It felt like part of the story was missing. Even though know I the plot of the film, and what lines should go where, being unable to place them exactly was unsettling. Watching a familiar story, but without the ability to understand the dialogue completely was an alienating experience. What would happen if I viewed Amelie without the English subtitles, completely in French? How would the viewing experience change by removing part of the film that was crucial for my understanding? When searching for a way to defamiliarize a familiar film, I was immediately draw to the concept of translation and how one’s understanding – or lack of understanding – of a particular language affects the viewing experience. Jeunet and Laurant did not write the screenplay anticipating that their words would eventually be translated into English – and that certain aspects of their original vision would be lost in the process of translation. But they are not an original part of the film. For me, as a monolingual English-speaker, the subtitles are an integral part of the film. The presence of subtitles in Amelie is something I absolutely have taken for granted. These subtitles are, of course, there to help the non-French speaking viewer understand the film and follow its plot. Like most foreign-language films released to primarily English-speaking audiences, Amelie is accompanied by English subtitles that correspond to the French dialogue. Oh yeah, and it’s a film with dialogue that’s completely spoken in French. It’s a film I’ve seen more times than I can count, and it’s a film that speaks to my world view possibly more than any other piece of media. It’s a love story, a coming of age story, and a ghost story all at once. Released in 2001, it tells the story of Amelie Poulain, an ordinary young woman and the extraordinary ways she interacts with her world. For someone so obsessed with words, it may come as a surprise that my favourite film is in a language that I barely understand.Īmelie is the esoteric and Technicolor love child of director Jean-Pierre Jeunet and screenwriter Guillaume Laurant. I read things and write things, and I’ve dedicated my academic life to studying English words and the stories that we have created from them. I learned to talk long before I could walk I haven’t stopped talking since.
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