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【Abstract】Film title translation is a hot issue in practice because of China’s large-scale English film importation in recent years and the significance of film title in film. Although film titles are usually short with four to five words on the average, film title translation is not an easy task. This paper tries to analyze the translation methods commonly used in English film title translation, namely, transliteration, literal translation, free translation and adaptation.
【Key words】English film title；Chinese translation；Ｔranslation method
课题项目：本文为2011年度河南省社科联，河南省经团联立项课题《修辞中的“同一理论”对翻译过程的阐释》的成果之一，立项编号：SKL—2011—1434。
注释：①刘重德.文学翻译十讲:49.
②Peter Newmark.A Textbook of Translation: 46.
1.Introduction
Film titles,which are the first thing the audience come to know about new films,are of great importance.The film title delivers the most important information about the films to the audience.A good film title can grip the attention of the audience at their first sight and stimulate their association with the plots, moods and other elements shown in the films.It not only attracts eyeball but also helps the film win an everlasting fame.Therefore,the proper translation of film titles is particularly important and even to the degree of helping decide whether the films are well accepted or not within other countries or cultures.An excellent translation may contribute a lot to the charm of the film and plays an important part in the introduction of a new film.It should have both cultural savor and good commercial appeal，not only be faithful to the original, but also cater to their aesthetic taste of the target language spectators and satisfy their psychological needs.As we all know, there exist many translation methods and no one single method can solve all problems of translation. Therefore,Film title translation is in fact a very complicated and problematic matter,not as easy as some non-professionals think it to be.It has its own stylistic, linguistic and cultural features,all of which need our attention while doing translation.This paper tries to analyze the translation methods commonly used in English film title translation,namely,transliteration,literal translation,free translation and adaptation.
2.Transliteration
Transliteration is to seek phonetic correspondence in terms of the translation of proper names and some other special nouns.Transliteration attempts to use a one-to-one correspondence, so that an informed reader should be able to reconstruct the original spelling of unknown transliterated words.
Transliteration could reserve the sounds of the original to the largest extent, keep its rhythm and attract the audience’s attention with strong exotic flavor.This method is not widely used in the translation,but it is indispensable.Many English films are entitled names of the hero or heroine,or names of some place or location.Especially when the film is about some famous historical figure,his or her name being the film title is taken for granted and nearly all biographic films are entitled this way. For example, Harry Potter“哈利.波特”,Jane Eyre“簡爱”,Hamlet“哈姆雷特”,Juno“朱诺”,Romeo and Juliet“罗密欧与朱丽叶”,etc.
In this way,the translator needn’t do much work because many of the proper nouns have already been translated into Chinese before. Transliteration helps retain the rhythm and form of the English film title. However,we can not say transliteration is the best way to translate those kinds of titles.Sometimes,translators have to adopt another method or combine this method with another method in order to make the translation more attractive,avoiding puzzling audience.For example,Frankenstein can be translated into“弗兰肯斯坦”literally,but this name sounds unattractive, especially to those who haven’t heard of this story before. So it gets another version“科学怪人”,which matches the content of the film and sounds more attractive to audience,especially those who love sci-fi films.
3.Literal translation
The definition of literal translation is “not to distort the true features of the original work.”①Influenced by the traditional principles of translation, Literal translation is widely used.In fact,we can say that every film title is translated literally first to see whether it is acceptable before we try other methods.It owns three advantages:1,it is faithful to the original text.2,this method proves very simple,practical and feasible because of the shortness of film titles, only including several words,so these titles could almost be translated word for word.3,the surface structure, the original content and the exotic flavor of the original are retained to a large extent,the audience who like foreign films will be attracted by the foreign elements in the title.
So when the original film title matches the content of the story or the theme of the film,the translator can adopt the method without hesitation.Great numbers of English film titles are translated in this way, for example, Brave Heart“勇敢的心”, True Lies“真实的谎言”, Roman holiday“罗马假日”,Kill Bill“杀死比尔”, The Godfather“教父”, etc.
From the above cases, we can see literal translation not only convey the original meaning, but also retain its exotic favor. These film titles are made up of common words but show the characteristics of brevity and sonority and give hint to the film content.So when the original film title is attractive,reflects the content or theme of a film,literal translation is the first choice for the translator.
