A Tentative Approach To Intentional Mistranslations Of English Film Names Into Chinese

Film, an art of picture and shadow, with its abundant forms ofexpression and its infinite art charms, is considered as an everlastingdomain which can attract people to seek after. Film name, is named as"business card", owning to its important role for the success of the film.Sometimes a good name can embellish the film better and thereforefacilitate the propagandizing of a newly-born film; in contrast, an awfulname can only downcast an excellent work. Therefore, it can bring forthmore complicated and more scientific re-creation in film name translation,which can be considered not only as a word-conversion between differentlanguages, but also an artistic creation and a cross-culturalcommunication.This thesis sets out to explore the E-C translation of film names andits intentional mistranslation, with an attempt to lay down some basicrules for guiding film name translation. During the past decades, the studyon the translation of films have made great progress, whereas, it is farfrom being sufficiently explored in film translation and film nametranslation due to their special and significant position in translation field;moreover, the study of intentional mistranslations of them from theperspective of aesthetics of reception and communication is even rarely seen. There are few monographs discussing on this topic at home andabroad. Only a few chapters have touched upon this issue. Actually, filmname translation is important and creative work. An excellent versionmay contribute a lot to the charm of the film and plays an important partin the introduction of a new film. Nevertheless, there is no systematic andfeasible principle to guide film name translation up to now. Virtually, filmname translation is very problematic, which is viewed as the translation inconfusion and even as the translation where the good and bad areintermingle. As a result, translations of different subjects have differentfunctions and purposes; and translations in different ages have to meetdifferent requirements. The function of film name translation is to givepublicity to the film—product in order to achieve the desired box-officesuccess. In this regard, the film name translation happens to have a sameeffect with the advertisement translation.In traditional translation theory, the optimal purpose is to string alongwith the original text to achieve absolute equivalence between the originand the translation, which is almost considered as an ideal state. In thepractical translation process, due to various factors such as the differencebetween languages and cultures, reader's horizon of reception andreactions of the reception as well as the characteristics of film names, it isdifficult for translators to present such translations, which are completelyequivalent with the original. Therefore, they have to do mistranslations on purpose for the sake of the target readers, in order to produce a moresuccessful, understandable and acceptable translation work.The traditional author-centered and text-centered studies cut off therelations between works and their readers, ignoring the initiatives ofreaders. Aesthetics of reception, for the first time in history, shifts thefocus from text authority to text-reader relationship and advocates that thedialogue between text and reader constitutes the meaning of a text. Thecommunication approach to translation, which takes all the essentialelements involved in the process of translation into account andemphasizes communication effect and highlights the role of receptors, issuitable to be the guiding theory of the translation of English film names.Based on the comparison of the sources, types, functions and styles ofEnglish and Chinese film names within the framework ofaudience-oriented approach, this thesis introduces four basic, namely theinformative value, the cultural value, the aesthetic value and thecommercial value, with an attempt to generalize five translation methods,i.e. transliteration, literal translation, free translation, combination ofliteral translation and free translation and adaptation.This thesis studies the intentional mistranslations of English filmnames into Chinese from the perspective of Aesthetics of Reception andCommunicationics. Different from actual mistakes found in translationworks, scrambled translation, uncontrolled translation and indiscriminate translation, intentional mistranslations discussed in this thesis are aninevitable phenomenon in E-C translation of film names, which is one ofthe ways leading to a successful translation work, for which, horizon ofexpectations, indeterminacy of the text meaning and reader responsetheory offer a firm ground. Its causes, features, functions andsignificances are dealt with. According to Aesthetic of Reception, thehistorical life of a literary work is unbelievable without the activeparticipation of the readers. The translated version should have bothcultural savor and good commercial appealing power, which should notonly be faithful to the original, but also cater to their aesthetic taste of thetarget language spectators and satisfy their psychological needs. Indeed,the translation of English film names is just like a'seesaw battle', whichtries to seek for a balance between literal translation and free translation,correspondence in form and similarity in spirit, art and commerce.