A Study on the Translation of English Movie Titles

A Study on the Translation of English Movie Titles

Abstract

随着时代的发展和文化的交流，英文电影日益受到人们的欢迎，片名的翻译也愈加受到人们的重视。电影对于人们来说，不仅是喜闻乐见的一种艺术形式，同时也是一种商品。它已成为我们生活中不可或缺的一部分，越来越多的英文影视作品被引进了我们国家。这些影视也成为文化交流的重要手段。本文研究英文电影片名翻译的特点和功能，并通过对当前英文电影片名翻译实践的研究，举例分析了英文电影片名翻译的标准和常用的方法。

With the development of the times and cultural exchanges, English movies are getting more and more popular, the film title translation is also more and more attention. The movie for people, not only is a beloved form of art as well as a commodity. It has become an indispensable part of our life, more and more English film and television works was introduced in our country. The film has also become an important means of cultural exchange. The thesis studies the features and functions of movie titles. And through the study of English film title translation practice, makes an analysis of English film title translation standards and methods

Key Words: English Movie Title Translation Title Features and Functions Translation Strategies

A Study on the Translation of English Movie Titles

1 Introduction

电影，又被称为“第七艺术”，它能传递信息、抒发情感，是一种深受大众喜爱的艺术表现形式，英文电影片名的翻译也引起越来越多的关注。虽然英文电影片名的翻译常被认为属于跨文化交际，但它也拥有自身明显的特点。电影的片名对一部电影的成功与否起着至关重要的作用，如何成功地做好英文电影片名的汉语翻译，对于进一步推动电影事业发展，促进中西文化交流有着非常重要的意义。本文就从分析英文电影片名翻译的特点着手，举例介绍英文电影片名翻译的标准及翻译的常见方法。

The film, also known as the \"seventh art\express feelings, is a popular form of art, English film title translation has attracted more and more attention. Although the English film title translation is often considered to belong to the cross-cultural communication, it also has its own character. The title of the movie plays a vital role in Chinese translation in a movie's success, how to make a success of English film title, to further promote the development of the film industry, has a very important significance to promote the cultural exchanges between China and the west. This thesis starts from the analysis of the characteristics of English film title translation, the common method for standard and translation of English film title translation.

2 Literature Review

2.1 The Features of English Movie Titles

Although movies, as a kind of literary form, have something in common with

other literary forms, they also have some unique features, which make them different

from others. It is the same with the case of movie titles.

2.1.1 Linguistic Feature

Linguistic Feature can never be ignored in movie titles. English movie titles are

usually very short, simple and compact with regard to the structure, but very rich in

meaning. In the view of the form, sometimes they just use one or two words as titles,

which may be the name of the protagonist or the place where the story takes place, for

instance, Avatar《阿凡达》, sometimes, they adopt various kinds of phrases as titles,

namely, noun phrases, verb phrases and prepositional phrases, here are some

examples: Dare to Love Me《敢于爱我》, using the structure of a verb-object phrase;

The Risk Pool《危险赌注》, prepositional phrase was employed.

2.1.2 Aesthetic Feature

Aesthetic Feature is also an obvious feature of English movie tiles. Generally

speaking, the aesthetic characteristics of movie titles are closely related to the

application of rhetorical devices, such as simile, metaphor, irony, personification

and so on. The employment of rhetorical devices has been proved to be

effective and powerful, because the carefully designed devices used in movie titles

help either to create some special kind of atmosphere, to arouse the imagination or to

move the passion. Some old examples are listed as following:

Dances with Wolves (personification)

True Lies (oxymoron)

2.1.3 Cultural Feature

Another important feature of English movie titles is Cultural Feature, which is

closely related to various aspects of societies, such as religion, philosophy, history and

so on. Mostly, idioms and allusions are often used in the movie titles which reflect its

cultural feature and convey rich cultural meanings. For example, movies such as

Gospel According to Janis《詹尼斯福音》are colored

in strong Western color, and clearly show the great influence upon English movie

titles exerted by western religious culture.

2.2 The Functions of English Movie Titles

Considering combination of the English movie tiles, here we will study the four main functions, that is, the informative, aesthetic, expressive, vocative functions.

2.2.1 Informative Function

the informative function is the most important function for an English movie. In this thesis, the informative function means informing the audience of the relevant information about the movie, for instance, when and where the story happens or whom the movie is about. Some titles tell us the hero or heroine of the movie, for example, the Forrest Gump《阿甘正传》, some may tell us the content or background of the movie, such as Peal Harbor《珍珠港》, some reveal the theme of the movie, which are abstract, only after you see the movie, will you know why it was named, for instance, Brave Heart《勇敢的心》, and some will provide us with the plot of the movie, such as , Saving Private Ryan《拯救大兵瑞恩》.

