Foreign Language versions of classics

[Michael O'Regan]

Viewing the Spanish Dracula raises the question for me - did all the studios at the time film alternate versions or was it just Universal? How many films were done like this? Frankenstein?

[cjh5801]

There was only one version of Frankenstein, but other studios filmed foreign language versions of films. Eran trece was the Spanish language version of Fox's lost Charlie Chan Carries On, and many of the Laurel and Hardy films had alternate language versions.

The practice supposedly ended in the 1930s, but I recently noticed that at least the first part of the French version of Imperial Venus (1963) is made up of alternate takes from the English language version.

[Michael O'Regan]

So, how was it decided which titles would have alternate versions filmed?

[Richard P. May]

It seems logical that this would only be done in situations where the re-shot version would have a box office appeal.

[augustinius]

This was a commonplace practice until the sound equipment for Hollywood allowed dubbing. Tons of movies were made multiple times for other markets. Buster Keaton made Spanish and French versions of several of his talkies, and there is both a German and English version of Anna Christie on the DVD, both VERY different to each other. The recent Laurel and Hardy DVD set had Spanish re-shoots of several L&H shorts. Not just Hollywood either - -there is of course an English and a German version of the Blue Angel. The practice was by and large over by 1932 but for two or three years, it would have almost been the norm as opposed to the exception.

[Wm. Charles Morrow]

MGM had Lubitsch direct a French language version of The Merry Widow in 1934. Chevalier and Jeanette MacDonald, who was fluent in French, repeat their roles, and the film is a shot-by-shot duplicate of the English language version. (Edward Everett Horton is missed, however). From what I gather Thalberg was worried that Chevalier's star was on the wane, and believed that this version would give him a boost in French speaking countries.

[todmichel]

In fact, this practice was never totally abandoned, and continued well after the early thirties. In the Fifties for instance, Christian-Jaque shot 3 versions of "Singoalla" (Swedish, French, English), all of them starring Viveca Lindfors, and 2 versions of "Barbe-Bleue", one in French with Pierre Brasseur, the other in German with Hans Albers; Cécile Aubry and Reggie Nalder were in both. Julien Duvivier shot a German and a French version of "Marianne of My Youth"; the French one with Pierre Vaneck and Gil Vidal, the German with Horst Buchholz and Udo Vioff; Marianne Hold played Marianne in both. Jean Boyer filmed "Garou-Garou, le passe-muraille" in French and English (as "Mr. Peek-a-Boo"), both with Bourvil and Joan Greenwood. In the early sixties, Edmond T. Gréville made two versions of "Les mains d'Orlac / Hands of Orlac", in French and English, with exactly the same cast but each shot (and the language) is différent, Christopher Lee says "merde!" in the French version, and Dany Carel is much unveiled also. Later, Werner Herzog made two versions (German and English) of "Nosferatu, Phantom of the Night), also with the same cast; both versions exist on DVD. Harry Kümel's "Malpertuis" also exists in two versions. Mustapha Akkad's "Muhammad, Messenger of God" was filmed in English and Arabic with different casts, both versions were theatrically released in France and are on the DVD. Etc.

[Michael O'Regan]

It seems logical that this would only be done in situations where the re-shot version would have a box office appeal.

Yes,indeed that does seem logical, but how come DRACULA and not FRANKENSTEIN for example? Would F not have appealed to the same audience as D?

[radiotelefonia]

This film, in the public domain, is no foreign language remake. This is the ORIGINAL version of a story that was later filmed in Italy twice. The second time in widescreen, color, "bigger" stars, and dubbed to English to be shown in the United States... but this original is much better:

[Hal Erickson]

Tenuously related to this thread is 1962's THE LONGEST DAY. Most American filmgoers saw the picture as intended, with the international cast speaking in their own languages, with English subtitles for the German and French actors. But when the film was first shown on American network TV in 1972, the print used alternate takes with the German and French cast members speaking in English (no not dubbed--actually saying their lines in English, obvious phonetically in certain cases). I've never seen that version since.

[Donald Binks]

I may be wrong, but I was under the impression that most Italian talking pictures - right up until recent times, were shot silent when they had a number of international stars in them. They were later dubbed with the voices in the language applicable to the country they were to be sold in.

[radiotelefonia]

This 1947 film was remade in Hollywood two years later:

[moviepas]

Eran trece This version does exist.

Paramount on Parade was made in other, seemingly lost, versions. One was the Swedish version. The Swedish(in English) All Talking All Dancing site has audio of the Swedish star who suicided not long after and his wife stayed in US and remarried there. The film appears to have vanished. A lot of this kind of work was done in the Joinville Studios in Paris which Paramount used. Marlene's husband was involved in the dubbing of films there before going to USA and that farm he is said to have had in California. Hitchcock's only musical(Waltzes of Vienna), with British dancer/singer Jessie Matthews, had a French version. Hitch hated the film and according to his daughter he rounded up all copies and negative and had the lot destroyed. However, after knowing this I fell over a French release from Universal in recent years that give both versions in a fashion of the film and pleased to have it.

Fox had Fox Europa to make films in England & Europe. Carousel as we know it came that way from Hungary to France & USA(Liliom).

The other angle is the redubbing the voices of native English speakers by others(not the songs). Australian films have had redubbed with USA voices in the 1970s etc, one Scottish film, Gregory's Girl had a US audio alternative. Just after WW2 Dirk Borgarde made his first films and one day he was in a moviehouse watching one with a friend in London and found his voice has been dubbed by someone else and he was not told. This happened to two or three of his earliest films. No reason has ever been found for this.

