It
seems that we can blame that old sod Franco for the size of the Spanish
dubbing industry. Where other countries tamely put subtitles on their
cinema or television screens, the Spanish are much more partial to James
Dean’s mouth making a ‘hi’ movement as a strange and gravely
Madrid-accented voice says ‘hola, ¿que tal?’There are
those who are surprised to discover how their favourite star really
sounded - think of Humphrey Bogart or Homer Simpson.
Sometimes,
they don’t even remove the original soundtrack – just turn it down with
the Spanish version bellowed out on top. There’s David Attenborough
telling us about snakes in his whispery voice – which at least this
viewer can – or at least could understand – if it wasn’t for the same bloke from Madrid thundering out something about serpientes venenosas rendering the whole thing impossible to understand in any language.
Franco
didn’t approve of foreign languages – Basque and Catalonian of course –
but anything else either. They might be saying something untoward,
immoral or revolutionary. So he banned them. No one was to speak
anything but Spanish – including the nation’s deaf, who were not allowed
to use sign-language (and even today they sign in a rather furtive sort
of way, as if they are still on the look out for a Guardia Civil).
So, forget
subtitles, everything imported had to be dubbed. Except, come to think
of it, pop music. It would have been a stretch having our friend from
Madrid crooning ‘she loves yer ya ya ya’ in castellano over the Beatles. I can’t see many people buying the record either.
Anyway, in
some cases, films were translated away from their original meaning – if
immoral or faintly subversive – and represented in a more acceptable
light. ‘She’s my girlfriend’, for example, might safely become ‘she’s my fiancée’.
Of course, if the film strayed to far from the Catholic Church’s view
of morality, or the Government’s view of political propriety, it would
never be shown here anyway. Which is why everyone had to drive up to
Perpignan to see Marlon Brando’s ‘Last Tango in Paris’ and why, between
the death of Franco and the arrival of the Internet, they sold porn
films by the lorry-load out of the Spanish gas stations.
Dubbed porn films, if you can imagine such a thing.
Televisions now have this special button for those who wish to see something in its ‘versión original’. Press it and – whoops – up’ll come the show in all its glory. My Spanish step-son, who is learning English and is fond of Bob Esponja,
inexplicably refuses to avail himself of this useful service of
switching him into SpongeBob SquarePants. Perhaps he doesn't want me to
get the joke.
Of course,
humour don't always translate, which makes watching Friends or Frasier a
bit hit or miss when enjoying the Spanish version. And anyway, Niles
was funny because of his voice!
The dubbers,
there must be a small coterie of them working out of a cellar
underneath a multiplex in Madrid, are usually unknown - until one of
them ups and dies. Then the media will tell us that Paco Orbera was the
beloved voice of Errol Flynn, Fred Flintstone, The fellow with the big
chin in Gunsmoke and Bruce Willis.
In the City, there will be a few cinemas that show films in ‘V.O.’ with subtitles, usually lowbrow romantic comedies. They do well with the American students.
Now, for all I go on about the desecration of Die Hard ('Jungla de Cristal' for some reason) by the dubbers - who I think must have some kind of cast-iron contract - at least the Continentals are prepared to look at foreign cinema, as well as their own (and the Spanish make quite respectable movies). In Britain, we think that everything good, if not ours, comes from Hollywood. When was the last time you saw a French film, an Italian TV show or a Spanish documentary? Bloody Americans – if there’s a decent European film out there, they’ll churn out a re-make (gotta have that Tom Cruise as the Good German who wants to murder Hitler).
In Greece or
Portugal or Denmark or Poland (well, I’m guessing about Poland to be
frank), you’ll sit down with the local version of popcorn and watch the
movie in its original language, the subtitles wobbling there at the
bottom of the screen and – in the Mediterranean cinemas at least – with
the entire audience talking at once. It's just Spain that's being
contrary over this.
I suppose
dubbing can be useful. The first thing I learnt in Spanish was ‘Hands
up’, which I have to admit that I’ve still yet to use in my private
capacity. A German friend once told me that he’d learnt English from
listening to pop music. Apart from coming out with some odd expressions
occasionally ‘(‘Baby, light my fire’, ‘you’re my Rockafella’ and so on),
he managed a certain fluency without, apparently, an undue amount of
effort. Perhaps some of my readers might want to follow his example and
start practicing singing along to Miguel Ríos or Camilo Sesto (If I were
you, I’d save the Flamenco until a bit later).
And thus the
dubbing industry, started and encouraged by Franco, had, by the time of
his death, become so powerful (in a relatively small field) that it has
managed to continue on into modern times.
One rare
occasion when subtitles are used outside of entertainment is when a
Catalonian politician holds forth on the TV, and his pronuncios
are posted below: usually too briefly to be read. Curiously though,
when a Catalonian politician wants to appeal to the larger public about
something other than politics, why, he’ll address us in Spanish. This
does not happen in the Basque County, however, where all declarations,
political or otherwise, are made in Spanish.
Perhaps they don’t have a good subtitling service there…
