English version worth buying? - Notre-Dame de Paris (1998) Discussion

[–] michiruwater 17 years ago

The lyrics ARE really, really effing godwaful. I think it would be better to stick with the French/Italian/Russian and skip the English.

"There is some one I must protect." - Riza Hawkeye, FMA

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[–] ttrek-1 17 years ago

I could say the same for the french lyrics.

Stilted and nary a rhyme amongst them.

French doesn't translate well to english... as english subtitles will attest, but they did the best could to make the french word fit and flow in the english language.

And I'd like to see any of you pathetic little worms do better. Its like saying Les Miserables was better in French. And it wasn't the French version just doesn't sound right... their Javert was really crap and thankfully now people base their portrayals off of Philip Quast.

The music in Notre Dame needs some cutting down. Its too drawn out and repetative. There is only so many times one can here Frollo sing about how much he wants to *beep* Esmeralda but can't cause he's a priest. Only Quasimodo's songs sound trully beautiful.

So... download Quasimodo and screw the rest. Stick to Les Miserables and Phantom if you want to see how a musical SHOULD be staged (with sets, not just nice lighting and a weird THE WALL style thing going on).

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[–] eroskitten 17 years ago

Actually, the lyrics aren't that terrible.

They're changed in a few places, but they're basically the same. Most of the cast members are the same also.

The English version of Belle is a good example; there's not a whole lot of difference. Purists might say otherwise, but for an English translation of the show, it's better than one would usually expect to find.

(Only, I wish they'd have kept Patrick Fiori.)

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[–] MissLadyLoki 17 years ago

All I can say is, as an American, it sounded funny to me, for some odd reason. I mean, I can't understand French/Italian/Russian(I take Spanish in school, but I wanna learn French in college), but I liked those ones more for different reasons. All of 'em are good in their own way, but English was crap.

BTW, I know a Spanish one exists. I saw some bits from it and I hated it.

I found the Fountain of Youth! It's the toilet!

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[–] Renfieldette 17 years ago

It's not a very good CD. Since you have heard the French first... don't bother with this one.

Juliette for Damien, Julia for Rasmus

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[–] MissLadyLoki 17 years ago

The English one? I didn't bother with it.

I found the Fountain of Youth! It's the toilet!

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[–] avia2 17 years ago

English lyrics weren't bad at all, the French were just BETTER...

... I've heard from people who love English and hate French that the French WAS better...

... however I think that's also because of French's latin influence - English words that come from french tend to be quite formal and "posh", so even spoken French naturally sounds better than spoken English (like in the lyrics)

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[–] 17 years ago

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[–] tymala 12 years ago

I think so, I listen to both as well as watch the Russian version on youtube to practice Russian, but I think Tina Arena has an amazing voice and I enjoyed hearing her sing Bohiemienne, and Steve Balsamo sang Belle beautifully even though I am partial to Patrick. The singer who was Fleur d'lisse was amazing as well.

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[–] avia2 12 years ago

The singer who was Fleur d'lisse was amazing as well.

Natasha St Pier. She was my favourite singer in the London production. She also represented France in Eurovision 2001, and did very well.

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[–] tymala 12 years ago

I agree with you completely about Natasha, actually I want to look up some of her performances on youtube. I just think the music of Notre Dame de Paris is absolutely beautiful and moving. I agree the lyrics in English and translation are not the best, but you still get to enjoy the music and I prefer to have English versions (in addition to the original) just to understand the scenes better and to to be able to connect with the story. Actually the Russian translation and lyrics are very deep.

No problem to watch them with subtitles on the screen but I love to be able to have the music on my ipod and enjoy it with some comprehension when I can't see the translation. But of course when you are studying a foreign language fantastic musicals like this really can help motivate you to memorize vocabulary and learn a bit faster. I liked being able to hear Bruno sing "The Age of the Cathedrals" in English as well.

So in my opinion, I think with such beautiful musicals- we should listen to it in our native language (if we are not bi-lingual) and enjoy the original or as many translations as you want. Yes, buy the English version!

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[–] Oddark123 10 years ago

It's also about how it's written. In a lot of case quite honestly musicals/operas are going to be better in the language they are written in for that very reason. While yes you can translate them all into any language sometimes it feels like you get a google translation (aka a jack of all trades guy who knows the basics of every language but doesn't know the finite of any and gets easily confused)

In some cases the english version has better sounding english than the direct translations of the french, but still it is sung better to the music in french.

I think in all honesty though if you have the time and money it's worth it to explore these kind of things though. Even though you may end up not liking it as much, the chance to explore the language in it can be interesting enough. However if you are mostly just looking for the entertainment then you'd probably just want to stick to the one you view as better.

Gamefaqs has a far worse population than IMDB

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