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Foreign Language & Testimonies

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reserv0ird0g

Hello fellow members of indietalk! I am in a stump and have been trying to figure out the answers to these two questions, but haven't been able to. I'm hoping someone will be able to help me out.

1. I'm writing a script for a film that is meant to be in Japanese, but of course, I am writing in English. How do I let the reader know that this script is meant to be in Japanese? (with English subtitles of course) Ex: Letters from Iwo Jima. It seems kind of repetitive to write (in Japanese) for all the dialogue.

2. I found some people who are willing to share their testimonies from a certain event in history that they were a part of. How should I approach the whole rights thing so that I can adapt (or write) their testimonies in my script? Do I type up some kind of form saying "I give full rights to the screenwriter to use my testimony"? Or is there something else?

Any and all help would be appreciated! I must say I am truly in love with this forum, especially the Screenwriting section. I can't tell you how many countless hours I've spent looking through old threads. :D
 
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reserv0ird0g said:
Hello fellow members of indietalk! I am in a stump and have been trying to figure out the answers to these two questions, but haven't been able to. I'm hoping someone will be able to help me out.

1. I'm writing a script for a film that is meant to be in Japanese, but of course, I am writing in English. How do I let the reader know that this script is meant to be in Japanese? (with English subtitles of course) Ex: Letters from Iwo Jima. It seems kind of repetitive to write (in Japanese) for all the dialogue.

2. I found some people who are willing to share their testimonies from a certain event in history that they were a part of. How should I approach the whole rights thing so that I can adapt (or write) their testimonies in my script? Do I type up some kind of form saying "I give full rights to the screenwriter to use my testimony"? Or is there something else?

Any and all help would be appreciated! I must say I am truly in love with this forum, especially the Screenwriting section. I can't tell you how many countless hours I've spent looking through old threads. :D
Click to expand...

If you're writing a script that is actually MEANT to be read in Japanese, then you'll need to get it translated to Japanese... Usually costs anywhere from a $500 to $2500 depending on who you can get to do it.

If you're writing the script for American producers to read, then of course you don't want it in Japanese because nobody will ever read it.

But something tells me I might not be completely understanding your dilemma... LOL.

filmy
 
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Thanks for the reply filmy! I realize that I may have not been too clear with my first post.

It is meant for American producers, but the whole movie will be in a foreign langauge. Does that make sense? Argh... I feel like it isn't making sense lol. The only example I can think of is Letters from Iwo Jima to get my point across.

I'll just say that I'm writing a script about the Hiroshima bombing, and I find it unrealistic if the Japanese people in my script were speaking English. But this movie is meant to be produced by an American Production Studio. I hope this helps you understand... so you can help me out lol. Because I am lost.

Btw, does anyone know the correct margins for a script? I was reading "The Hollywood Standard" and "The Screenwriter's Bible" and both have different settings for the margins. I use Final Draft. So hopefully someone can help me out with this too because I hear people are very precise when it comes to format.
 
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Script format...

I would use this guide as a starting point:

http://www.oscars.org/nicholl/script.pdf

The only thing I do differently is after the master location, I enter a blank space, then a single dash mark, another blank space, and then time of day... Like this:

EXT. DESERT HIGHWAY - DAY

Let me tell you WHY I do it that way...

It's expected. LOL. Plain and simple. Without the dash mark or even double dashes as others use and depending on the reader, it can hang the reading. Yeah, it's STUPID. Yeah, it shouldn't matter.

But it does. LOL.

Notice what it says here:

http://www.oscars.org/nicholl/format.html

A Few Notes on Formatting

There is no absolute "standard" format used by all professional screenwriters working in the American film industry. Slight variations abound in scripts written by professionals. That said, professional scripts will invariably resemble the formatting guide that follows. Nuances may vary -- margins slightly different, a dash here or there, parentheticals used this way or that -- but overall, professional screenplays fit these guidelines.

Here's my translation... LOL.

Use this as a starting point and THEN after your screenplay is finally complete, use different adustments to tweak or CHEAT the page count but use only those kinds of cheats you can get away with.

Cheats like making the font 95% of the size will definitely lower page count but you're just screwing yourself when someone retypes those pages and gets an accurate page count.

I like to cheat page count by simply adjusting the margins. I've seen acceptable left margins extend all way to 2 inches. You can cheat the top, right, and bottom -- usually with success by starting with an inch and either subtracting or adding .01 at a time until you get close to what you want -- page count wise.

I never go over .02 either way.

Dialogue is another area where screenplays can differ quite a lot... Same rule applies.

Another easy cheat is to triple space from the bottom of a scene to the next master scene heading. This is definitely going to increase your page count but a real easy fix when you've completed the script and it runs long... Just change it to a double space and page count goes down immediately.

Those are my own guidelines and have served me well.

As for your script... So you are writing it for American producers... As I see it, you have a few options...

1) Under each character cue that speaks in Japanese, you'll have to enter a parenthetical (as you previously mentioned) that says:

(in Japanese; English subtitles)

However, these really should be used sparingly and it sounds as though you're going to have a lot of Japanese dialogue.

If so...

2) Set up the scene to let us know that the characters are speaking in Japanese... Something like this:

NOTE: DIALOGUE IN THIS SCENE SPOKEN IN JAPANESE; SUBTITLED IN ENGLISH.

I would put this UNDER the description of the location on its own action line in CAPS.

3) I've seen a few screenplays that displayed a very similar note underneath the first description/action paragraph of the very first master location heading. Something like this:

NOTE: DIALOGUE IN THIS SCREENPLAY SPOKEN IN JAPANESE; SUBTITLED IN ENGLISH.

4) Finally, I've also seen a similar note placed above FADE IN:

If it were me, I would probably go with either 2 or 3 above DEPENDING on how much Japanese you require.

Hope that helps...

filmy
 
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