On Translation Of English Film Titles In Light Of The Skopos Theory

Film title translation occupies an important position in the translation field.Well-accepted film title translations can arouse the interests of audiences, attract themto go to the cinema, and thus directly increase the box office revenues. However, it hasnot received much attention from translation circles and only a few studies havecentered on it. Besides, most of these studies only focus on the discussion of thespecific translation strategies and do not propose any systematic and feasibletranslation principles. Traditional translation theories are feeble and futile for thetranslation of film titles that are oriented around strong purpose; they can not explainthe strategies of adjustment, omission and creation in most translation practices. TheGerman functionalist translation theory approaches translation from a new angle.According to the theory,“the end justifies the means”(Nord,2001, p.29), namely, thepurpose of translation decides translation strategies. This theory also gives a legalstatus to those translation methods that are not recognized by traditional translationtheories. Under the guidance of the Skopos Theory, the author analyzes twelverepresentative film title translation examples and puts forward two tentative translationmethods. This paper argues that the Skopos Theory may serve as an appropriatetranslation theory to conduct English film title translation for it enables the translatorto have enough room for creativity and thus provides a theoretical basis for achievingthe commercial value of the film and winning the box office revenue.