Demonic_Duck Posted July 2, 2015 at 03:47 PM Report Posted July 2, 2015 at 03:47 PM Got behind, only just watched to the end of episode 7. Why do Chinese shows/films dub adults performing painfully obvious voice acting parts over child actors? Children don't sound like 撒娇ing adults when they speak, they sound like children. Quote
StChris Posted July 3, 2015 at 12:00 PM Author Report Posted July 3, 2015 at 12:00 PM It's not just child actors who receive the dubbing treatment. If you're only up to episode 7 then you've got quite a bit of dubbing goodness to look forward to! The worst offender for dubbing imho is 爱情公寓. They completely dubbed the voice of a fairly major character (Nuolan). I can understand that they might discover some problems with the sound during post production and want to dub a small section to make it clearer, but I really don't understand the casting process whereby they choose someone for the role while disliking their voice so much that they feel the need to dub it over. I can only assume that they thought her voice was fine during the audition, and then decided later that it didn't really suit the character. It must have come as a blow to the actress concerned. The way you say your lines pretty much accounts for half of your performance as an actor! Quote
StChris Posted July 3, 2015 at 12:16 PM Author Report Posted July 3, 2015 at 12:16 PM Hi hanola, glad you're enjoying the show. I think good textbooks are essential when you're first starting out but, as you said, it's always good to supplement that with some real-life Chinese. I starting watching Chinese TV shows pretty early on in my learning process too, but I always watched ones with English subtitles and was just happy to be able to understand the odd word or phrase here and there (对不起, 我肚子饿了, 你活该 etc). It looks like that with your Japanese you have the advantage of being able to jump right in and start reading hanzi. Quote
Flickserve Posted July 3, 2015 at 12:56 PM Report Posted July 3, 2015 at 12:56 PM I can read some characters but sometimes, I really wonder did the actor really say what is written? Quote
StChris Posted July 3, 2015 at 02:46 PM Author Report Posted July 3, 2015 at 02:46 PM Episode 19: 真的完蛋了 After spending the entire series wrangling, Claire and 叶军 finally go to the registry office to get divorced; only Claire's temper gets them into bother again and results in a trip to the local 派出所. http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XMTI3NjAyNDQyMA==.html?from=y1.2-2.4.1 围城 wei2cheng2 besieged city 百般 bai3ban1 a hundred different ways/kinds 共存 gong4cun2 coexist 姘头 pin1tou0 have illicit relations 秧歌 yang1ge0 a type of rural folk dance 老三届 lao3san1jie4 refers to people who were at high school during the years 1966, 1967 and 1968, and so were sent off to the countryside without having the chance to take their 高考 exam (this was the period of the Cultural Revolution). Many would get the chance to take the exam and continue their education once it was reinstated in 1977. 插队落户 cha1dui4luo4hu4 (of urban school graduates) be sent to the countryside to become members of a production team 孽债 nie4zhai4 be guilty if an offence, for which one has yet to be punished for 梅干菜 mei2gan1cai4 some kind of dried pickled vegetables made with leaf mustard 净身出户 jing4shen1chu1hu4 to leave a marriage with nothing (no possessions of property) 赖 lai4 the fault of, to blame 都赖你=it's all your fault 罪状 zui4zhuang4 charges or facts about a crime 招商银行 zhao1shang1yin2hang2 investment bank 奥特莱斯 ao4te4lai2si1 retail outlet (what an ugly sounding word!) 陈坤 chen2kun1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chen_Kun 钟馗 zhong1kui2 a mythological figure supposed to drive away evil spirits) 钟馗伏魔 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3585004/ 徐静蕾 xu2jing4lei3 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xu_Jinglei 王朔 wang2shuo4 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wang_Shuo 陈凯歌 chen2kai3ge1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chen_Kaige 头一回 tou2yi1hui2 for the first time 骚货 sao1huo4 slut 碰瓷 peng4ci2 someone who deliberately tries to get themselves hit by a car so that they can exhort money from the driver 周润发 zhou1run4fa1 Chow Yun-fat 口头语 kou3tou2yu3 pet phrase, a expression or turn of phrase that a speaker repeatedly uses without being aware of it 沪语 hu4yu3 Shanghainese 结实 jie1shi0 solid, sturdy 捂 wu3 to cover with one's hand 胃口 wei4kou3 appetite 监控 jian1kong4 CCTV camera 抄 chao1 make a turning move 治安 zhi4an1 public order 水瓶座 shui3ping2zuo4 Aquarius (zodiac sign) 倒流 dao3liu2 flow backwards 趾甲 zhi3jia3 toenail 1 Quote
