Ealing - with subs

Discuss internationally-released DVDs and Blu-rays or other international DVD and Blu-ray-related topics.
Post Reply
Message
Author
User avatar
Erikht
Joined: Thu Nov 20, 2008 5:31 am

Ealing - with subs

#1 Post by Erikht » Fri Oct 02, 2009 4:35 pm

Apart from Criterions edition of Kind hearts and Coronets, I have had trouble finding Ealing DVDs with subtitles. As the Library has a rule aboout subtitles, this means that I can not buy loads and loads of Ealing films. Does anybody know about more Ealings (especially the comedies) with subtitles?

User avatar
tojoed
Joined: Wed Jan 16, 2008 11:47 am
Location: Cambridge, England

Re: Ealing - with subs

#2 Post by tojoed » Fri Oct 02, 2009 4:47 pm

The Ealing comedies in the UK are distributed by Optimum and they, notoriously, don't put subs on any English language films. It's a great pain to the Mutt 'n' Jeff community, as we are known, but also for people like yourself.

I honestly don't know of any Ealing films with subs, apart from KH and C which you mentioned.
If I can find any I'll snap them up and let you know.

User avatar
Sloper
Joined: Tue May 29, 2007 10:06 pm

Re: Ealing - with subs

#3 Post by Sloper » Fri Oct 02, 2009 5:02 pm

Yes, it's a particular problem (I imagine) for non-native speakers since Ealing actors talk with such idiosyncratic accents (thinking especially of Guinness in Lavender Hill Mob, my favourite by far). It's absolutely amazing that Optimum released Mandy, a wonderful Ealing film about a deaf girl, with no subtitles! Although the actors do all speak very clear Received Pronunciation in that one.

I can also confirm that the Region 1 Anchor Bay release of Dead of Night (the double bill with Queen of Spades) has no subtitles. And although the picture quality is apparently much better than the Optimum release, even I find the soundtrack a bit indistinct...

User avatar
MichaelB
Joined: Fri Aug 11, 2006 6:20 pm
Location: Worthing
Contact:

Re: Ealing - with subs

#4 Post by MichaelB » Fri Oct 02, 2009 6:14 pm

Sloper wrote:It's absolutely amazing that Optimum released Mandy, a wonderful Ealing film about a deaf girl, with no subtitles! Although the actors do all speak very clear Received Pronunciation in that one.
...though that doesn't matter if you can't hear them.

That has to be the stupidest decision since the film The Waterdance played in its first and only week in London in a cinema without wheelchair access. You have only to read a plot summary to see why this might have been somewhat short-sighted.

User avatar
Sloper
Joined: Tue May 29, 2007 10:06 pm

Re: Ealing - with subs

#5 Post by Sloper » Fri Oct 02, 2009 6:23 pm

MichaelB wrote:...though that doesn't matter if you can't hear them.
Quite. I just meant that Mandy might be somewhat less of a challenge to non-native speakers than the comedies, which tend to be a bit more, er, colloquial. I also wanted to recommend the film, because it needs a boost given its cavalier treatment on home video.

User avatar
L.A.
Joined: Thu May 28, 2009 7:33 am
Location: Helsinki, Finland

Re: Ealing - with subs

#6 Post by L.A. » Fri Oct 02, 2009 8:22 pm


Jonathan S
Joined: Sat Jun 07, 2008 3:31 am
Location: Somerset, England

Re: Ealing - with subs

#7 Post by Jonathan S » Sat Oct 03, 2009 4:29 am

Sloper wrote:I can also confirm that the Region 1 Anchor Bay release of Dead of Night (the double bill with Queen of Spades) has no subtitles. And although the picture quality is apparently much better than the Optimum release, even I find the soundtrack a bit indistinct...
I found the Anchor Bay Dead of Night totally unwatchable - or, more precisely, unlistenable - for that reason. Excessive noise reduction makes it sound as though everyone is speaking through heavy colds. The original soundtrack is perfectly clear, as my old off-air recording attests (I haven't seen the Optimum, being put off by reviews). As with many other DVDs (though this is the worst I've heard), I'd much rather Anchor Bay had done no sound restoration at all than this abomination.

I continue to be amazed that so few reviewers comment on the aural equivalents of grain removal, edge enhancement, etc. often perpetrated on films by so-called sound restorers. It has of course long been a major concern to collectors of '78' reissues, especially when we can compare them with the originals. To those with the good fortune of normal hearing, most old film soundtracks - like sound recordings from more than 80 years ago - can sound both clear and wonderfully full-bodied but the insistence on removing any background hiss often compromises both of these attributes. An ideally reproduced soundtrack, to my ears, of a film contemporary with Ealing is the UK Odeon release of The Man on the Eiffel Tower - even though UCLA had to work with battered old prints!

User avatar
Erikht
Joined: Thu Nov 20, 2008 5:31 am

Re: Ealing - with subs

#8 Post by Erikht » Sat Oct 03, 2009 6:24 am

Thank you, that was very helpful. I will have to continue looking, as you have proven that there are indeed some Ealings with subs. But God Damn Optimun to Hell for not taking the outlay of putting subtitles on these discs. My dear old mother, who has been working for 4 years in South Africa in a 100% English speaking work place can't understand a word of the Ealings, as the discant in her ears ain't what it used to be. I concider myself more that fluent in English, but I too have some problems, and prefer them with subtitles. Which is why I made the rule for the library on subtitles.

A company from Finland, no less.

