manga, probably because manga takes frames to establish the environment before they launch into who's there doing what. In cinema-speak terms this is called "Pillow Shots", where the camera shoots just the background for several seconds. This has no real purpose in advancing the plot; it just serves to establish the environment."
The conversation then switched to Scott McCloud's books (Understanding Comics/Reinventing Comics) and mystery of why Nausicaa isn't mentioned in either one. Scott Ryan wrote (about Reinventing Comics), "Towards the end of the book he lists tons of authors (Japanese and otherwise) with a tiny thumbnail of their work and discusses their style/impact on the medium. For all the ground he covered, I was quite surprised he didn't mention the Nausicaa manga. It was clear to me he hadn't read it."
Marc Hairson reported, "I saw him several years back when he was making a book tour and asked him then about Nausicaa. He had read at least part of it, but it was *after* he had done "Understanding Comics" and he promised to have more about manga in his coming book. Five or six years later "Reinventing Comics" comes out and it only has a little bit specifically about manga in it. Things change while you're writing a book."
Julio Gea-banacloche mused, "I think McCloud's study of transitions was a really neat thing he did, but I'm not sure if it's something anybody else can do. I mean, I think it's far from being a scientific, objective tool. . . Actually, I feel that some of this discussion is a bit misguided, in that Nausicaa is really a *very* atypical manga--which, paradoxically, may help explain McCloud's apparent lack of enthusiasm about it!"
Michael Johnson dug up a copy of the internet chat Miyazaki held back in November 1999. He also whipped up a page with MML subscriber stats. Dave Jutsum spotted news about the distribution of "Sen". The "Time" article mentioning Miyazaki is now on the "Time" website. Places to shop in Scotland from Derek Webster and Lorraine Poole. Andy Davidson and Albert Sureda discover Miyazaki/Takahata goods in Spain.
That's all folks, see you next week.