Question:
My father-in-law is Chinese (speaks Cantonese) and is recently retired, hence has a lot of time on his hands. He's really getting into his films but is having trouble following most of them. He speaks little English and therefore is restricted to Chinese films.
The problem is that his tastes tend towards the serious and/or the epic - absolutely NOT Hong Kong/kung fu films - and most of these are in Mandarin. He speaks a certain amount of Mandarin but can only really follow simple films or historical epics. Anything with naturalistic dialogue or strange dialects will leave him flummoxed. To give you an idea, he understood (and loved) The Road Home and The Emperor And The Assassin. We then bought him A One And A Two for Christmas but he was unable to follow it. :(
Can anyone recommend any good DVDs (any region) that come with Chinese subtitles? He'd be able to follow anything if it was subtitled (although please bear in mind his particular taste if you can - no sci-fi epics please!)
Failing that, are there any good films in Cantonese that aren't martial arts movies? All serious Chinese film-making seems to be in Mandarin.
Any assistance or recommendations gratefully received. :)
Well most/all HK dvds have chinese subtitles on them so your only other other problem is the films your father i law likes. For example how about films by Zhang Yimou such as Raise The Red Lantern. It is in mandarin but the R3 dvd has chinese subtitles on it so he could read them ok.
I also noticed that the HK dvd of A One And A Two has both cantonese and mandarin sound tracks on it as well as chinese subtitles. So he could either watch in mandarin with chinese subtitles or watch with the cantonese dub :)
Am I right to assume you got him the UK release with just english subs ?
www.dddhouse.com is your best bet for r3 dvds, your only problem now being the type of movies for him to watch. They are very cheap and a great supplier. For example that A One And A Two dvd costs HK$45 which is only around £3.50 (£5.00 with postage :) )
www.hivizone.com is another good site as well for R3's but they are more expensive.
Both companies are however extremely reliable and I've never had any problems with any of them :)
Basically for your father in law you'd be better always getting the r3 releases of mandarin films. They are all near enough guaranteed to have chinese subtitles. If you want to give a list of films your father in law might fancy seeing (but are in mandarin) it will be easy enough to find out if R3 dvds are available with chinese subtitles :)
I guess your father in law might like other Zhang Yimou films (he did the road home) such as Raise The Red Lantern which you can get on r3 with chinese subtitles.
Check out one of the R3 supliers, eg www.hivizone.com - they have loads of movies with chinese subs
The problem is that his tastes tend towards the serious and/or the epic - absolutely NOT Hong Kong/kung fu films - and most of these are in Mandarin. He speaks a certain amount of Mandarin but can only really follow simple films or historical epics. Anything with naturalistic dialogue or strange dialects will leave him flummoxed. To give you an idea, he understood (and loved) The Road Home and The Emperor And The Assassin. We then bought him A One And A Two for Christmas but he was unable to follow it. :(
Can anyone recommend any good DVDs (any region) that come with Chinese subtitles? He'd be able to follow anything if it was subtitled (although please bear in mind his particular taste if you can - no sci-fi epics please!)
Failing that, are there any good films in Cantonese that aren't martial arts movies? All serious Chinese film-making seems to be in Mandarin.
Any assistance or recommendations gratefully received. :)
Answers:
Well most/all HK dvds have chinese subtitles on them so your only other other problem is the films your father i law likes. For example how about films by Zhang Yimou such as Raise The Red Lantern. It is in mandarin but the R3 dvd has chinese subtitles on it so he could read them ok.
I also noticed that the HK dvd of A One And A Two has both cantonese and mandarin sound tracks on it as well as chinese subtitles. So he could either watch in mandarin with chinese subtitles or watch with the cantonese dub :)
Am I right to assume you got him the UK release with just english subs ?
www.dddhouse.com is your best bet for r3 dvds, your only problem now being the type of movies for him to watch. They are very cheap and a great supplier. For example that A One And A Two dvd costs HK$45 which is only around £3.50 (£5.00 with postage :) )
www.hivizone.com is another good site as well for R3's but they are more expensive.
Both companies are however extremely reliable and I've never had any problems with any of them :)
Basically for your father in law you'd be better always getting the r3 releases of mandarin films. They are all near enough guaranteed to have chinese subtitles. If you want to give a list of films your father in law might fancy seeing (but are in mandarin) it will be easy enough to find out if R3 dvds are available with chinese subtitles :)
I guess your father in law might like other Zhang Yimou films (he did the road home) such as Raise The Red Lantern which you can get on r3 with chinese subtitles.
Answers:
Check out one of the R3 supliers, eg www.hivizone.com - they have loads of movies with chinese subs
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