Subtitles for adults

From the beginning, the diners have made their choice clear: in films and in works aimed at adults, in general, they are inclined to use subtitles, as they consider that the original version loses more with the dubbing than with the subtitling. “Thinking about the actors I think it is a doubling crime, because much of the representation is lost,” says Ane Muñoz. In addition, I find it incredible to hear the Chinese speaking in Basque or in Spanish.” He believes that if they duplicate, the work of the dubbyists should be closely monitored, but stresses that the subtitles should also be provided well prepared: “In my short Basurdea, for example, the protagonists are two fishermen of Hondarribia and I wanted to maintain their language and their expressions; that had to be reflected also in the subtitles, they could not be neutral subtitles, and for that I used ‘we found’ and so on. In the same way, when thinking about plans, framing, etc., I took into account that I would use subtitles, and it is useful to predict this, for example, so as not to put the image too complete when reading”. In fact, as pointed out by Iñako Gurrutxaga, with the subtitles part of the information is also lost, while reading can lose the nuances that appear in the image, but with their deficiencies, the loss is less than in the dubbing.

They have pointed out that much is lost, for example, in the doubling of multilingual films: despite the fact that the characters work in various languages, they often translate them into a single language – at least in Spanish – eliminating inter-language play. With subtitles, however, there are tricks, brackets, cursive, colored… to represent the actors in different languages.

To the detriment of dubbing in Basque, adults are not used to watching movies of this kind, especially because they have seen them folded in Spanish, and it is strange to hear them in Basque, says Marian Galarraga. Not only that, the movies are not as well folded as Castilian, as the Spanish doubles are the best in the world. Luistxo Fernández also has little hope of doubling in Euskera and prefers to educate his sons and daughters in the original version, “but beyond films and series, there is another lot of materials that are best consumed, such as documentaries, with an economic unfolding above the original voice.” Any support is not valid for subtitles. “The other day a friend told me that he had been watching a Korean film on his cell phone with subtitles,” Muñoz said, “and to that end, to put subtitles on such a small screen, I see no sense to him.”

Cartoons and children

In the case of audiovisuals dedicated to children, the interlocutors also agree: they touch the necessary dubbing for the youngest in the house who cannot read. Gurrutxaga has pointed out that children have no problem seeing the same cartoons that occur in both the Euskaldunes and the Castellanoparlantes channels, and Fernández added that from an age, 7-8 years old, he focuses more on the quality of the dubbing than on the language when choosing the same cartoons in Basque or Spanish. That is, voices and dubbing give a lot of importance to be well done to decide which one you like the most.

But what is the right age to jump into the subtitles? It has given us some clues Luistxo Fernández. In his opinion, he has shown that at 9 years of age they begin to develop the ability to read and follow subtitles, and at 10 they can already watch the movie with subtitles. Moreover, “we sometimes see some of the world’s best animated film productions, and many of the films from the Pixar or Miyazaki studios are so round that even a 4-year-old could understand them in original version, both in English and in Japanese.”

For the sake of the normalization of the Basque Country, what is the preferred option?

The diners have not forgotten that the Basque language is a minority language and that we live surrounded by Castilian; that is the line that has given the longest and most dense debate. Does the situation of the Basque Country influence the defense of one model or another? Galarraga has pointed out that, to the extent that we suffer the bombardment of works in Spanish both on television and in cinemas, if we have to protect the Basque language, it is necessary that the works also be gathered in our language: “I always say, if in one room the film is offered in Spanish, in the other you have to be doubled in Basque, give the option of seeing it in one language or another. I would like to see a law put in place to ensure that all the films offered here are shown in Basque. Are subtitles preferable? Okay, let's sub-write it in Euskera, but then let the Spanish version also be subtitled, let everything be offered in the original version and subtitled in one language or another, if not, the Basque Country is at an incandescent disadvantage, surrounded by movies folded into Spanish."

Gurrutxaga believes that people will not go to the Basque Country to watch a folded film, because if in the adjoining room it is in Spanish, in the dubbing we will never be able to compete with the Spanish version. Therefore, the opposite strategy can be to give subtitles to people who want to consume in Basque: “For countries with many speakers where dubbing was born, we are four cats and it’s not enough to sustain a dubbing industry, why don’t we spread the habit of consuming the things subtitled in our society? An Argentine friend told me that there is a contrary trend taking place: until recently it was normal to see everything sub-written, now, instead, everything is bending and the friend cannot support it because it has been educated in another way. That’s why I say it’s a matter of custom, at first it will be difficult, but we’ll have to start to change that culture, and people will end up getting used to it.”

In addition, Muñoz believes that the subtitles for linguistic normalization are very useful: we are reading a foreign language film in Basque, we are not thinking in Spanish or in French, but in Basque. He also considers it dangerous for the film director to argue that the language is not standardized to defend dubbing. There are many ways to keep the Basque, “and by listening to the protagonists speak in Basque in a Mongolian film I will not know more Basque; on the contrary, I will sacrifice the artistic part if it is doubled and lose other details as a cinéphilous”.

But, as has been said, the key and the problem is to extend the subtitles. The Internet is changing the forms of audiovisual consumption, there are many people who see films and series downloaded from the network or from the network, often subtitled. “What we cannot think is that Euskera will be hegemonic in the television landscape we consume – he has taken the word Luistxo Fernández. The presence of the Basque country will be decreasing as there are more chains, we have seen it with DTT, and at least it can be an opportunity for everyone to get off the net and see them with subtitles in Euskera. The project Azpitituluak.com is there, thanks to the volunteers who translate we will make a catalog, and it is worth creating a popular file with subtitles in Basque as wide as possible. In this sense, it would be important to share the rich ETB subtitle file, as it has already made the subtitles of many films, but they cannot be achieved.” The ETB3 coordinator also believes that ETB should have a public and free license.

Gurrutxaga has also made a final note: to boost Euskera, rather than translating foreign production into Euskera, the road is to strengthen local production in Euskera.

Economic factor

Duplication is much more expensive than subtitling. What weight does it have and what weight should the economic factor have in choosing the model? The quartet has addressed the issue on the basis of Basque Public Television. As explained by the ETB3 coordinator, more than an expensive job, television looks at the audience and, for the time being, the doubled work attracts viewers. It added that EiTB, as a public body, should take into account not only its economic criteria, but also its commitment to industry and society, and that television has an agreement with the dubbing industry to maintain a dubbing quota. In Galarraga’s words, even if adult content were offered, if ETB were to opt for translating films for children and young people, it would be enough to support the industry of the doubling houses there, “because there are not so many”.

In the economic priorities, the member of azpitituluak.com has denounced the “irreversible problem” in which all this is at the starting point: “The largest audiovisual public economic cooperation in Euskera focuses on the financing of a large Spanish-language house. EITB is an absolutely diglosic organisation and there is no political party that wants an ETB entirely in Basque. In this area we should look at Catalonia, where it is not a public television in Spanish, and that policy has brought more steps behind, such as the keeping in the cinema of a number of films folded into Catalan”.