StChris Posted July 3, 2015 at 03:34 PM Author Report Posted July 3, 2015 at 03:34 PM Some tricky bits in this episode: 1. The conversation with the woman in charge of granting divorces. (from 05:18 onwards) I'm not 100% sure what she's getting at here. She seems to think that their divorce is fake, and that 叶军 is preparing to go abroad. The only scenario I can imagine is that she thinks they want to immigrate and that 叶军 will divorce Claire, have a sham marriage in the other country, then divorce and remarry Claire once he gains the right to permanent residency. She warns Claire that most men in this type of situation never come back ("十个里有十一个是不回来的"). She also warns 叶军 that since he has agreed to sign over all his property over to Claire, he'll be left with nothing (净身出户) should Claire catch him having an affair (小花头). That's the best I can come up with anyway. 2. 五册那 (13:38) Definitely a Shanghainese insult. Anyone care to translate? 3. Conversation with the policeman (20:03) The policeman says: 我年轻的时候和你一样，眼睛里没沙子。可年纪大了才发现，很多时候啊，坏就坏在没沙子。这做人呢，包容点，谁能一辈子不犯错啊？ I think to not have sand in your eyes means to believe you're pure and innocent, and have never done anything wrong. Maybe someone can correct me on this if I'm wrong. Quote
StChris Posted July 3, 2015 at 03:36 PM Author Report Posted July 3, 2015 at 03:36 PM Flickserve, what the actors say and the the subtitles seem to match pretty well to me, except for the parts when they're speaking Shanghainese or Sichuanese. Quote
Demonic_Duck Posted July 4, 2015 at 01:45 PM Report Posted July 4, 2015 at 01:45 PM It's not just child actors who receive the dubbing treatment. If you're only up to episode 7 then you've got quite a bit of dubbing goodness to look forward to! The worst offender for dubbing imho is 爱情公寓. They completely dubbed the voice of a fairly major character (Nuolan). I can understand that they might discover some problems with the sound during post production and want to dub a small section to make it clearer, but I really don't understand the casting process whereby they choose someone for the role while disliking their voice so much that they feel the need to dub it over. I can only assume that they thought her voice was fine during the audition, and then decided later that it didn't really suit the character. It must have come as a blow to the actress concerned. The way you say your lines pretty much accounts for half of your performance as an actor! That sounds awful, but at least if both the voice actor and the poor unfortunate whose voice was deemed too 难听 to remain on the finished product are broadly within the same age range, the result seems like something that person could concievably produce without dramatic physical changes to their lungs and vocal cords. An adult woman dubbing a little girl's part will never sound natural unless she's a highly talented voice actor (and China seems to be sorely lacking in talented voice actors... think of all those hundreds/thousands of dubbed western shows where every male part is dubbed by a single guy making minor alterations to his voice. It's like your dad telling you bedtime stories... and the weirdest thing is it seems to be the same guy for all of the shows). I guess a woman dubbing a girl's part is better than a man dubbing a boy's part. You're doing a sterling job with all these vocab lists, by the way. I still need to catch up with this show. I'm not sure "mould-breaking" was quite the right description, but it's certainly entertaining enough. Quote
StChris Posted July 4, 2015 at 07:40 PM Author Report Posted July 4, 2015 at 07:40 PM Haha, well I did concede that I might be exaggerating a little with the whole "mould-breaking" thing in my first post, but I still maintain that this series is a cut above your average Chinese show (not that there's tough competition mind). My favourite ever Chinese drama is still probably 空镜子: http://www.chinese-forums.com/index.php?/topic/16969-first-episodes-2-%E7%A9%BA%E9%95%9C%E5%AD%90-empty-mirror/ The show I mentioned with the really bad dubbed character 爱情公寓 is actually really good and definitely worth watching (renzhe did some good work on with the vocab lists) http://www.chinese-forums.com/index.php?/topic/24159-first-episode-70-%E7%88%B1%E6%83%85%E5%85%AC%E5%AF%93-ipartment/ 1 Quote
