Cultural Translation: Difference between revisions

** This is quite common in advertising. The same thing happens in Ireland with British ads.

** The same in Switzerland, where advertisements originally from Germany (and in Standard German) are often redubbed to Alemannic German.

 

== Anime and Manga ==

* The Hebrew dub of the anime ''[[Samurai Pizza Cats]]'' was on par with, or even better than, the Japanese original.

* In one episode of ''[[Excel Saga (anime)|Excel Saga]]'', Il Palazzo's [[Once an Episode|speech outlining the current strategy for world domination]] is peppered with random bits of what may or may not be real Italian and other bits which are English spoken with a heavy fake Italian accent; as the trivia pop-ups point out, this is because in the original Japanese the speech was interspersed with random ''English'' and a bad American accent, and they needed to retain the same feel. By and large, though, the series averts the trope; jokes will be translated more or less as they are, and instead you can turn on the aforementioned tooltip feature which will explain why something which is just an insane non-sequitur in English is actually an elaborate joke in Japanese.

 

== Comic Books ==

* Early English translations of the ''[[Tintin]]'' comics tried to rehome the heroes away from their native Belgium. There are references to British currency, and Captain Haddock's mansion (Marlinspike Hall in English, originally Château de Moulinsart in French) is located in the fictional English county of "Marlinshire". The artwork betrays the non-English setting—cars drive on the right-hand side of the road, and police officers are seen wearing the uniforms of the Belgian Gendarmerie.

 

* The [[Neil Gaiman]] novel ''[[Coraline (novel)|Coraline]]'', in its adaption to [[Coraline (animation)|film]], has been remodeled from an England-based storyline to one based in the United States.

* In ''[[Fantastic Mr. Fox]]'' the animal characters are all played by Americans - but the setting is still in the English countryside. Presumably this is a form of [[Translation Convention]] for [[Talking Animal]]s. Interestingly, [[Evil Brit|the human villains are English accented]].

** [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VxROnKlbAro The Canadian French translation] of the same song from the same movie:

{{quote|- On peint son profil sur tout les vases...|Sur tout les VASES!}}

* In the Japanese version of ''[[Inside Out]]'', green peppers are being fed to Riley, who hates them, while in the Western version, it was broccoli… a favorite among Japanese children.

* In one ''[[Toy Story (franchise)|Toy Story]]'', Buzz has the American flag behind him during one of his speech, while in the international it’s the planet Earth.

* The American sub of ''[[Kung Fu Hustle]]'' replaced an offhand reference to two beautiful lovers Chinese mythology with Paris and Helen of Troy. The sub script is Woolseyed in other areas as well, while the dub is more straightforward, including keeping the reference to Xiaolongnu. The French dub preferred the less subtle Romeo and Juliet.

* A rare example in which only cultural references were changed. In the European versions of ''[[Demolition Man]]'', all references to Taco Bell were re-dubbed as Pizza Hut, due to Taco Bell's relatively small foreign penetration.

* The [[Live Action Adaptation|live-action film version]] of ''[[Street Fighter (film)|Street Fighter]]'' made the All-American soldier Guile into the protagonist instead of Japanese warrior Ryu, the franchise's usual lead character. Somewhat justified since Guile was one of the few characters in the ''[[Street Fighter II]]'' series who was motivated by his grudge against the [[Big Bad]] M. Bison, whereas Ryu's rivalry was primarily with Sagat at the time. Ironically enough, [[Jean-Claude Van Damme]], the actor who played Guile, couldn't [[Fake American|fake a convincing American accent]] if his life depended on it.

** The fact that the [[Big Bad]] is called "M.Bison" is this trope plain and true.

* ''[[Fever Pitch]]'' was originally a autobiography about a fan's obsession with the Arsenal Football Club in England (in fact, Nick Hornby's, who also wrote ''[[High Fidelity]]'' below). It was adapted into a American movie about a fictional person's obsession with baseball's Boston Red Sox. Conveniently, the word "pitch" applies to both football/soccer and baseball, so the title remained the same. The ending had to be changed [[Real Life Writes the Plot|at the last minute]] due to the Sox actually ''winning'' the World Series. The ending actually mirrors that of the British-made first film adaptation, in which Arsenal wins the First Division for the first time in 18 years. Unlike the Sox win, the Arsenal win was, at that time, historical fact.

* The 2007 film ''[[The Seeker]]'', based on Susan Cooper's ''[[The Dark Is Rising]]'' series of books, stayed in Britain but made the main character and his family Americans.

* When ''[[Godzilla|Godzilla, King of the Monsters]]'' was brought to the United States, [[Importation Expansion|scenes with an American reporter played by Raymond Burr were added]] into the film, with dialogue changes and edits used to make it seem like he was interacting with the Japanese cast. Interestingly, this version was later dubbed back into Japanese and shown in Japan under the name ''Monster King Gojira,'' and it was a hit, with future kaiju films including reporter characters inspired by Burr. The makers of ''Godzilla'' were suspicious of the poor dubbing of the time and thought American audiences wouldn't watch a subtitled version. Plus, they probably felt that more Americans would get the message about atomic weapons if it was in English.

* ''[[Great Expectations]]'' by [[Charles Dickens]] was adapted into a film in the early 2000s, changing the location from 19th century England to 20th-century Southern California.

