Dave's ESL Cafe's Student Discussion Forums

[karikaririka]

When I was reading a book, I met expressions of which I couldn�t understand the meanings.

In the book, a writer is selling his story to a motion-picture company. The president of the company was interested in the story, but he insisted that the story should be altered to make a box-office. He changed the title, the characters, and the situations. Although the story was about Spanish Inquisition, he insisted the setting should be changed too.
He said, "Fine. We will shoot in Vancouver. But no subtitles and we gotta update."　←What does this sentence mean? Does "subtitles" mean "caption"? or �subheading�? What word is omitted after "update" ? Is it �setting�? And what words are omitted before�no subtitles�? Could you tell me ?

If you don�t mind, can I ask you one more questions about this book?
The president said to the writer who was not good at writing from the woman .�We�ll bring in Nora Ephron to punch up the he-said, she-said dialogue�
What is �he-said, she-said dialogue�? Nora Ephron is famous scriptwriter who wrote the script of �You got a mail�. So I think this sentence has something to do with love stories. Am I right?

[dragn]

Yes, subtitles are the words that appear at the bottom of the screen that tell you what people are saying (either in the actual language being spoken or, more commonly, translated into some other language). I'm not really sure what exactly needs to be "updated." I can make educated guesses, but so can you.

Incidentally, there aren't exactly any words actually omitted before "no subtitles." However, you could rephrase this as "But let's not use any subtitles." That's what he means.

"He-said, she-said dialogue" is just a reference to dialogue in a novel or movie between a man and a woman. It doesn't necessarily have to be a romantic novel or movie, but often is in many cases.

Greg

[karikaririka]

Thank you very much for your speedy response.
So, can I rephrase this as �But let�s not use any subtitles, we should arrange this story to suit modern taste� ?
By the way, why �But� is used in this line? Should subtitles be used if they shoot in Vancouver? In Vancouver they speak English, so, Im not sure but, I think there is no need to use subtitles.
This script is about Spanish Inquisition, properly they should shoot in Spain. In this case I think that subtitles need to be used, because they speak Spanish there.

About"He-said, she-said dialogue", thank you for your illuminating explanation. I could gain proper understaning.

[dragn]

[karikaririka]

It�s so nice of you to answer such ambiguous questions.
I�m sorry if I hurt your feelings, but it was not my intention.
I�m so poor in English that I couldn�t discern appropriate questions and unappropriate questions. Pleae forgive me.I�ll be more careful.
Your answers were helpful to me. I'm very grateful to you.
I�ll be happy if you�ll advise me again in the future.

[redset]

In my experience, if someone uses a smiley they're not really upset

I think the president of the movie studio basically wants to change a lot of things about the novel, sacrificing the novelist's vision to make it more simple and more popular - to the point where it's not really much like the book! Updating probably means bringing it into a modern setting, or adding some 'cool' aspects that moviegoers expect to see these days.

I'm not entirely sure about the but - the president is offering a deal ('you get what you want but here's what I want to change'), so it seems as though the author wants to film in Vancouver and the president is allowing this concession, and following it with his own requirements. I don't know why the author would especially want a movie based on the Spanish Inquisition to be filmed in Vancouver, so it sounds like a strange couple of sentences to me - since you're reading the book, maybe you know something we don't!

You'd expect there to be a lot of dialogue in Spanish, which would require English subtitles - however they're not popular with the general public, which is probably why the director is refusing to use them (meaning the movie would be acted in English of course, not in Spanish with no translation!). The subtitles don't have anything to do with where a movie is filmed, they're just needed if the movie has speech or text which needs to be translated for the audience.

Basically what seems to be implied is that the director wants to 'dumb down' the author's work, cutting corners to save money and pandering to the average moviegoer just to make a big profit, rather than staying true to the author's vision. But this is just a guess, since I haven't read the book

EDIT: Oh yeah, another definition of 'he said, she said' is an argument between a man and a woman, both claiming different things happened. It's often used when there are two or more sides in a dispute, each claiming something different is true, with people stuck in the middle unsure of what the real truth is.