somethingfunny Posted July 13, 2015 at 10:02 AM Report Posted July 13, 2015 at 10:02 AM I watched about 13/14 episodes of this and never noticed any dubbing... I was concentrating pretty hard on following what was happening though. Which characters voices were dubbed? While I enjoyed some episodes I kind of gave up on this for two reasons. Firstly, the product placement was outrageous, I'd rather they just have an advert break, although that was essentially what was happening when a character would stop mid-conversation to launch into an aside on the merits of 人马头. Secondly, I found pretty much all the characters to be fairly unlikeable. 安东尼 was a big sop, ling was super aloof to the point of having no personality, 叶军 just seemed to look p*ssed off the whole time. Admittedly though, Claire was kind of interesting and 小年糕 (apart from her voice). However, 胡超 was by far the best character and had me laughing out loud on a regular basis, especially the episode where they first meet 小年糕 outside the restaurant. If you told me that all remaining episodes were about his character then I'd watch them right now. Pretty much every time I watched an episode I had my fingers crossed it was going to be about him. Actually, I'd be interested to know if anybody knows if there are any other (comedy) shows that he's in... Of course, the upside is that it was good listening practice and I learnt some pretty interesting vocabulary, thanks again for all the effort you put in StChris, good job! (p.s. A couple of days ago I met up with a friend of mine from back home who is on a 2 week trip of China and I took him to a nightclub, just to show him what it was like really, and anyway the cheapest thing on the menu was some kind of Remy Martin. I have to say, it didn't make me feel like a 真男人 when I was drinking it, probably because it was fake and the club was full of questionable folk.) Quote
StChris Posted July 17, 2015 at 10:16 AM Author Report Posted July 17, 2015 at 10:16 AM Episode 20: 狗熊与荷包蛋 In this final episode it finally looks as though 胡超 might be on the straight and narrow as he gets a job in the local coffee shop. Meanwhile 家皓's fugitive friend's days could be numbered as the police start looking for a killer. http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XMTI4MTY5MzkwNA==.html?from=y1.2-2.4.19 物欲 wu4yu4 craving for material things 纵横 zong4heng2 length and breadth, all over 身不由己 shen1bu4you2ji3 involuntary, under compulsion 狗熊 gou3xiong2 black bear, coward 荷包蛋 he2bao1dan4 poached eggs 黑名单 hei1ming2dan1 blacklist 麦乐送 mai4le4song4 McDonalds delivery service 暗无天日 an4wu2tian1ri4 an abyss of darkness, a world without justice 失传 shi1chuan2 lost (not handed down from past generations) 以下 yi3xia4 the following 播报 bo1bao4 to announce, to read (the news) 通缉 tong1ji1 to order the arrest of someone 侦查 zhen1cha2 investigate (a crime) 系 xi4 to concern, to relate to 缉捕 ji1bu3 to arrest 线索 xian4suo3 clue, thread 属实 shu3shi4 verified, to turn out to be true 刑警 xing2jing3 criminal police (short for 刑事警察) 档次 dang4ci4 quality, class 盗墓 dao4mu4 to rob a grave 盗墓笔记 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daomu 弄堂 long4tang2 alley 盯梢 ding1shao1 to shadow someone (follow them) 反悔 fan3hui3 to renege on a deal, break a promise 蟋蟀 xi1shuai4 cricket (insect) 娘们儿 niang2menr wife 两小无猜 liang3xiao3wu2cai1 innocent playmates (of a boy and girl) 挂 gua4 to die 寻思 xun2si0 to think to oneself 接缝派 jie1feng1pai4 welcome back party 放哨 fang4shao4 be on patrol 旮 ga1 nook, out of the way place 提心吊胆 ti2xin1diao4dan3 be on tenterhooks, be on edge 犊子 du2zi0 calf (baby cow) 枉费 wang3fei4 to waste, in vain 穷凶极恶 qiong2xiong1ji2e4 extremely vicious, utterly evil 1 Quote
StChris Posted July 17, 2015 at 10:41 AM Author Report Posted July 17, 2015 at 10:41 AM somethingfunny, the guy who talks to the girls in the bar in episode 13 is definitely dubbed, and also 安东尼's dad in episode 18. Yeah, 安东尼 is a total wet blanket. If they film a second season of this hopefully him and Ling will take that job in Singapore. 胡超 is my favourite too, but I think 梅婷's no-nonsense attitude provides good foil for his overall rascalliness. I like his friend 家皓 too, although the show never explains how a person who was so poor in university that he needed handouts from his friend to survive suddenly becomes so rich in the span of just a few years that he can give away his house and car and still be splashing the cash, despite only being a piano teacher. I know there's some kind of law that every Chinese show has to have a really rich guy in it, but still... If you've already made it to episode 13 then you might as well carry on and finish the lot. As far as I can remember there's only one more 安东尼 episode and lots of 胡超 goodness in the remaining 7. If you like the actor who plays 胡超 then you can check out his other works here: http://www.youku.com/star_page/uid_UMTI4NTkyNA==.html Let me know if you find anything decent. 1 Quote
