MovieChat Forums > The Manxman (1929) Discussion > The lines without title cards

The lines without title cards

posted 12 years ago by adamthompson1981
3 replies | jump to latest

The trivia page says:

Two key lines in the film have no intertitles, the viewer having to lip read them. About 64 minutes into the film, Kate reveals to Philip "Philip, I am going to have a baby." 4 minutes later, she reveals to her husband Pete "I am going to have a baby."

I agree with the second one, but I had serious trouble lip-reading the first one. The "Hitchcock/Truffaut" book says it's "I'm expecting a baby." Which is it?

Also, these were around 50 minutes into the version I saw, probably because of different running speeds.

[–] slokes 11 years ago

Keep in mind Anny Ondra, the actress playing Kate, could only speak English phonetically at this time, and had to be dubbed off-screen by another actress playing the lead in the later Hitchcock sound flick (his first, and next after this) "Blackmail."

In short, she could have been saying anything. I've tried following her lips at key moments of dialogue and sense that she wasn't saying anything in English that was more than a couple of words long.

[–] Patricia91 11 years ago

I got the baby part, too. I thinks that's all you needed to get sense of the line.

[–] 11 years ago

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