Literal translation is adopted as a useful technique in translating film titles.But we must make sure that the translated versions are acceptable and will not lead to the negative association in the target cultures.For example,the 81st Oscar film“Revolutionary Road”is translated into“革命之路”,it makes Chinese audience regard it as a political film,but the title is the name of the road where a young couple trying to overcome personal problem to raise their two children live.So this translation is not suitable. It may be better if we adopt free translation or adaptation. Here are my suggestion----“浮生路”，or“無望的主妇”.The latter will attract more audience because of a popular American TV series “Desperate Housewives”.
4.Free translation
Since no two languages are identical,it is impossible for translator to find equivalent expressions in the target language all the time.Free translation is a strategy that seeks to convey the meaning and the spirit of the original title without sticking to the form mechanically.According to Peter Newmark,“Free translation reproduces the matter without the manner，or the content without the form of the original.”②In English film title translation，this method is frequently applied when literal translation is not suitable.In some cases,free translation may be better in transferring the meaning and the spirit of the film. For example, the literal translation for“The Bridges Of Madison County” is“麥迪逊之桥”,the audience who has never seen this movie before would probably think it a documentary of the bridges in Madison country.This is far from the real content of the film,which is a love story.But the version“廊桥遗梦”is warmly applauded by the audience since it conveys the content well and sounds beautiful and elegant.
Free translation often calls for some techniques,such as addition, omission, and so on.From the above examples,we can find translators add more information to the original film title.Addition is a very common method of free translation when the source language is too simple,or may mislead or confuse the audience. Like ‘Patton’ is translated into“巴顿将军”,“Alexander”,“亚历山大大帝”.The film ‘ghost’ is translated into “人鬼情未了”,telling audience that the love between the hero and heroine overcomes death.If it is translated into“鬼”, many people will regard it as a horror story and dare not to watch it.“Home alone” is rendered into“小鬼当家”,better than“独自在家”.Both titles have four characters, yet the former tells us more information.Some films have ship, spaceship or other names as their titles.For Chinese translations, we usually add a character“号”at the end.The addition makes the thing in the title clearer.For example,‘The African Queen’ is translated into“非洲皇后号”, “Poseidon”“海神号”, and“Air Force One” into“空军一号”.
Another type of free translation is omission.true，a translator has no right to subtract any meaning from the original.But it does not follow that he should refrain from omitting any words at all in translation.In fact，the disparity between English and Chinese really calls for omission in the process of English-Chinese film title translation.Generally speaking，omission in film title translation is to deal with the excessive use of English pronouns, and such functional word as articles,propositions and so on.Look at the two examples:My Fair Lady is translated into“窈窕淑女”and A walk in the cloud“云中漫步”.Here“my”,“a”,“the”and“in” are omitted in the translation.
These freely translated versions succeed in exerting the functions of film titles and attracting the audience.They focus on the target audience and serve the purposes of better communication.However,free translation doesn’t mean random translation.A basic rule the translator should follow is to make the Chinese versions retain the content and the spirit of the original titles.
5.Adaptation
Adaptation is the freest form of translation.Adaptation is very creative in that it completely abandons the form and content of the original film title and makes a fresh start based on the content of the film.The adopted film title had nothing to do with the original one.Adaptation is to a great extent a process of generalization and summarization of the content of the film, a process of reproduction and recreation.Therefore,the translator must first understand the content and the film genres of the original thoroughly and profoundly,and then creatively and accurately reproduce it with the aid of his outstanding art of translation.
Take the film“The Englishman who went up a hill but came down a mountain” for an example.The original English title is acceptable in form and meaning, but when it is translated literally into“上山又下山的英国人”,it doesn’t differ“hill”and“mountain”,and couldn’t convey the original content and theme.And also the Chinese title is too long and violates Chinese people’s aesthetic standards.So another translation“情比山高”would be better.Another film“The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”is also a very good example,which is translated into“返老还童”, much better than its literal translation“本杰明·巴顿奇事”, because it’s a story about a man who is born old but dies as a baby.