2.2.2 Vocative Function

According to the philosophy, “everyone has curiosity”, we will feel excited when

we see something fresh and strange and we take delight in learning and easily be

influenced. The vocative function is just to influence the audience‟s sentiments and

arouse their interests. Fahrenheit9.11, the best-selling documentary movie, strongly

criticized the Bush government. The director chose the 9.11 event as part of the title in

his movie to attract audience and also convey the main idea of the movie.

2.2.3 Aesthetic Function

Aesthetic function is to bring audience enjoyment from the title. The

aesthetic feeling is a main factor that causes audience to make the decision whether

they will go to a movie or not. The aesthetic function is most obviously felt on the

romantic movies. Some titles of the classical movies have become the synonym of

romantic, such as Casablanca, Sleepless in Seattle.

2.2.4 Expressive Function

The expressive function of the movie titles means the author‟s attitude or feeling to this movie. Through the title the audience can sense the theme, the mood and the structure in which the movie is organized. For instance, The Shaw Shark Redemption 《肖恩克的救赎》.

5 Strategie of English Movie Title Translation

Undoubtedly, the methods of translation are major issues when we are dealing

with translation. So far, there are four major basic translating methods in movie title

translation, and they are transliteration literal translation, free translation as well as the

synthesis of literal translation and free translation.

5.1translating methods

5.1.1 Transliteration

The first method is transliteration. Transliteration refers to the process by which

one reads and pronounces the words and sentences of one language using the letters

and special symbols of another language. Thus transliteration is meant to preserve the

sounds of the syllables in words.

5.1.2 Literal Translation

Literal translation means translating literally, keeping both the original from and the original content. For instance《Brave Heart 》

5.1.3 Free Translation

Free translation is a strategy that seeks to convey the meaning and spirit of the original title without sticking to the form mechanically.

5.2 Cultural Factors

Translation is not just superficial but the exchange of two different cultures.

There are various ways of dealing with cultural factors. Among them, domestication

and foreignization is most widely used.

5.2.1 Domestication

Domestication,also called adaptation, means 归化 in Chinese. It is mother

culture oriented, which tries to make the translation abide by our native

culture. In this

way, the audience can easily accept and understand the translation work.

5.2.2 Foreignization

Foreignization,also called alienation, means 异化 in Chinese. It recognozes the

difference between two cultures and presents the difference., which makes the translation as original as possible. In this way, we can feel cultural shock sometimes.

5.3 Commercial factors

As a popular artistic form, movies are the product of commercialization. Movies

are apt to attract the public attention and earn a large box-office income. Therefore, as

the important part of English movie titles are also tinged with commercial color，

there have emerged a lot of exciting passionate, mysterious or thrilling titles, while

some of these titles are not the reflection of the original story.

5.4 Individual factors

Due to different people’s different personal experiences,

pre-understanding, and cognitive modes, the interpretations are bound to be different,so different translators have different versions of the same movie titles.

5.5 Factors of Movie Types

According to the contents and the way a movie is presented, we can divide

movies into different types, such as社会伦理片(Ethical Movies) 、校园生活片

(Campus Life Movies) 、战争片(War Movies ) 、历史传记片( Legend-Based

Movies ) 、西部片( Western) 、公路片(Road Movies ) 、政治片( Political

Movies) 、浪漫爱情片(Romance) 、科幻片( Science Fiction Movies ) 、惊险悬念片

(Thriller ) 、音乐歌舞片(Musical) 等

7 Case Analyses

7.1 Case 1 The Wizard of Oz

The movie The Wizard of Oz is widely known to us with《绿野仙踪》 as its

Chinese name. Literally, we can translate it into《奥兹国的巫师》. So it appears wrong

to translate the movie title into 《绿野仙踪》. Of course, it is not the case. It seems

unfaithful to its original title, but it better presents the sense of fantasy and fairy and

romance in the movie, which can make a good name to the ear. In this way, it can

greatly attract our attention, especially children.

7.2 Case 2 Home Alone

Home Alone means“单独在家”superficially. Its translation is《小鬼当家》. We

are impressed with the cleverness and braveness and kindness of the young

protagonist. In our eyes, 小鬼is just what is presented in the movie.

8 Conclusion

Though movie titles are short, their translation is not an easy task. The present

study of movie title translation is far from instructive and theoretical. This thesis

explores English movie title translation’s strategies ,such as foreignization and domestication etc.

In the previous parts, this thesis introduces the linguistic, aesthetic and cultural

features of English movie titles in light of the functions of English movie titles:

mainly, the informative function, aesthetic function, the expressive function, vocative

function. Therefore, the present thesis holds that the translator should translate movie

titles under the basic principle of fulfilling the specific functions of movie titles.

Through the four factors that influence the naming of English movie titles, this thesis

provides the support for English movie title translation with suitable translation

strategies. Then this thesis analyzes the translation strategies for English movie

translation, namely, transliteration, free translation, liberal translation and adaptation.

This thesis is the study of English movie title translation in the hope that it can

make the further contribution to this field. However, this thesis is far from perfect, and

it also has some limitations, both in the analysis and specific explanations.

References