How Subtitling Services Help Break Down the Cultural Divide

The immense benefit of professional subtitling services and their positive contribution to the on-going diffusion of cultures around the world can be understood more through this personal anecdote. In the old days, it was easy to dismiss, say, a movie whose language was unknown to you. Back in the early 1990s, when I first came across a VHS copy of Giuseppe Tornatore's award-winning film Cinema Paradiso, the audio was in Italian-a language I barely understand even now-and so my ignorance made it easy for me to toss the said copy in the back bin. Instead, I would often watch movies that were already in the language I knew-English-such as the usual Hollywood fares, action and science fiction and fantasy films.
Many years later, finding a DVD copy of Cinema Paradiso and eventually being able to watch it, I realized the huge importance of the work that I almost failed to see. The said movie, after all, earned several rewards from a number of film festivals and award-giving bodies, foremost of which were the Academy Awards, the BAFTA, and Cannes.
It is important to note that professional subtitling services played a very important role in my personal experience-without English subtitles, for instance, I would not have access to the incredible emotional depths of the movie. I would not have understood Alfredo's role in the life and love of Salvatore. I would not have been able to plumb the depths of Salvatore's sense of loss-and the eventual peace that enfolds him by the end of the movie, as he watches the spliced reels of all the kissing scenes in films Alfredo had gathered many years ago.
This little anecdote could also have been the story of so many countless people whose lives have been "enriched" by having access to great works from countries of a different language. One cannot discount the important contribution to global culture of so many nameless professionals who labour at language translation services only to bring us accurate subtitling services.
Along with newly emerging forms of media (the emergence and gradual popularity of new media formats such as Blu-ray, for instance), subtitling services will only become much more in demand in the foreseeable future. And of course, it is not simply limited to a small number of languages-a typical DVD or Blu-Ray disc, for instance, of a fairly popular movie can have as many as 10 language choices in its "Subtitles" section, whereas the audio option is usually limited to up to three languages. Obviously, subtitling services play a crucial role in the dissemination of cultural products around the globe.