** The earlier 1953 film adaptation similarly moved the story to southern California, while the famous 1938 radio version by [[Orson Welles]] took place in New Jersey.

* ''Insomnia'' is a 2002 remake of a 1997 Norwegian film with substantially [[Lighter and Softer|altered plot and characters]] from the harder, more cynical ''[[Film Noir]]'' original. The constant daylight of the Scandinavian summer was a crucial plot point and symbol in the original; so the American remake was located in Alaska in order to preserve that aspect of the story, while still managing a US location.

* ''[[The Eye]]'' (2008 film) starring [[Jessica Alba]] is an American remake of the 2002 Hong Kong film by the same name. The setting is moved to the United States and the characters are given Western-sounding names.

* ''[[Matilda (film)|Matilda]]'' has its setting transferred to the United States, and all the characters are Americans—except the evil headmistress, making her an [[Evil Brit]] by default.

* An odd case with ''[[Straw Dogs]]'' and its 2011 remake. The original was directed by [[Sam Peckinpah]] and starred [[Dustin Hoffman]], both Americans, but took place in the UK. The remake will take place in the Deep South, swapping the negative portrayals of rural Englishmen for negative portrayals of American rednecks.

 

== Literature ==

* After [http://nesztelencsiga.hu/archives/2009/07/15/megint_konyv_sot_Pratchett/ some deliberation on her blog], one of the Hungarian translators of [[Terry Pratchett]]'s ''[[Discworld]]'' novels decided to translate the name of the character Susan to Hungarian ''Zsuzsa''. This hasn't met with universal approval among fans, some of whom pointed out that Sto Helit (where Susan is from) was so obviously unlike Hungary that giving her a Hungarian name was jarring. To be fair, the translator really made a heroic effort to get most of the puns translated, and leaving Susan's name alone would have displeased the other half of the fandom.

* The Spanish language versions of Lee Iacocca's books ''Iacocca: An Autobiography'' and ''Talking Straight'' also do this, but to [[Blind Idiot Translation|retarded levels:]] All the references about American-style football are replaced as ''American Rugby'' (since the translators [[Viewers are Morons|thought that Spanish-speaking audiences would not know what American-style football is.]])

** Not to mention the translation of those books are the Spanish-language version of [[Ye Olde Butcherede Englishe]], despise the books ''not being fiction literature and not taking taking place in the Middle Ages or Ancient Times.''

 

== Tabletop Games ==

* A strange semi-example: ''[[Traveller]]: The New Era'' is peppered with references to 20th-century pop culture, which caused many people to wonder why people in the 50th-something century were so fixated on pre-spaceflight Earth. [[Word of God]] has it that this is supposed to be a Cultural Translation along with [[Translation Convention|rendering 50th-century English as modern English]].

 

* ''Police 911'': In the Japanese version, you start in Tokyo, then travel to Little Tokyo in Los Angeles. In the US version, it's the other way around, in addition to the stages being in a slightly different order.

* Tecmo's 1st [[Captain Tsubasa]] is translated into ''Tecmo Cup Soccer Game'' upon exporting. It features blondes and non-Japaneses who represent a strangely named national team instead of Japan.

* ''[[The House of the Dead (series)|House of the Dead: Overkill]]'' might just be better than the original series. The original series (at least the first two parts of it) consisted of [[Dull Surprise|English VAs literally reading Engrish text]], loads of "satanic" and [[Tarot Motifs]], and a lot of zombies in jeans walking shirtless...For dessert, it got its inspiration from horror B-movies. Overkill...makes it ''even more'' of a B-movie, except it get inspirations from places where the original series '''didn't'''. Namely, the ''[[Grindhouse]]'' films. The [[Not Using the Zed Word|mutants]] now include a foul-mouthed two-headed beast, an ''extremely'' loud girl who holds an uncanny physical resemblance to the ghost from ''[[Chakushin Ari]]'' (to the extent that Caesar [[It Makes Sense in Context|fed his phone to her]]), bloody nurses and, of course, a cussy prison warden called Clement [[Running Gag|MOTHERFUCKING]] Darling. Add a film grain and ''everything'' [[Porn with Plot|(well, almost everything)]] ''Grindhouse'' had, and you get Overkill. And all this was developed by the British company Headstrong Games.

* The Japanese version of ''[[Police Quest]]'' [http://ca.kotaku.com/5812431/japan-what-the-hell-did-you-do-to-this-classic-pc-adventure-game redraws the game to make everyone look like Anime characters.]

** In "Super Nanny," Captain Hero's line "Auf Wiedersehen, Frenchie!" is dubbed over with "Vaya con dios, darling!"

** ''[[Forrest Gump]]'' is mentioned in place of Jose "Daddy Long Legs" Martinez in "The Lemon-AIDS Walk."

*** Also, in the same episode, the [[wikipedia:Ku Klux Klan|Ku Klux Klan]] is mentioned in place of [[wikipedia:Denny's|Denny's]].

** In "Mexican't Buy Me Love," [[wikipedia:Bell Biv DeVoe|Bell Biv DeVoe]] is once again replaced, but this time with [[wikipedia:Pussycat Dolls|The Pussycat Dolls]].

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Translation Tropes]]

[[Category:Localization Tropes]]