A note for those of you with _Let The Right One In_ at home or in your Netflix Queue

[fengshui]

Watch the dubbed version with Narrative Subtitles (subtitles for signs and letters and the like), not the subtitled version. The subtitles have been dumbed-down substantially from the original theatrical screenings: http://iconsoffright.com/news/ ( Read more... )

Comments

[once_a_banana]

Augh! That just arrived in the mail today. Thank goodness I didn't buy it. How's the dub? Does it do a better job of matching the original lines?

*sob*..... this is why we can't have nice things....

[fengshui]

I watched it last week. It's good, but I can definitely see how much of the power was missing from what I saw. I'll probably re-watch it sometime, but I'll never be able to do-over that first watch.

According to the people on that page, the dubbed version has the original translation, so you should be good there.

My verdict

[once_a_banana]

Yes. Okay, I've watched it now with the dub. I can't be sure, but after sampling the other option I've reached the conclusion that the film is still better in Swedish with the crappy subtitles. It's true that you miss maybe 5% of the lines due to the subtitles simply being missing or incomplete, and the rest may lack certain subtleties or have somewhat misleading wordings (kind of like it is when we watch any anime). But the voice acting in the dub is so bad (with may one exception) that I think any benefit you get from having the complete dialogue is more than erased due to missing all the subtleties of intonation in the original performances. So much of the characters exists in this realm, beyond the specific words they're saying. In the dub they at best lose this connection (along with their lip sync), and at worst are portrayed with horrendously inappropriate voices (e.g. the bully at school). Take all this, and add the fact that the entire sound mix is completely bleached of all its atmosphere, literally, in the dub: they

Re: My verdict

[fengshui]

Interesting. So it's a failure of production on both fronts.

[brittlepoetry]

Anyway to find an original subtitle version?

[fengshui]

The original screeners that the studio sent out are right, as is the Region 2 DVD. I also expect that the Bittorrent copy will be right. :/

Other than that, we'll have to wait for a "Special Edition" or corrected disc from the studio. Thankfully, I too only netflixed it rather that buying it.

[muckefuck]

Optionally, learn Swedish between now and whenever the film arrives!

[voxel]

Well, if the Narrative Subtitles and the subtitles are different tracks, shouldn't you just be able to press the subtitle key on your remote and get the one that's better? Or is there something there that I'm missing? You should be able to play whatever audio and whatever subtitle track is on the DVD that you want to, and play them together (unless you have a broken DVD player, this offer not valid anywhere DRM can mess with your ability to mix and match content).

[fengshui]

The narrative subtitles are the subtitles necessary to watch the dub. (Subtitles for newspapers, signs, etc. for people who are watching the dub and who don't read Swedish) The other subtitle track has all of the dialog subtitled as well, but it's the crappy dialog. The good dialog isn't on the disc at all in any form other than spoken by the crappy dub actors.

[lhn]

Apparently the production company actually listened to the complaints, and will be using the theatrical subtitles going forward. (Though they're not offering exchanges to previous purchasers.) It might be worth dropping a note to Netflix suggesting they replace any discs they bought.