Usually, adaptation occurs in the following three cases.Firstly,the literal translation of some titles makes the audience completely confused. They cannot understand the film when they see the title.For example,if “The Others”(小岛惊魂) is translated into“其他的人”,it only makes us wonder what it really means. Secondly,for other titles,literal translation makes sense,but it may be somewhat irrelevant to the theme of the film. “Little Children” is translated into“身为人母”(As Parents),not“小孩子”,because the film is in fact a story of two parents,who are no children. Thirdly,adaptation may bring a better and more eye-catching translation. For example,“乱世佳人”is better than“随风而去”as the translation of ‘Gone with the Wind’,and“真假公主”is much attractive than“安娜斯塔西亚”as the translation of “Anastasia”.
However, we must realize that the method of adaptation cannot be overused for the pursuit of sensational effect and box-office hit.In general,literal translation and free translation should be the prior methods.Only when the two cannot fulfill the aim can the method of adaptation be applied because of out of choice.
6.Conclusion
Since each method has its own advantages as well as limitations，this thesis holds that all these translation methods are indispensable and supplementary to each other and that no single method can always solve all the problems in film title translation.For this reason,the translator should bear in mind that whatever method he adopts，he must have a deep and comprehensive understanding of the whole film and the essence of each method,make the best use of them in a flexible and appropriate way.In addition, the translator should take the audience’s reception and expectation and the box-office hit into account.
【References】
［１］刘重德.文学翻译十讲.中国对外翻译出版公司.
［２］Peter Newmark.A Textbook of Translation.Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press.
［３］贺莺.电影片名的翻译理论和方法.外语教学,2001．1，22：（１）.
［４］龙千红.英语电影片名佳译赏析—兼谈电影翻译对译者的要求.西安外国语学院学报,2003．9，11（３）.
［５］毛發生.两岸三地外语影片片名翻译比较.西安外国语学院学报,2002．12，10（４）.
［６］毛显辉.电影片名及相关术语的翻译.中国科技翻译,2001．8，14（3）.
［７］何跃敏.当前西片译名中的问题与对策.中国翻译,1997,（４）.
［８］吴敏.浅谈英语电影片名的翻译.中国翻译,1995,（５）.
［９］http://ent.sina.com.cn/m/f/.
［１０］http://www.douban.com/group/topic/4482301/.
【Key words】English film title；Chinese translation；Ｔranslation method
课题项目：本文为2011年度河南省社科联，河南省经团联立项课题《修辞中的“同一理论”对翻译过程的阐释》的成果之一，立项编号：SKL—2011—1434。
注释：①刘重德.文学翻译十讲:49.
②Peter Newmark.A Textbook of Translation: 46.
1.Introduction
Film titles,which are the first thing the audience come to know about new films,are of great importance.The film title delivers the most important information about the films to the audience.A good film title can grip the attention of the audience at their first sight and stimulate their association with the plots, moods and other elements shown in the films.It not only attracts eyeball but also helps the film win an everlasting fame.Therefore,the proper translation of film titles is particularly important and even to the degree of helping decide whether the films are well accepted or not within other countries or cultures.An excellent translation may contribute a lot to the charm of the film and plays an important part in the introduction of a new film.It should have both cultural savor and good commercial appeal，not only be faithful to the original, but also cater to their aesthetic taste of the target language spectators and satisfy their psychological needs.As we all know, there exist many translation methods and no one single method can solve all problems of translation. Therefore,Film title translation is in fact a very complicated and problematic matter,not as easy as some non-professionals think it to be.It has its own stylistic, linguistic and cultural features,all of which need our attention while doing translation.This paper tries to analyze the translation methods commonly used in English film title translation,namely,transliteration,literal translation,free translation and adaptation.
2.Transliteration
Transliteration is to seek phonetic correspondence in terms of the translation of proper names and some other special nouns.Transliteration attempts to use a one-to-one correspondence, so that an informed reader should be able to reconstruct the original spelling of unknown transliterated words.
