Rendition FAIL!

Last night we settle in to watch a movie - how boring has my life become?

Anyway, despite the fact that I was called a particularly nasty word when I said I'd rather stab my eyes and ears out than watch a film with Meryl Streep and Reese Witherspoon in it we chose to watch "Rendition".

Oh GAWD this movie is a turkey.

It raises some valid points about the United States' foreign policy and anti-terrorism protocols, but barely explores them in any depth - giving as a fluff piece about torture, essentially.

But that's not usually enough to make me bog about a film. Holy baby Jaybus I'm forced to endure enough of the worst of the world's cinema (almost on a weekly basis) and I don't feel compelled to share my pain on here with you all. However (because I'm copping so much grief from certain quarters about not bloggiong enough) maybe I'll add "Turkey of the Week" uh... better make that "Month" ;)

No, this little rant has to do with DVD subtitles.

This particular film is set mainly in Northern Africa and Egypt - much of the dialogue is in Arabic (although it sounded distinctly Farsi to me). So, does it make any sense that there are three options for subtitles on this stinking pile of garbage?

1. English Subtitles for the hearing impaired.
2. English subtitles of movie commentary by the director.
3. Off.

Are you on farken DRUGS Mr Movie Guy???

Let's start with subtitle #2. Who in their right mind wants to sit through a movie (and a lame as hell crap piece of baloney like this one) and read what the director thinks of the composition in the shot during the interrogation sequence? FARK OFF!

Subtitle #3. Off. Brilliant. Unless I learn Arabic, Egyptian, Farsi and Ms Streeps' curious brand of whatever 'southern' accent she was trying on this time (almost sounded like a dingo was about to eat her baby) I'm not going to be able to understand diddly-squat about this crappy waste of celluloid.

Okay, subtitle #1. Which I had to endure for pretty much all of this flick. English subtitles for the hearing impaired. Great! Now I get subtitles or EVERY character, including those speaking in English. But if that's not enough, we get every incidental sound described in loving detail. [fork taps against plate] or [chickens squawk] or [clears throat]. It has to have been the most distracting thing I've ever had to witness whilst watching a film. In fact, it was probably more painful than the torture being administered to one of the central characters. And what made it even more infuriating was that the incidental subtitles referred to sounds THAT WERE BARELY AUDIBLE EVEN TO ME!! [Man shouts] Huh? Maybe three hundred metres away. [phone rings] In an office, under the volume of the people talking and not even relevant to the story, as aid telephone doesn't get answered anyway. [heartbeat quickens] huh? [butterfly lands on plate of butter in the fridge] FMD!!!!

And the icing on the cake... why bother pointing out to hearing impaired people all of the things that they would never even hear in real life IF THEY WERE ACTUALLY THERE??

Wow!" said the deaf guy watching Rendition, "this movie is EVEN MORE REALISTIC THAN REAL LIFE!!!"


AAAAAAAARRRRRRRRGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!1!!!!!ONE!!!1!!!!!1