MovieChat Forums > L'illusionniste (2011) Discussion > The dialogue. Did we miss anything?

The dialogue. Did we miss anything?

posted 14 years ago by nu_riot
4 replies | jump to latest

Okay, I already know the answer is "no", but I'm still curious. Was there any part of the dialogue that is worth mentioning? It's not subtitled, and the film basically works as a silent movie, so I assume none of it is important. Although I'm still interested. If anyone here knows Gaelic could they give us some examples of what the girl was saying?

I guess moments like when she was checking out the rooms of the apartment she was saying "Here's the bedroom. Here's the bathroom." But I wonder if at any point the girl or the man said something that's worth bringing to attention.

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[–] Vashbul 14 years ago

I don't think there's any Gaelic in it. Occasional French and English words were spoken, but a lot of it was gibberish and meant to be (sounded like mock-Korean, actually).

[–] chuck-526 14 years ago

I'm under the impression the "gibberish" (especially from Alice) was in fact "Scots Gaelic". In any case, to answer the title question, no we didn't miss anything; in every case the meaning is quite clear from the visuals and the context. (And the few signs that sorta matter are in English!)

[–] 14 years ago

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[–] Spielburger 14 years ago

"Yeah, I think she was speaking scots gaelic."

I'm rather glad I came into this thread late. "Gibberish", or "mock-Korean"? Sheesh...

As dandy_vision and others have said - yes, Alice speaks Scots (or Scottish) Gaelic. The pub landlord also welcomes Tatischeff with a few words of Gaelic. Tatischeff himself speaks French, and the other characters generally speak English.

As I mentioned in another thread, it's not made clear exactly where Alice lives, but we can presume it's one of the islands off the West coast of Scotland. Nowadays, Scots Gaelic is not that common in Scotland as a whole, but in some of the islands (particularly the Outer Hebrides) you'll still find a lot of people who speak it as their first language.

And to address the OP's question: there was some discussion of this a while back, but from memory I don't recall any of the dialogue being all that critical. The only thing that springs to mind is when Tatischeff - reading from the recipe book - says "lapin" (rabbit), thus setting up the later joke where he mistakenly thinks Alice has cooked his rabbit.