I watched this movie last night - I bought the boxed set of flms as a treat!
Is the boy, Alexander, in the film Murder She Said, dubbed over? His voice sounds very high pitched - its sounds like a woman has been dubbed over the actor's voice- I've heard this thing on films before where they get an actress to dub over a child's voice - it never sounds convincing.
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I was wondering the same thing. He sounds exactly like Martin Stephens in Village of the Damned (1960). Stephens seemed dubbed, too, but the DVD commentary claims that he wasn't. And I wrote that he wasn't for the title's FAQ page. But now I'm starting to wonder.
... J. Spurlin
I'm watching this one right now. If I had to make a bet, I'd say that a.) the kid is dubbed, b.) dubbed by the same person who dubbed the boy in "Village of the Damned," and c.) that the kid in "Village of the Damned" was unquestionably dubbed by a woman.
shareI may have to change that entry I made on Village of the Damned's FAQ page. I'm thinking more and more that he was dubbed. Maybe I'll listen to the commentary track again. I may have misunderstood what the film historian said about that.
How did you like this film (assuming you've finished it already)?
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Well, it's always possible that the film historian on the commentary track may have been mistaken or misinformed - it just sounds for all the world to me like a woman dubbing the voice, and the same one who did the voice in VOTD. Always has been a slight pet peeve of mine - it always distracts from a production when that's done. I love old radio shows, but it's always pretty obvious when they're having a woman fill in for a boy's part. And you can tell that the singing voice of Mark Lester in "Oliver" is a woman as well.
Anywayyyy, that aside - Murder She Said was great. I'd never seen any of these Margaret Rutherford/Miss Marple movies before, this was the first one for me. It was excellent. Loved it from the first, when she sticks her tongue out at that little girl on the train, to the very end where she leaves with Mr. Stringer. [SPOILER] And I've always loved Arthur Kennedy, so I got a kick out of him being the villain of the piece. Really fun and entertaining. Getting ready to start watching "Murder Most Foul" right now.
I know what you mean. I've often been annoyed by children being dubbed by women. The little French boy in Charade is obviously dubbed.
You listen to old-time radio, too? You probably know there's an excellent man who did boy voices: Walter Tetley, who was Leroy on The Great Gildersleeve. On TV he was the voice of Sherman from the Mr. Peabody segment of the Bullwinkle show.
This was my first -- and so far only -- Margaret Rutherford/Miss Marple, too. And I enjoyed it. (Though she was more amusing than the mystery plot. And that repetitive music -- which sounds great at first -- was annoying.)
I like Arthur Kennedy, too. I just saw him as the incestuous stepfather in Peyton Place. Good performance. Terrible movie (though many disagree; the IMDb rating is high).
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Hey J.
Yeah, the kid in Charade is a perfect example!!
I love old radio shows! If I remember correctly, Walter Tetley had some kind of disease that kept things at the pubescent level, which is why he had that young sounding voice for such a long time. I just saw him the other day, he had a bit part in Out of the Fog with John Garfield. His best movie role was the wisecrackin' usher in Who Done It?, kept giving Lou Costello a bad time. Yeah, he was great as Leroy, I think my favorite thing that he's in is the Phil Harris-Alice Faye radio show, where he plays Julius, always getting mixed up in some wild scheme with Phil and Remley, I remember one episode where he had to pretend he was a Martian. Without looking him up on imdb, seems to me I read that he was relatively young when he died. Who could forget him as Sherman??
Yeah, Arthur Kennedy is awesome, my favorite thing Arthur Kennedy did was a western with Jimmy Stewart called "The Man From Laramie."
Welp, anyway, hope you're having a good day.
I've been watching a lot of Abbott and Costello lately. Recently: ... Meet Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and ... Meet the Keystone Cops. (Neither very good.) Who Done It is in my queue, so I'll be seeing it eventually.
Man from Laramie is in the queue, too. Jimmy Stewart is my favorite actor, but I've never gotten around to his 1950s Westerns.
Say, dustinthewind, I just started a thread in The Watercooler about old-time radio if you'd like to come visit:
http://www.imdb.com/board/bd0000101/nest/78957403
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Ive seen this movie a number of times and this is the first time I realized his voice was dubbed....guess Im more critical these days.
The little boy's voice in North West Frontier was dubbed too.
Yeh, I've always thought his voice was dubbed too. It also sounds the same as cousin Daphne's dubbed voice in 'Sailor Beware'
On the topic of Dubbing and hoping you don't mind me going off topic slightly, but every time Valerie Leon appears in anything, her voice is dubbed too, I wonder why!
My guess would be they decided to dub him to avoid continuity issues in his voice, which I'm sure was going through that whole cracling phase during filming.
But you're right, it's a very obvious dub. I was looking away from the tv when he first spoke & I was very surprised to then see a boy and not the woman I so clearly heard talking! :)
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"Never finish what you can't start!" ;)
I don't know what the regulations were at the time but certainly now in the UK there is a real problem if even part of a child's voice needs to be post-synched. The child ideally has to watch the scenes on screen to do this, but they aren't allowed to as the film hasn't yet been certified as suitable for their viewing.
No matter that they were obviously on set for the shots in question, no matter that the shots in question might be completely innocuous... it's that stupid.
John-367 wrote: "...there is a real problem if even part of a child's voice needs to be post-synched. The child ideally has to watch the scenes on screen to do this, but they aren't allowed to as the film hasn't yet been certified as suitable for their viewing.
..."
.........................
!!! Funny yet awful. (And I'll bet this little artifact of the societal urge toward censorship caught many UK filmmakers, resulting in entire child-roles having to be dubbed by an adult.)
Just adding to the testimonies: Tonight I saw this movie for the first time, and I, too, immediately wondered if the boy's voice had been dubbed.
I don't know if he was dubbed, or not, but I thought Alexander's character was the most amusing! A boy of his age having the wit and perfect diction was indeed a treat! I also thought it was amusing that he spent most of the day dressed to the nines! I love it when he smarts off to Hillman the gardner by pointing out his use of a double negative!
shareI've just read that Alexander's voice was dubbed by Olive Gregg?
shareIf it was dubbed by a woman, the poor kid must have had a hard time getting through school with that on his record.
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Young Ronnie Raymond played Alexander. His voice always had that posh, upper class sort of quality going but I never once thought in terms of it being a dubbed female voice.
I was surprised that to learn at his IMDB page that he had 2 appearances in tv show roles in 1962, the year after Murder She Said, & that was the end of his film career.
Does anyone have any follow-up info on the kid?
According to this site he is a retired undertaker & widower with grandchildren. I think he made the right career move - I found his performance insufferably cloying - ruined the movie for me!
At my place there are always lots of laughs & only some crying.
My thoughts exactly. Whoever decide to dub his voice destroyed the film.
shareAlexander's voice was dubbed by Martin Stephens. Regarding Martin's voice in Village Of The Damned: The voice you hear is actually Martin Stephens' voice. It was overdubbed to make him sound other-worldly, being an alien.
shareThis is very cool to know. I thought something was both very familiar and a bit off about the voice. Martin Stephens being born in 1949 and Ronnie Raymond in 1946 makes a three-year age difference and naturally the voice would sound higher and somewhat unnatural even if Stephens tried lowering his voice a bit.
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