Imagine if they had been able to make sound films about 200 years ago in England and they survived. They would have to be dubbed or subtitled for today's English speakers to understand them. I am reading an 1800s English novel currently and many words and grammatical constructions are different then we would use today.

Two old friends of mine have run an evening Sunday to Friday 4 hour radio show here for over twenty years and have both had over 50 years radio & TV experience. They are excellent speakers and wellknown here. Recently, an old lady phoned in and told them they should be replaced as their voices were bad etc etc and she raved on. So they quickly got one of the panel guys on the show(he also queues up the callers and finds out what they want to talk about in advance of going on air) to take over the show for about 10 minutes. This guy has the most pronounced lisp you ever did here with all the R's as W's etc. Never heard from the lady after that.

In live theater here in Australia for a number of years they have had the habit of the locally born cast putting on American accents if the play is American. Ridiculous if you ask me and I used to delight when they slipped and their native accents crept in.

From a viewing point of view I prefer to watch films in their original languages and follow the subtitles if supplied. I have watched Paint Your Wagon in German-language and English subtitles which wasn't too bad.

In modern tlmes there have been films say made in USA that years later a foreign version has appeared or viceversa, been adapted from the original story. An example is the French Boudu Saved From Drowning which evolved into Down & Out in Beverly Hills years later. Victor Victoria is one that had a German original in the 1930's and Jessie Matthews made the Engllsh version later(First a Girl) using the same story but as a musical. Dirk Borgarde's 1950's English Come to the Fair is a remake of a German early 1930s original although no reference to the original seems to be on the credits.

[todmichel]

[quote] Victor Victoria is one that had a German original in the 1930's and Jessie Matthews made the Engllsh version later(First a Girl) using the same story but as a musical. Dirk Borgarde's 1950's English Come to the Fair is a remake of a German early 1930s original although no reference to the original seems to be on the credits.

"Victor Victoria" was remade as a musical in 1935 in UK as you mentioned, but moreover it was originally shot twice, the alternate version, in French, being called "Georges and Georgette". It was co-directed by Reinhold Schünzel and Roger Le Bon, and starred Adolf Wohlbrück, Meg Lemonnier, Julien Carette, Paulette Dubost and Félix Oudart.

The real title of "Come to the Fair" was "So Long at the Fair", 1950, co-directed by Anthony Darnborough and Terence Fisher, and you are right, it was a remake of Veit Harlan's "Verwehte Spuren", 1938. Both versions are quite superb, and suspenseful.

[Ray Faiola]

This was a dubbed version, but the titles are nifty!

[antoniod]

Don't forget Otto Preminger made a German version of THE MOON IS BLUE with Johanna Matz and Johannes Heesters(The loved-in-Germany-hated-in-his-native-Holland-for-working-with-nazis singer who just died at 107.)He said that you needed German stars for a film to make money in Germany. I'd read that the European print of KING KONG was always better than the US one. So why did it take so long for the US to get a version that resembled the 1933 release as opposed to the 1938 one?

[todmichel]

I'd read that the European print of KING KONG was always better than the US one.

Well, if you mean the French print shown above, the entire first reel was missing (the movie started with the boat leaving New York, so the French audiences of 1933 never knew how Fay Wray met Robert Armstrong, etc.). The same abridged version - but in German of course - was shown in Germany. In both the first reel was cut, but all the other shots cut in USA for the 1938 re-release were uncut - I saw this French version countless times in the early 60s, first at the Cinémathèque, then with a 9.5mm print that I bought at the Flea Market. Then in the mid-Sixties KING KONG was re-released in France, with giant posters everywhere, in two versions: a) the same shortened French-dubbed print, and b) for the first time, the subtitled US version, but NOT the 1938 one. It was - don't ask we where they got it in the mid-60s - the same complete version later (much later) seen in America.

[Christopher Jacobs]

I'd read that the European print of KING KONG was always better than the US one.

Well, if you mean the French print shown above, the entire first reel was missing (the movie started with the boat leaving New York, so the French audiences of 1933 never knew how Fay Wray met Robert Armstrong, etc.). The same abridged version - but in German of course - was shown in Germany. In both the first reel was cut, but all the other shots cut in USA for the 1938 re-release were uncut - I saw this French version countless times in the early 60s, first at the Cinémathèque, then with a 9.5mm print that I bought at the Flea Market. Then in the mid-Sixties KING KONG was re-released in France, with giant posters everywhere, in two versions: a) the same shortened French-dubbed print, and b) for the first time, the subtitled US version, but NOT the 1938 one. It was - don't ask we where they got it in the mid-60s - the same complete version later (much later) seen in America.

When I was in Egypt in 1979, I saw KING KONG as part of a double-feature in an "open-air" theater. It was in English with French and Arabic subtitles, and included all the censored shots later restored to the American print but showed no evidence of any splices (unlike the American newly restored versions at the time, which had obvious contrast and grain shifts at each restored sequence). It also jumped from the opening credits to a scene on the ship, shortly before they arrive at Skull Island. I'd always wondered whether it was an abridged version, or if the projectionist merely skipped a reel or two to fit it better into a double-bill. It sounds like it must have been the same European cut you describe.

[radiotelefonia]

This classic film was remade in Hollywood one year later: