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bits of dialogue redubbed innto French for Blu-Ray

posted 15 years ago by luckard
8 replies | jump to latest

So I noticed something weird on the new Blu-Ray. Lots of little unimportant exchanges between Ford or his wife and various French characters, which originally all happened in English, are now in unsubtitled French.

It makes things confusing because it's a major plot point that Ford doesn't speak French, so having him ask the bellboy "What time is it?" in French, for example, makes no sense. Sometimes he even switches between French and English within the same sentence.

It's mostly bits where people's faces are offscreen, and it's definitely the actors themselves, including Ford.

I had an old VHS from 1988, the old American DVD, and the UK widescreen DVD. None of them had these exchanges in French.

Very odd.

[–] luckard 15 years ago

I just figured out what happened. I popped in my British DVD, which has a French audio track. It turns out the French track is not the standard redub of the entire film into another language by local actors. Oddly, it only consists of occasional random bits of dialogue in French, all done by the original actors, including Harrison Ford. Very unusual. The rest is the existing English version.

This is the track they mistakenly put onto the American Blu-Ray. It's not the American version of the film. Perhaps it's how it was released in France, though one assumes with French subtitles for the lengthy portions in English.

Somebody carelessly doing a transfer could easily have mistaken the two audio tracks, it's not until about ten minutes in, when Ford's wife talks to the hotel desk clerk, that the first words dubbed into French appear. Unfortunately they are quite frequent after that point.

AARGH! I'm going to call and ask them to fix this, but I'm not too hopeful.

Maybe when this gets released on Blu in the UK they'll fix this, and it'll be a regionless Blu.

As is, this is far and away the best this film has ever looked, but it undermines the main theme of what an outsider Ford's character is if he randomly speaks fluent French at times. Not the Blu I was hoping for. :(

[–] princeofnewyork 15 years ago

I thought Ford's French in the original was spotty at best? I guess overseas it was easier for the audience to understand his French? Thanks for this bit of info, Luckard! Interesting indeed!

[–] laserfan 14 years ago

IMO luckard is mistaken; this "restored French" dialog is the correct way to present the film for Blu-ray. Indeed a major portion of Walker's quandry is that he DOESN'T speak French (he knows only some words and phrases that he's picked-up from his wife or from their honeymoon years earlier--with a French-fluent wife it makes sense that he'd have learned bits & pieces of it). But he's not at all comfortable himself with the language, so when his wife disappears he's left to unravel a mystery alone, in a city and with people he can't readily communicate with.

The French that is used is completely natural, and mostly irrelevant to the plot (niceties in the hotel) or easily skipped-past (the French that's spoken when they're trying to locate the Concierge) but who cares--and Walker's head is elsewhere during these exchanges anyway.

The major sequence, the extended interrogation of Michelle by the two Israeli agents (of course they can speak to her in fluent French!) was not meant to be understood by Walker (or the audience); probably has a key plot point-or-three in it, though of course I could be wrong about this and maybe someone who speaks French can steer us straight in that regard. Regardless if they'd been speaking English, you can bet Walker would have had his ear pressed to the door to be able to hear what was being said. Instead he didn't/couldn't listen-in and eventually tried (successfully) to break it-up when they seemed to be getting rough with Michelle.

So I never questioned the extensive use of French, without English subtitles, in this film, because I believed that it simply was correct and a key part of Walker's quandry.

Having said all this I admit I'd never seen Frantic before the Blu-ray; not theatrically, not on home video VHS/LD/DVD/whathaveyou so am puzzled if what luckard says is true that the previous presentations didn't bother with French at all, and had everyone in Paris speaking English!??!?!

[–] balthazar_bee 14 years ago

You know, I think I agree with laserfan. I've seen the film several times, but I didn't even notice that these exchanges had been altered for the new blu. Maybe I understand enough French to cope better than some, but I think I prefer it this way.

In any case, over at the bluray.com message boards someone has reportedly gotten in touch with Polanski, who has contacted the studio in an effort to get it fixed.

[–] knifeparty2004 13 years ago

Well, although I haven't seen it on blu-ray, I disagree with laserfan. There is a scene in the original where Ford says, "Je non-parlais francais." He can't even say that he can't speak French. Another seen where Ford is presenting the photo to the florist, he can't even say "Je cherche ma femme" (Im looking for my wife), as he tries to communicate in sign-language. That's how bad his French is supposed to be. So all these French exchanges between Ford and French characters really shouldn't be happening and I think it would severely detract from the film.

I'm a stickler for keeping things original and the way they were intended so when someone does something like this it pisses me off. Don't get me started on George Lucas...

[–] StarmanSkywalker 13 years ago

Luckard is right, the Blu-Ray used the wrong English track.
He did after all write Roman Polanski's office and got a confirmation from the director himself:

http://forum.blu-ray.com/blu-ray-movies-north-america/128687-presumed-innocent-frantic-double-thriller-feature-blu-ray-2.html

[–] kmiv 13 years ago

"The major sequence, the extended interrogation of Michelle by the two Israeli agents... probably has a key plot point-or-three in it..."

What we used to learn from this was that it was definitely the statue that everyone was after - now unless you've seen it before or can understand French, this point only becomes clear by inference. This was the only part where I (a longtime fan of "Frantic" since it came out decades ago) thought we were missing the English track.

Also, Michelle's dialogue with the two guys was one of my favorite scenes of hers - she says she recognized the hairy one on the plane because the flight attendant poured coffee all over him and he's got a terrible temper, which pisses hairy dude off. It all comes across as her messing with them, and makes me smile every time. :) There's also a neatly delivered bit between the two dudes - they hear a noise in the bathroom, the older one says, "You checked the bathroom?" he goes to check and only sees the birds *beep* - then later when Harrison calls out and they all of a sudden know someone's in the bedroom, the older one sarcastically says, "You checked the bedroom too, I suppose?" Gets a laugh every time I watch the movie with people. :)

[–] The Truth 12 years ago

In the Finnish version (with Finnish subtitles), the exchange in French between the agents and Michelle was subtitled, as were most of the other important bits of French dialogue in the movie. I assume the Finnish translator didn't just decide to translate them on his own, but that they were part of the translation script, so clearly these scenes were meant to be understood by the non-French-speaking audiences.