Feb
24
The world of doblaje in Spain
Dubbing movies and tv shows in Spanish is a major industry in Spain. Despite the fact that Spanish television channels and Spanish movie theaters are packed with products made in Hollywood, the overwhelming majority of that “product” is translated and dubbed into Spanish. U.S. television shows like CSI, Grey’s Anatomy and House are extremely popular with viewers in Spain and Spaniards go crazy for other Anglo pop-culture offerings like Harry Potter and The Lord of the Rings…but in Spanish, not in English. This is probably one of the single biggest factors why more Spaniards don’t speak English. They’re not exposed to enough real, dynamic English in all its forms spoken by native speakers. But I digress…
The industry in Spain for dubbing (i.e. replacing the original actor’s voice with a Spanish voice) is HUGE. So huge, in fact, that some actors who specialize in dubbing movies are practically household names. 
For example, Joan Pera, the voice of Woody Allen in Spain, is well known in Spanish cinematic circles. (Check out his photo. Looks like a young Woody, doesn’t he? 
)
That’s why some Spaniards are puzzled that Javier Bardem, undoubtedly the brightest star in the Spanish film industry, decided not to dub his own voice into Spanish for the American movie No Country for Old Men. The movie is completely in English and Javier gives a great performance as the creepy villan Anton Chigurh. But when it came time to dub his movie into Spanish, Javier took a pass. 
His voice in Spanish will be supplied by Jordi Boixaderas (pictured to the left), the same actor who also makes a living being the Spanish voice of Russell Crowe, Sean Bean from the Lord of the Rings movies, and Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson.
According to some Spaniards, dubbing a movie requires a different set of skills than regular acting. In fact, there are many Spaniards who consider dubbing an art. Some point to the experience of another Spanish actor Antonio Banderas, who has dubbed his voice in Spanish in some of his own films to less than critical acclaim. They say that Banderas doesn’t sound as good in Spanish as his dubbing double.
But if you’ve ever watched a dubbed movie or tv show in Spain and thought that all the voices sounded similar, you weren’t imagining it. 
Many of the top locutores dub multiple voices for the top actors and actresses. So if you’re wondering why the voice of John Travolta, George Clooney, Mel Gibson and Michael Douglas all sound exactly alike in Spanish it’s because they’re all voiced by the same Spanish actor, Salvador Vidal.
Anyway, I want to write more on this topic because it is an interesting cultural difference (this wide acceptance of dubbed movies) between Anglo culture and Spanish culture and also because I love talking about movies, but I’ve got to run. Maybe I’ll continue this topic tomorrow once we find out who has won at the Oscars. And if you’ve got your own opinion about dubbing movies, post away in the comments section. ¡Hasta entonces!
The problem is that dubbing was a great way in the Franco era for the government to control content, especially in a period when a large part of the population were iliterate. Nowadays the public are just used to it and can’t be bothered making the effort to read subtitles, As you point out, the situation is so ridiculous that many actors have the same “voices” and often Spanish pepole will say that’s the voice of Michael Caine or whoever.
It’s clear that this is one of the (many) problems with English learning - if you go to Portugal, where Tv & cinema are in the “original version”, the people are much more used to listening to other languages.
[…] movie dubbing but I’ve lost my original train of thought. Sorry. Meantime, check out the insightful comment that Chris made yesterday about dubbing’s history in […]
Chris,
Wonderful insight. Thanks for making this point. One of my co-workers had told me before that during Franco it wasn’t unheard of for plotlines in movies to change (thanks to the dubbing). My co-worker mentioned one example he knew of where the actors were supposed to be unrequited love interests but were turned into brother and sister in the dubbing, etc. I can’t remember the title of that movie now. I need to find out.
Nice article and comment by Chris. I agree with it all. The quality of the voice acting is really astounding sometimes. The Simpsons dubbers are spot on.
At least with the cable television channels, you can choose to hear the original soundtrack. One interesting thing is that sometimes, when the original actors are mumbling a lot in the original English soundtrack, I find myself switching to the overdubbed Spanish soundtrack because of how clear and easy to understand the dubbers are. Actors don’t always speak clearly, but the dubbers always do.
Yes, The Simpsons dubbers in Spanish do a pretty good job of capturing the same tone as the original English voices. So it can be done. But try watching reruns of Friends in dubbed Spanish. Ick!
I think Javier is giving the Spanish movie going public a silent message. That message is, “Go see the V.O. movie”.