Transliteration could reserve the sounds of the original to the largest extent, keep its rhythm and attract the audience’s attention with strong exotic flavor.This method is not widely used in the translation,but it is indispensable.Many English films are entitled names of the hero or heroine,or names of some place or location.Especially when the film is about some famous historical figure,his or her name being the film title is taken for granted and nearly all biographic films are entitled this way. For example, Harry Potter“哈利.波特”,Jane Eyre“簡爱”,Hamlet“哈姆雷特”,Juno“朱诺”,Romeo and Juliet“罗密欧与朱丽叶”,etc.
In this way,the translator needn’t do much work because many of the proper nouns have already been translated into Chinese before. Transliteration helps retain the rhythm and form of the English film title. However,we can not say transliteration is the best way to translate those kinds of titles.Sometimes,translators have to adopt another method or combine this method with another method in order to make the translation more attractive,avoiding puzzling audience.For example,Frankenstein can be translated into“弗兰肯斯坦”literally,but this name sounds unattractive, especially to those who haven’t heard of this story before. So it gets another version“科学怪人”,which matches the content of the film and sounds more attractive to audience,especially those who love sci-fi films.
3.Literal translation
The definition of literal translation is “not to distort the true features of the original work.”①Influenced by the traditional principles of translation, Literal translation is widely used.In fact,we can say that every film title is translated literally first to see whether it is acceptable before we try other methods.It owns three advantages:1,it is faithful to the original text.2,this method proves very simple,practical and feasible because of the shortness of film titles, only including several words,so these titles could almost be translated word for word.3,the surface structure, the original content and the exotic flavor of the original are retained to a large extent,the audience who like foreign films will be attracted by the foreign elements in the title.
So when the original film title matches the content of the story or the theme of the film,the translator can adopt the method without hesitation.Great numbers of English film titles are translated in this way, for example, Brave Heart“勇敢的心”, True Lies“真实的谎言”, Roman holiday“罗马假日”,Kill Bill“杀死比尔”, The Godfather“教父”, etc.
From the above cases, we can see literal translation not only convey the original meaning, but also retain its exotic favor. These film titles are made up of common words but show the characteristics of brevity and sonority and give hint to the film content.So when the original film title is attractive,reflects the content or theme of a film,literal translation is the first choice for the translator.
Literal translation is adopted as a useful technique in translating film titles.But we must make sure that the translated versions are acceptable and will not lead to the negative association in the target cultures.For example,the 81st Oscar film“Revolutionary Road”is translated into“革命之路”,it makes Chinese audience regard it as a political film,but the title is the name of the road where a young couple trying to overcome personal problem to raise their two children live.So this translation is not suitable. It may be better if we adopt free translation or adaptation. Here are my suggestion----“浮生路”，or“無望的主妇”.The latter will attract more audience because of a popular American TV series “Desperate Housewives”.
4.Free translation
Since no two languages are identical,it is impossible for translator to find equivalent expressions in the target language all the time.Free translation is a strategy that seeks to convey the meaning and the spirit of the original title without sticking to the form mechanically.According to Peter Newmark,“Free translation reproduces the matter without the manner，or the content without the form of the original.”②In English film title translation，this method is frequently applied when literal translation is not suitable.In some cases,free translation may be better in transferring the meaning and the spirit of the film. For example, the literal translation for“The Bridges Of Madison County” is“麥迪逊之桥”,the audience who has never seen this movie before would probably think it a documentary of the bridges in Madison country.This is far from the real content of the film,which is a love story.But the version“廊桥遗梦”is warmly applauded by the audience since it conveys the content well and sounds beautiful and elegant.
Free translation often calls for some techniques,such as addition, omission, and so on.From the above examples,we can find translators add more information to the original film title.Addition is a very common method of free translation when the source language is too simple,or may mislead or confuse the audience. Like ‘Patton’ is translated into“巴顿将军”,“Alexander”,“亚历山大大帝”.The film ‘ghost’ is translated into “人鬼情未了”,telling audience that the love between the hero and heroine overcomes death.If it is translated into“鬼”, many people will regard it as a horror story and dare not to watch it.“Home alone” is rendered into“小鬼当家”,better than“独自在家”.Both titles have four characters, yet the former tells us more information.Some films have ship, spaceship or other names as their titles.For Chinese translations, we usually add a character“号”at the end.The addition makes the thing in the title clearer.For example,‘The African Queen’ is translated into“非洲皇后号”, “Poseidon”“海神号”, and“Air Force One” into“空军一号”.
