mm, gotta love anti-American snobbery.

[alexist]

Quite a few of the British reviews of March of the Penguins have commented on the "overly sentimental" narration and said, more or less, "trust the Yanks to tack that on".

What they don't appear to know is that the original French narration had actors as the "voices" of the penguins, and by all accounts was even more sentimental and anthropomorphised than the American one!

But of course, it was the Americans who had to tack on a sentimental narration; could never have been the French....

Comments

[http://users.livejournal.com/_kent/]

Right. So, the American version is not a translation of the French dialogue? In which case, the American version's narration is the sole responsibility of the American producers, and it is right to criticise the American producers for that. If the reviews are saying "...ruining the excellent and unsentimental original French film" then they are wrong. But they are not saying that. They are not reviewing the French version at all, for the not unreasonable reason that the French version has not been presented for review, and is not on general release in this country.

The British may be a down-on-its-luck ex-imperial nation, but we are still Gods of the Wildlife Documentary, and we will brook no foolishness in this, our last bastion of world supremacy!

[rainfx.livejournal.com]

1. I think the British have a problem with the 'Americanisation' of films. Braveheart. The Patriot. U571. The Italian Job(!).

2. "Trust the Frenchies to tack on the overly sentimental narration" is just as likely were they to review the French version.

And of course, we conveniently forget Johnny Morris & "Animal Magic". :)