Kore-eda's "Shoplifters": What Was Lost in Translation
Kairi Jo and Lily Franky in "Shoplifters"
Longtime readers of Under the Hollywood Sign will remember my articles on Hirokazu Kore-eda's previous films and the linguistic and cultural confusion they engendered. Some of the problems stemmed from a lack of understanding of Japanese culture by American critics, while others were caused by Kore-eda's English subtitles.
An example of the latter occurs in "Nobody Knows," where the criminally neglectful mother refers to herself in English subtitles as "Mother." Although in Japan it's standard to refer to oneself by familial title--mother, father, brother, sister--it isn't in western languages. This led to one American critic using "chillingly" in describing the mother's perfectly normal Japanese. Clearly, "Mother" should have been translated as "I."
In light of this, I was relieved that "Shoplifters" has much better subtitles--at least until a key scene near the end. In it, Osamu Shibata, the head of a fictive family of societal throwaways says--according to the English subtitles--to Shota, the boy he has lovingly fathered, "From now on, I'm not your dad."
Unfortunately, that's not what he says in Japanese. As spoken by the actor Lily Franky, that pivotal line is: "So, I'll go back to being your uncle."
What difference does it make? For starters, what seems to be Shibata's rejection of the boy he bestowed with his own first name (both Osama and Shibata being pseudonyms) is anything but. He desperately wants to remain a part of Shota's life, as Kore-eda makes clear when Shibata subsequently runs after the bus Shota is riding. In fact, it is Shota who rejects Shibata by not looking back, though when he is out of sight the boy whispers, "Dad."
At a reception before the recent Golden Globes Foreign Language Symposium, I broached the translation with a member of Kore-eda's production team. She told me that they had discussed the line but decided not to translate it literally because they assumed the word uncle would confuse non-Japanese viewers. "He's not really his uncle," she said, and was surprised when I told her that avuncular relationships among people unrelated by blood are common in America and Europe, too.
"Shoplifters" is a masterpiece, and highly deserving of the Palme d'Or it won last year at Cannes. But Kore-eda, who speaks no English, needs a subtitler who understands cultural nuance as well as Japanese and English. There's so much more to languages than words.
Related articles:
https://underthehollywoodsign.wordpress.com/2010/09/15/lost-in-translation-american-movie-critics-on-japanese-films/
https://underthehollywoodsign.wordpress.com/2014/02/08/like-father-like-son-what-was-lost-in-translation-and-what-wasnt/
https://underthehollywoodsign.wordpress.com/2019/01/13/on-directing-children-hirokazu-kore-eda-reveals-his-secrets/