Another type of free translation is omission.true，a translator has no right to subtract any meaning from the original.But it does not follow that he should refrain from omitting any words at all in translation.In fact，the disparity between English and Chinese really calls for omission in the process of English-Chinese film title translation.Generally speaking，omission in film title translation is to deal with the excessive use of English pronouns, and such functional word as articles,propositions and so on.Look at the two examples:My Fair Lady is translated into“窈窕淑女”and A walk in the cloud“云中漫步”.Here“my”,“a”,“the”and“in” are omitted in the translation.
These freely translated versions succeed in exerting the functions of film titles and attracting the audience.They focus on the target audience and serve the purposes of better communication.However,free translation doesn’t mean random translation.A basic rule the translator should follow is to make the Chinese versions retain the content and the spirit of the original titles.
5.Adaptation
Adaptation is the freest form of translation.Adaptation is very creative in that it completely abandons the form and content of the original film title and makes a fresh start based on the content of the film.The adopted film title had nothing to do with the original one.Adaptation is to a great extent a process of generalization and summarization of the content of the film, a process of reproduction and recreation.Therefore,the translator must first understand the content and the film genres of the original thoroughly and profoundly,and then creatively and accurately reproduce it with the aid of his outstanding art of translation.
Take the film“The Englishman who went up a hill but came down a mountain” for an example.The original English title is acceptable in form and meaning, but when it is translated literally into“上山又下山的英国人”,it doesn’t differ“hill”and“mountain”,and couldn’t convey the original content and theme.And also the Chinese title is too long and violates Chinese people’s aesthetic standards.So another translation“情比山高”would be better.Another film“The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”is also a very good example,which is translated into“返老还童”, much better than its literal translation“本杰明·巴顿奇事”, because it’s a story about a man who is born old but dies as a baby.
Usually, adaptation occurs in the following three cases.Firstly,the literal translation of some titles makes the audience completely confused. They cannot understand the film when they see the title.For example,if “The Others”(小岛惊魂) is translated into“其他的人”,it only makes us wonder what it really means. Secondly,for other titles,literal translation makes sense,but it may be somewhat irrelevant to the theme of the film. “Little Children” is translated into“身为人母”(As Parents),not“小孩子”,because the film is in fact a story of two parents,who are no children. Thirdly,adaptation may bring a better and more eye-catching translation. For example,“乱世佳人”is better than“随风而去”as the translation of ‘Gone with the Wind’,and“真假公主”is much attractive than“安娜斯塔西亚”as the translation of “Anastasia”.
However, we must realize that the method of adaptation cannot be overused for the pursuit of sensational effect and box-office hit.In general,literal translation and free translation should be the prior methods.Only when the two cannot fulfill the aim can the method of adaptation be applied because of out of choice.
6.Conclusion
Since each method has its own advantages as well as limitations，this thesis holds that all these translation methods are indispensable and supplementary to each other and that no single method can always solve all the problems in film title translation.For this reason,the translator should bear in mind that whatever method he adopts，he must have a deep and comprehensive understanding of the whole film and the essence of each method,make the best use of them in a flexible and appropriate way.In addition, the translator should take the audience’s reception and expectation and the box-office hit into account.
【References】
［１］刘重德.文学翻译十讲.中国对外翻译出版公司.
［２］Peter Newmark.A Textbook of Translation.Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press.
［３］贺莺.电影片名的翻译理论和方法.外语教学,2001．1，22：（１）.
［４］龙千红.英语电影片名佳译赏析—兼谈电影翻译对译者的要求.西安外国语学院学报,2003．9，11（３）.
［５］毛發生.两岸三地外语影片片名翻译比较.西安外国语学院学报,2002．12，10（４）.
［６］毛显辉.电影片名及相关术语的翻译.中国科技翻译,2001．8，14（3）.
［７］何跃敏.当前西片译名中的问题与对策.中国翻译,1997,（４）.
［８］吴敏.浅谈英语电影片名的翻译.中国翻译,1995,（５）.
［９］http://ent.sina.com.cn/m/f/.
［１０］http://www.douban.com/group/topic/4482301/.