1w ago

I unironically would go to this

90 comments

Movie theaters suck. They're expensive as fuck, loud parts shake the room, quiet parts are silent, no control over subtitles.
- no control over subtitles.
  Really most theaters I know you can rent a little plexiglass thing which gives you subtitles from a rear projector.
  
  What the fuck?
  Most theaters I know simply put the subtitles in the local language in EVERY movie.
  
  This doesn't happen in native English speaking countries (when the movie language is English, which it is 99.999% of the time).
  
  Yeah but the thing about being British is the local language is English. So I don't need subtitles to watch John Wick.
  Usually subtitles are only for the benefit of people who are deaf who obviously aren't very large percentage of the population so they get a little plexiglass thing so everyone else doesn't have to look at pointless subtitles.
  
  Yeah no. So much dialogue is unclear in movies. I started using subs when I had kids because they’re loud and discovered so many lines in movies I’ve seen many times but had never understood before. Now we watch everything with subs even if kids aren’t present.
  
  I'm also a native English speaker and I tend to disagree. I often find it hard to understand what the actors are saying due to poor sound quality and/or mixing. The explosions are too loud, the speech is too soft and I find myself turning on subtitles and playing around with the volume when watching movies at home.
  
  I have working ears and I always watch media with subtitles. Don't pretend to speak for me.
  
  Good for you?
  I have nothing against people watching with subtitles if they want to watch with subtitles. When did you get that idea?
  
  Stephen Fry talks about turning on the subtitles
  
  Must be a Europe thing. I’ve been to a plethora of movie theaters and never came across this. They just have designated Closed Caption screenings.
  
  I've never seen anything like it in Europe, where I live they even show the subs in 2 languages at the same time. It's horrible.
  
  It certainly thing in the UK I have no idea what other countries do. I've never watched movies in other countries unsurprisingly.
  
  Very much not common everywhere. Where I live, if you want subtitles, you need to find a cinema that has a showing with subtitles. Usually that’s also paired with the non dubbed original audio.
  A personal subtitle screen like those translucent mirrors you‘re describing sounds like a great solution though. I don’t really like subtitles unless I’m watching in a language I don’t understand very well but I know a lot of people who prefer having them on regardless.
  
  One could do it like in an opera house, where the subtitles are shown on a separate screen above or below the stage
  
  Or how they used to do it in the old days: pay a dozen or so soot-smudged orphan kids to dart back and forth throughout the performance with the script printed on signs, keeping time with the action on the stage. Might lose a few to milk-leg or dropsy but these were the mud times so at least they're not dodging industrial machinery through a cloud of mercury and asbestos.

90 comments