In August, 2013, I started an English course and, after three years studying grammar and reading some books, I realized I should start pushing myself harder with respect to my listening skills. Then, I decided I would watch animation movies, due to their simpler language, to enhance my comprehension of spoken English.
After some time having fun watching animations, I decided it was time to raise my standards. I thought I should watch movies presenting more complex dialogues and, therefore, contexts that were closer to those I would find in real life. Of course, some American movies are immensely far away from what real life looks like, but you’ve got the idea, right?
Among the many movies I’ve watched, I will address two, which I think will serve the purpose of exemplifying my opinion: Rush Hour, starred by Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker; and Angels and Demons, based on the book by the same name written by Dan Brown.
In both movies you find different characters from different countries, thus each of them having a particular accent when speaking English. If you take Rush Hour as our first example, in which the two main characters are a Chinese inspector named Lee, who is interpreted by Jackie Chan, and a LAPD detective named James Carter, who is interpreted by Chris Tucker, you clearly notice the Chinese accent from inspector Lee against the native English spoken by detective Carter. If you ever watch this movie’s version in Portuguese, you will only know that each character has its own voice actor, but they both have the same accent; that is, even being important for the understanding and enjoyment of the movie, a Portuguese native speaker wouldn’t be able to differ between a Chinese struggling a little to speak in Portuguese and a “native speaker” (because they kind of make detective Carter and all the other Americans sound as someone from Brazil).
In addition, if you take our second example, Angels and Demons, which is set mainly in Italy, more specifically in Vatican, a country where the Pope lives, you would expect to hear different accents including, of course, an Italian accent. That’s exactly what you see if you are able to watch it in English; otherwise, if you watch the Portuguese dubbed version, you will find out that there is absolutely no difference between accents, regardless where the character is from.
In order to conclude my opinion, I want to point out that, even though some information is lost when a movie is dubbed, the work that is done by these professionals is essential, as is the process of translating any material. It allows people to communicate and, even more fascinating, it allows cultural exchange, which could, hopefully, foster tolerance and respect among people.