StChris Posted July 17, 2015 at 10:44 AM Author Report Posted July 17, 2015 at 10:44 AM Poor Remy Martin. All the product placement and advertising to establish themselves as the high-end sophisticated choice for today's young city slickers, yet they still end up as the cheapest thing on the menu in some sketchy club. 1 Quote
StChris Posted July 17, 2015 at 10:54 AM Author Report Posted July 17, 2015 at 10:54 AM Well, that's it (until series two at least). If you've managed to make it to the end as well, then join me for a bottle of 人头马club, as we congratulate ourselves on being 真男人. (ladies, don't feel excluded, that includes you too. "真男人" is a marketing concept that transcends mere gender). If anyone's interested I did the whole vocab thing with a different series last year: http://www.chinese-forums.com/index.php?/topic/43679-chinese-drama-with-vocab-%E6%88%91%E4%BB%AC%E6%97%A0%E5%A4%84%E5%AE%89%E6%94%BE%E7%9A%84%E9%9D%92%E6%98%A5/ Like 男人不醉, it's pretty short (for a Chinese drama) at 24 half an hour episodes. 1 Quote
somethingfunny Posted July 17, 2015 at 11:48 AM Report Posted July 17, 2015 at 11:48 AM If I've got some down time I'll check out the remaining episodes. You're right, 胡超 and 梅婷's interplay was a pretty good aspect of the show. And yes, 家皓 was also pretty good, especially in that episode where they meet 小年糕. His endless wealth does seem a bit suspect though. It's funny, I lived in Shenyang for 3 years and that episode where his 东北 friend turned up was a little too close for comfort - in other words, I found the story line much more believable before he admitted he was lying about killing that guy. And just like 乔杉 who turns up as the token 东北人 in comedy sketch shows, he manages to turn something long like 干什么玩意的 into just one syllable. Incredible. Thanks for the big effort on this one. I'll check out that link and see if anything turns up. (Also, like any high class liquor, there are a lot of different coloured labels they can charge you different prices for, I'm sure the 真男人 in this show only drink the priciest.) 1 Quote
somethingfunny Posted July 17, 2015 at 11:49 AM Report Posted July 17, 2015 at 11:49 AM Actually, does anyone know what the difference between 真男人 and 男子汉 is? Apart from the colour of Remy Martin they both drink... Quote
HerrPetersen Posted August 25, 2015 at 10:37 AM Report Posted August 25, 2015 at 10:37 AM Are there plans to continue the show? It does not feel quiet finished yet. Quote
StChris Posted August 25, 2015 at 11:09 AM Author Report Posted August 25, 2015 at 11:09 AM I haven't seen any official confirmation yet, but the articles that I have read seem to imply that there will be a second series. The show was a joint venture between youku and tudou (I don't think it was ever broadcast on regular TV). It seems to have been fairly successful, so hopefully there'll be more. You're right about it not seeming finished yet. Pretty much all of the storylines are still at a loose end (will 叶军 and Claire divorce, does 家皓 and 小年糕 ever get it together etc). Quote
HerrPetersen Posted August 26, 2015 at 09:14 AM Report Posted August 26, 2015 at 09:14 AM Fingers crossed; I find it difficult to find truely enjoyable Chinese media and this show was quiet fun. I did not "study" the show and probably misunderstood a lot of things that were going on. I did read your vocab lists so thanks for that and the recommendation. Quote
StChris Posted August 26, 2015 at 06:59 PM Author Report Posted August 26, 2015 at 06:59 PM This thread has an index of the different shows covered on the forum with a brief description for each, I'm sure you can find something you like out of all of those. Apart from the ones I mentioned above, another series I quite enjoyed was 蜗居. http://www.chinese-forums.com/index.php?/topic/24097-tv-series-recommendations-and-index-thread/ If not then films tend to be better quality than TV shows. The last Chinese film that I really liked was 有话好好说 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5toOYMdx1bc Quote
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