Film Titles in French

Some of the popular titles that have come out simultaneously in the US and in France sound much more intriguing in French.

Consider, for instance, "The Devil Wears Prada" and "Le Diable s'habille en Prada," or the Al Gore thriller, "An Inconvenient Truth" which has been transformed into "Une Vérite Qui Dérange."

A funny thing happened as I was watching "The Devil Wears Prada" last night on the screen: I ended up reading the subtitles, just as I did when I watched English-language movies in Japan, subtitled in Japanese.

There are some cultural differences such as the way one character talks about coming into work at 8 AM in English, which is translated into 9AM in French. With the work day beginning and ending later and meals time shifted down a few hours later than in the US, a good translator has to not only get the words right but has to also make sure these translations are "culturally acceptable."