Foreign language dialogue

[Orbital Bob]

i know that if a character is speaking in a foreign language, parenthesis are needed under the name of the character, and then english is used. But what if subtitles are not to be used when this character is speaking. In other words no one knows what the character is really saying. Would I still need to put the character like this:

.......................MAHMOUD
.................(foreign language)
............blah blah blah blah blah blah

or what

[jimjimgrande]

If no one is meant to understand it, then it probably belongs in an action line, not in dialogue format.

JOHN
You in or you out?

CHANG
Moment please.

Chang and his partners confer in Mandarin, while John waits for an answer.

[ComicBent]

You can always just use:

CHANG
(in Chinese)
This guy is a big dope.


The decision of what/how/when/if to subtitle is the director's decision.

[captain bligh]

it's not the director's decision in the screenplay; it's the writer's decision.

i always aim for the reading experience to be as close to what i imagine watching the movie would be like as i can make it, and if i imagine that someone says something in a foreign language, but it isn't subtitled (i have had scenes like that, where the meaning of the dialogue is made obvious by the context -- or not made obvious at all), then i simply write it in the foreign language.

i've done this in spanish and german, in two different scripts. no one has ever said this was wrong, and that includes people who make their living as agents or writers or directors or producers.

i'm not saying what the others have said isn't sound advice. i think it is. if that's the way you want to do it.

but i also think there's more than one way to do things, and you should choose the way that best expresses what you want expressed, the way you want it expressed.

[Webs]

I have a bit of foreign language in my current work. The worst is something like this:

CHARACTER
Hey, Rudy, how's it going?
(in Hebrew to Tal)
Boy, that Rudy is a jerk.
(to Rudy)
Tal thinks you're a jerk!


That's a lot of wasted lines. :)

(Dialogue made up for this example, and not indicative of my true level of inability.)

[Deus Ex Machine]

The parenthetic format to indicate a language is fine. That's how I do it.

If we are not meant to understand what is said I'd be inclined to include in the action rather than dialogue.

Jack and Jill have a heated exchange in Chinese.

Jill seductively purrs something in Chinese.

Jack gasps something in Chinese.

Etc...

[v i o l e n t c a s e s]

if you want to see something like dem's example above, but formatted as character with dialogue, check out the screenplay for the crow. it handled this very well.

[Alex Mercer]

In my script I needed a person to speak spanish in a really small part. This is how I did it

Mexican
(o'dios es un nombre)
Oh my god its a man.

Is this acceptable?

Alex

[jimjimgrande]

First Alex - it would be "Dios mio, es un hombre."

Second - if you want it said in Spanish, but understood in English, you would write

MEXICAN
(in spanish)
Oh my God, it's a man.

or

MEXICAN
(in Spanish, subtitled)
Oh my God, it's a man.

You don't write it out in Spanish unless you have some particular reason to.

[Deus Ex Machine]

Don't write it in Spanish, write it in English and indicate it is being spoken in Spanish. To write it in both languages is redundant at best and pure gibberish at worst if the reader is unable to read Spanish.

.....DEUS
..(in Latin)
Do it like this.

[Alex Mercer]

Thanks, Ill change it now.

Alex

[Webs]

I have a closely related question. Say you have to put a foreign-language phrase in dialogue instead of putting it in English for a tarnslator to work on later. Examples I can think of are prayers (Latin, Hebrew, etc.) or specific salutations (you want "adieu" instead of "au revoir" or "salut", e.g.).

When you put this in dialogue, should you italicize it, to indicate that it is in a foreign language and shouldn't be spoken as if in English? An English speaker saying "au revoir" sounds different than when that is spoken in French. Most fiction and stylebooks will italicize foreign words. Should a screenplay?

[Deus Ex Machine]

It's not necessary to italicize or underline or bold foreign words in dialogue. Keep foreign words to a minimal and try to stick to those that are commonly used.

........DEUS
Si. I understand.

[Hairy Lime]

Spanish keeps creeping into my scripts. Several conventions I've used to good effect depend on the situation.

First, If the entire conversation takes place in Spanish, I'll put that information in the action description with something simple like "Pepe and Chip speak Spanish throughout this scene." This saves lines and lines off the length of the script, particularly if the scene is several pages in length.

If the conversation switches languages, I use the parenthetical (in Spanish) for the foreign language and write the English dialogue as usual.

If the audience and/or protagonist is not supposed to understand what is being said, I'll write the dialogue in Spanish.

Finally, if the language varies within a sentence (Spanglish anyone?), I'll use the Spanish word italicized and if the word isn't commonly known, I'll usually try to use another character (or context) to convey the meaning.

For example...

BERT
You scared? You're such
a little puta.

ERNIE
Dude, I'm no p-ssy.

[A Pathetic Writer]

I have a character translating Apache in my newest script.

It reads something like like this:


JOHN
ai la ba xi ra tana i
(beat)
I would like a taco, please.

[DUCPHO]

RED BEAVER
(in Blackfoot, subtitled)
Bla, bla, bla!

[Deus Ex Machine]

Writing out the actual language only tries to impress the reader with your linguistic skill but it doesn't advance the story at all because only the English can be understood.


................DEUS
Veni, vidi, vici.
......(In Latin)
I came. I saw. I conquered.

Is the same as:

................DEUS
Gibberish that wastes space.
......(In Latin)
I came. I saw. I conquered.

My deux cents :)