BritishGuy

I am sure many of us here have seen an international film, spoken in a different language and translated into English via subtitles. A lot of martial arts films for example have English subtitles. Or, to name one of the latest, Inglourious Basterds by Quentin Tarantino, has translations from French, German and Italian into English. I can't help but wonder sometimes how accurate the translations are when watching a movie. Sometimes the written translation "feels" a bit too short to have covered the whole dialogue. For example, in "Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows", in one scene Sherlock and his team are running through a forest to escape from the German artillery. A German soldier shouts out "zu viele Fuchse fur euch paar Huhner", which is translated in the movie subtitles as "time to introduce Little Hansel!". But what he was actually saying was "too many foxes for those few chickens". How accurate are these subtitles, in your opinion? Have you ever noticed an error or mistranslation between the spoken dialogue and the written subtitles?

Google Translate is probably useful to me when translating one word or a sentence of about five words. Other than that, the results are massively inaccurate, either completely incoherent or it translates to something you wasn't planning to say. I have a friend from Finland and I've given up using Google to translate from English to Finnish (he can speak English too) because every time I did, the sentences either made no sense at all or caused him to burst into laugher. At one point, somehow, Google had managed to translate a sentence about melons into a sentence about female breasts. Thanks for that Google. :confused: The paid translators are likely to be much better. The majority of them are translated live by actual people who speak the language, which is really what you are paying for.

Hello there, I am BritishGuy and I am (at the time of writing this) a newbie on this great forum! I just wanted to say HELLO to the community before I dive into the threads. I am a writer, having written several blogs, tutorials and articles. I am also currently writing a fantasy novel that I have been putting off for too long. I love tea. It is my absolute guilty pleasure. You will most likely see me with a cup of tea in my hand while sitting with my keyboard. Feel free to ask any questions! I'm looking forward to meeting everyone.