I vaguely remember that there was a foreign romantic comedy about ballroom dancing from around ten years ago. I recall that it got good reviews so I requested Strictly Ballroom from Netflix. It was directed by Baz Luhrmann, who directed Moulin Rouge! so I figured it had to be it. I watched it a few nights ago and, um, it was pretty bad. 94 minutes of my life lost forever.
After more Internet searching, I discovered the movie I was thinking about was Shall We Dance? I hope it is better.
Well months after everyone else saw the movie, I finally saw Chicago. Even though it came out on DVD less than a month ago, I’ve had it since March. It is one of the cheap bootleg DVDs that my wife bought when we were over in China.
Although I wasn’t partial to the purchases, I didn’t suggest that she toss them after she bought them at a street corner. They have been a mixed bag too. Besides the broken English on the packaging, the information on the paper packaging (like the running time) is usually not accurate.
I usually turn subtitles on even when the movie is in English. I do it because I watch most DVDs after my kids have gone to bed and I don’t want to miss a line of dialog when the volume is turned down.
What I found most humorous with these DVDs, is that the English subtitles are not constrained by what the actors actually say. The sentences usually make sense but rarely correlate to what is being said. They are so off the mark that I cannot enjoy the movie with them on. I figure they must be translating spoken English to Chinese and then back to written English.
I also have Catch Me If You Can. According to its subtitles it is the real life story of “Flank” Abignail.