Movie Title Translations
June 24th, 2009 by justinbBad Santa — USA
"Lost in Tokyo"
A Not so Saintly Santa — Argentina
Santa is a Pervert — Czech Republic
With such a straight forward original title, is such a liberal (and odd) translation of a movie title necessary? Marketing research and recent trends say yes. The title may be changed to account for cultural differences, remove a double entendre or pun that doesn’t work in translation or, more commonly, for reasons apparently unknown…
Translations of movies can be quite vexing to someone more familiar with the original title. Here are a few examples of the more confusing, both translated into Spanish and into English
“Con la Muerte en Los Talones” (North by Northwest)
“Sonrisas y Lagrimas” (The Sound of Music)
“Vanilla Sky” (Abre los ojos)
“Pan’s Labyrinth” (El laberinto del fauno)
Tags: movie title translations, Movie Titles in English, Movie Titles in Spanish, translation of a movie title
November 16th, 2009 at 4:55 pm
I remember reading a story about awkward film title translations. In one country the film “La Cage Aux Folles” was known as “Night of Screams and Feathers.” I found that rather amusing.
November 16th, 2009 at 9:55 am
I remember reading a story about awkward film title translations. In one country the film “La Cage Aux Folles” was known as “Night of Screams and Feathers.” I found that rather amusing.
April 16th, 2011 at 8:20 pm
I got so disturbed when I came to America and I found out that the real name of the movie is “The Raiders of the Lost Ark” which is so much more appropriate than “The Hunters of the Lost Ark” as they translate it into Spanish! Therefore, it should not be: “Los Cazadores del Arca Perdida” but “Los Usurpadores del Arca Perdida”. Or just because “usurpadores” is not a frequently used word do they think people would not understand what they mean??
Similar case of the movie “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom”, they translated it as “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Perdition” which refers to a spiritual state of sin, as if Indiana was induced to some form of sin just by entering the temple. SO the movie should not be called “El Templo de la Perdicion” but “Indiana Jones y el Templo de la Condenacion” which refers more to some form of punishment for entering the temple, more accurate with the original.
June 1st, 2011 at 7:36 am
[...] Movie Title TranslationsTranslations of movies can be quite vexing to someone more familiar with the original title. Here are a few examples of the more confusing, both translated into Spanish and into English… [...]