Alright, I dont speak too much French, but I'm pretty certain that the explanation for "MMM," translated in the subtitles as "Manech Marries Mathilde," is actually "Manech et Mathilde" when Manech says it. Am I hearing that wrong? If not, and it is Manech et Mathilde, then where does the middle M come in?
we all know that art is not truth.
art is a lie that makes us realize the truth
Manech actually shouts "Manech aime Mathilde"....
old thread: http://imdb.com/title/tt0344510/board/nest/44217293
RIP Ian....
AHHHH! very clever! thank you!
we all know that art is not truth.
art is a lie that makes us realize the truth
in the novel, Manech carves "MMM" into a tree and brings Mathilde over to show her, telling her that they are now engaged, and the "MMM" stands for "Manech's Marrying Mathilde", or "Mathilde's Marrying Manech", as you like. it's a fairly important point which is referenced later in the book as well when Mathilde becomes a semi-successful artist and paints a still life of the tree, keeping the "MMM" visible and telling Germain Pire it means "Manech's Marrying Mathilde".
shareDoes the M really stand for "marrying" in the novel? I like the previous poster's explanation that the M stood for "aime", but I guess either would make sense. Except wouldn't the french translation of "Manech's marrying Mathilde" be "Manech se marie avec Mathilde", which would abbreviate to MSMAM? Or did he just shorten that to MMM because it's catchier and easier to carve?
shareThe original phrase is "Manech aime Mathilde." Thus, the second M comes from "aime." When they translated the novel/movie from French, obviously "Manech loves Mathilde" wouldn't match up, so they changed it to "marrying" to make it work.
shareOkay, that makes more sense. Thanks for clearing that up.
sharei, too, took it as the phrase "Manech aime Mathilde" and MMM as a symbol for that phrase (For non-french speakers - since the french pronunciation of "Aime" sounds practically the same as the French pronunciation for the letter "M" - Like in english, using the letter U to stand for you, or O for owe, etc).
Then in the English translation, they just used the word "marry" etc to match the visual with the word to make a reasonable meaning.