The one version I've found of this movie appears dubbed, yet the lips seem to match. The version Im watching is Italian. But why are the actors dubbed speaking the same italian language? Especially since they are great actors? It's extremely distracting seeing these actors dubbed in Italian especially since they appear to be speaking itallian themselves. Whats up with that?
The DVD I have is in the French language, the actors are all speaking French.
shareI believe you're right but why does IMDB list the film's language as Italian?
shareBecause regular people like us contribute film information to IMDb, and whoever added the information may have watched a DVD with only one language - dubbed Italian.
I frequently notice inconsistent details listed for independent foreign films that have multiple DVD releases, but stopped updating the information years ago, because somebody else with a different DVD would change the information.
I even submitted some of the details as trivia and technical details and dvd information, only to have others with different DVDs delete the information, thinking the information was wrong, instead of quickly googling for verification.
But now that IMDb launched its Wiki-Faq, people could add the discrepancy to the Faq, and hopefully other people with different DVD versions could add other details. DVD1 from distributor 1 is French only, DVD2 from distributor 2 is French-dubbed Italian, DVD3 is from distributor 3 is French only with subtitles, etc.
Yes, but the original soundtrack of the movie is in Italian, with Polanski and Depardieu dubbed (they recited their lines in French). All the other actors are italian, they spoke their lines in Italian and then dubbed themselves.
share[deleted]
*beep*, I think you're right!
I was almost sure that the film had been released everywhere in the world in the dubbed Italian version, but after a quick search I found out that it was released like that only in Italy, and in French everywhere else.
There's a tradition in Italy to dub everything - you always shoot a film without sound and add sound later. Also, for some reason, the Italian public don't seem to mind if the lips and the sound don't match, while for example in the US this would be proof of total incompetence. It's a matter of taste, I guess (personally It drives me nuts:).
Consequently, not only Italian-speaking but also many French-speaking (and other languages too) films produced in Italy display this kind of characteristic.
There are some exceptions, such as many films of Antonioni, but most great Italian directors and producers simply don't bother to sync sound versus lips.
This message has not yet been deleted by an administrator
Notice that the credits are in Italian . That made me think that it might have been originally in Italian (I saw the French version)
shareI disagree. Italian dubbing pays extremely attention to the lip sync.
And the voices are beautiful, often very much better than original ones (what a disappointment to me when I first heard Marlon Brando's real voice :D ).
This movie was in French/Italian, and then dubbed in Italian, a very good work especially by Leo Gullotta who dubbed Polanski.
You may ask why to dub everything.
It's a matter of history: during Fascism foreign languages and words were forbidden, and then this remained. It's a matter of usability for all kind of audience, too, even if there is now more public asking for the original versions of movies.
The film was shot in Italian and in French. Apparently and for a good reason Tornatore wanted Depardieu and Polanski to do this film. Depardieu speaks a little Italian, I don't know about Polanski. The only way was to shoot in French and then dub them.
As someone had mentioned, it's an Italian tradition to dub movies. There was an issue when the film Heat came out actually because the guy that dubbed De Niro was the same that dubbed Pacino. I don't remember how that was resolved back then, but the dubber is dead now anyway.
Most of the other actors, Sergio Rubini and all, are speaking Italian though. It might not seem to sync perfectly because they probably recorded the dialogue all later in Post so it won't sound that much different from the dubbed Depardieu and Polanski.
It was an Italian/French co-production. Most of the crew was Italian, all spoke French in the film. It was released in both languages. The Italian was dubbed, as stated above.
share