User avatar
Yojimbo
Joined: Fri Jul 04, 2008 10:06 am
Location: Ireland

Re: Ealing - with subs

#9 Post by Yojimbo » Sat Oct 03, 2009 9:20 am

Its funny the question of subtitling Ealing movies although I am willing to grant that having less exposure to such accents than even we here in Ireland are used to can make them sometimes difficult to decipher, - btw, is it true that 'The Commitments' was subtitled for the US market?, - but I remember that, even though subtitles were provided at certain judicious points in the classic Jimmy Cliff movie, 'The Harder They Come', I had no difficulty in understanding it, without subtitles

nighthawk4486
Joined: Tue Mar 03, 2009 11:19 pm

Re: Ealing - with subs

#10 Post by nighthawk4486 » Sat Oct 03, 2009 12:19 pm

I seem to recall subtitles on all the films in the Alec Guinness collection and Amazon claims it is closed-captioned. The only EL film I ever thought needed subtitling on screen was Trainspotting.

max_cherry
Joined: Tue Aug 25, 2009 2:49 am
Location: Ukraine

Re: Ealing - with subs

#11 Post by max_cherry » Sun Oct 11, 2009 4:29 pm

Amazon.com' comments on Guinness collection from LionsGate shows that disks are the same as were issued by Anchor Bay, and Anchor usually goes without subs. But Anchor adds closed caption, so it helps for customers who live in USA. For others of us it's useful only if we play DVD on PC... So here is the hard way - verify that this or that DVD has CC, get it, rip CC from it, rip DVD, add subtitles to DVD-copy, burn it on DVD-R, watch it...

SuperBlu
Joined: Tue Mar 03, 2009 10:10 pm

Re: Mandy - with subs?

#12 Post by SuperBlu » Tue Mar 16, 2010 10:02 pm

Sloper wrote:It's absolutely amazing that Optimum released Mandy, a wonderful Ealing film about a deaf girl, with no subtitles!
Amazon UK is selling an edition of Mandy WITH subtitles (or so the page says) that came out in 2009. So did Optimum rerelease it? Optimum's product page still shows the old 2008 release date with no indication of a rerelease.

User avatar
Sloper
Joined: Tue May 29, 2007 10:06 pm

Re: Ealing - with subs

#13 Post by Sloper » Wed Mar 17, 2010 5:13 am

Interesting; the box now says 'with hard of hearing subtitles'. Good for Optimum!

User avatar
tojoed
Joined: Wed Jan 16, 2008 11:47 am
Location: Cambridge, England

Re: Ealing - with subs

#14 Post by tojoed » Wed Mar 17, 2010 5:24 am

It's nice that they have been shamed into putting subtitles on "Mandy". It's a pity they don't do it for all their English language films, it's not much to ask.

User avatar
manicsounds
Joined: Tue Nov 02, 2004 10:58 pm
Location: Tokyo, Japan

Re: Ealing - with subs

#15 Post by manicsounds » Wed Mar 17, 2010 10:19 am

and of course for some reason, even the recently released BD of "Ladykillers" have no subtitles for English....

User avatar
Erikht
Joined: Thu Nov 20, 2008 5:31 am

Re: Ealing - with subs

#16 Post by Erikht » Thu Mar 18, 2010 6:46 am

Will, ya kno' 'ow it is, guv', wudd take awa' som' o' the exper'nce o' the watcin', understandin' all that the nippers a' sayin' to ea' other.

User avatar
Duncan Hopper
Joined: Mon Dec 21, 2009 5:16 am
Location: http://www.eldiabolik.com
Contact:

Re: Ealing - with subs

#17 Post by Duncan Hopper » Thu Mar 18, 2010 6:59 am

Erikht wrote:Will, ya kno' 'ow it is, guv', wudd take awa' som' o' the exper'nce o' the watcin', understandin' all that the nippers a' sayin' to ea' other.
Nippers? I didn't know there were any children in 'the ladykillers'. :wink:

User avatar
Erikht
Joined: Thu Nov 20, 2008 5:31 am

Re: Ealing - with subs

#18 Post by Erikht » Thu Mar 18, 2010 6:59 am

Duncan Hopper wrote:
Erikht wrote:Will, ya kno' 'ow it is, guv', wudd take awa' som' o' the exper'nce o' the watcin', understandin' all that the nippers a' sayin' to ea' other.
Nippers? I didn't know there were any children in 'the ladykillers'. :wink:
Mandy, at the other hand....

User avatar
MichaelB
Joined: Fri Aug 11, 2006 6:20 pm
Location: Worthing
Contact:

Re: Ealing - with subs

#19 Post by MichaelB » Thu Mar 18, 2010 9:51 am

Erikht wrote:Will, ya kno' 'ow it is, guv', wudd take awa' som' o' the exper'nce o' the watcin', understandin' all that the nippers a' sayin' to ea' other.
Come on, own up - were you Dick Van Dyke's voice coach on Mary Poppins?

User avatar
Erikht
Joined: Thu Nov 20, 2008 5:31 am

Re: Ealing - with subs

#20 Post by Erikht » Thu Mar 18, 2010 10:01 am

MichaelB wrote:
Erikht wrote:Will, ya kno' 'ow it is, guv', wudd take awa' som' o' the exper'nce o' the watcin', understandin' all that the nippers a' sayin' to ea' other.
Come on, own up - were you Dick Van Dyke's voice coach on Mary Poppins?
Whell!, Sir, I b'liv' that wudd 'ave moRe pRon'nc'd "R"'s, if ya' see whatt I mean.

But for those of us who thought we knew English and was shocked, SHOCKED I tell you, to find on our first charter trip to Greece in the mid' eighties that this was not so, when meeting our first drunk Liverpudlian, these Ealing films bring back sad memories. And for my poor, old mother, whose descant went the way of American Lending Banks several years ago, the un-texted films can be a problem. As for the deaf, these editions are worthless, are they not?

Post Reply