Hi
I want to order the DVD but whats really the original language of the movie.
Amazon UK says: language English eand subtitles English
But is nt the movie in French?
I would prefer the original "meant-to-be" language WITH subtitles.
Anyone knows the answer?
Thanks
Jan
There isn't really a single "original" language for this film at all. What little dialogue there is is a mixture of English, French and Gaelic.
However, The Illusionist is rather like many of Jacques Tati's live action films, in that although not strictly a "silent" film, its dialogue isn't crictical to understanding the plot. Instead, it's there primarily as part of the film's "sound picture".
I did (by mistake) set the captions on, on my DVD copy.
Besides being an horrible obstruction to the beautiful drawn scenes (they were yellow letters on a black box), they had no use at all, since there is not much dialog in most of the movie. And where there is some dialog, you don't need to understand the language... because is kind of obvious.
...I switch them off in less than 5 minutes.
"Besides being an horrible obstruction to the beautiful drawn scenes [..] they had no use at all, since there is not much dialog in most of the movie."
The only practical use I can think of for subtitles for this film is as a "Hearing Impaired" version, i.e. one that contains descriptions of the whole "sound picture" rather than just the dialogue.
As you point out, subtitles would be worse than useless if used purely for translation here, because the negative effect of having the subtitles on screen would outweigh their minimal benefits.
It’s language-neutral; there isn’t any real dialog, most of it is mumbled gibberish and whenever anyone “speaks”, it is clear what is happening regardless of what they said.
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Synetech