An integral aspect of XYZ Films’ operations involves identifying international films with potential appeal to the United States market.
Maxime Cottray serves as the chief operating officer at the independent studio, which is based in Los Angeles.
According to Mr. Cottray, the U.S. market has historically presented challenges for foreign language films.
“Its reach has traditionally been confined to coastal New York viewers through art house films,” he stated.
This limitation is, in part, attributed to a language barrier.
“Unlike Europe, America has not cultivated a culture accustomed to subtitles or dubbing,” he noted.
However, this language hurdle may become more manageable with the advent of new AI-driven dubbing systems.
Recently, the audio and video of “Watch the Skies,” a Swedish science fiction film, were processed using a digital tool known as DeepEditor.
This tool manipulates the video to create the illusion that the actors are natively speaking the language into which the film is being dubbed.
“When I first observed the capabilities of this technology two years ago, I was impressed. However, having seen the latest iteration, it’s truly remarkable. I am confident that the average viewer would be unable to discern that the actors weren’t originally speaking the target language,” Mr. Cottray remarked.
The English-dubbed version of “Watch The Skies” was released in 110 AMC Theatres across the U.S. in May.
“To put this into perspective, without the English dubbing, the film would not have been screened in U.S. cinemas,” Mr. Cottray explained.
“U.S. audiences were able to experience a Swedish independent film that would have otherwise been limited to a very niche viewership.”
He also noted that AMC intends to pursue similar releases in the future.
DeepEditor was developed by Flawless, a company headquartered in Soho, London.
Scott Mann, a writer and director with credits including “Heist,” “The Tournament,” and “Final Score,” founded the company in 2020.
He felt that traditional dubbing techniques used for international versions of his films often failed to capture the emotional depth of the originals.
“When I worked on ‘Heist’ in 2014, which featured a brilliant cast including Robert De Niro, and then saw the movie translated into a different language, I realized why movies and TV don’t always translate well. The traditional approach to dubbing fundamentally alters the film,” said Mr. Mann, who is now based in Los Angeles.
“The dubbing is often out of sync and performed differently. From a filmmaking purist’s perspective, the rest of the world is seeing a product of significantly lower quality.”
Flawless developed its proprietary technology for identifying and modifying faces, based on a method first outlined in a 2018 research paper.
“DeepEditor uses a combination of face detection, facial recognition, landmark detection [such as facial features], and 3D face tracking to understand the actor’s appearance, physical actions, and emotional performance in every shot,” Mr. Mann explained.
He states that the technology can preserve the original performances of actors across languages without requiring reshoots or re-recordings, which reduces both costs and production time.
According to Mr. Mann, “Watch the Skies” was the first feature film in the world to be fully visually dubbed.
In addition to enabling an actor to appear to be speaking another language, DeepEditor can also transfer a superior performance from one take to another or insert new dialogue while preserving the emotional content of the original performance.
Fueled by the proliferation of streaming platforms such as Netflix and Apple, the global film dubbing market is projected to grow from US$4 billion (£3 billion) in 2024 to $7.6 billion by 2033, according to a report by Business Research Insights.
Mr. Mann declined to specify the exact cost of the technology, noting that it varies depending on the project. “I would estimate that it costs about a tenth of what it would cost to reshoot or modify the scene in any other way.”
His clients include “virtually all of the major streaming services.”
Mr. Mann believes that this technology will allow films to reach a broader audience.
“There is an enormous amount of incredible cinema and television that is simply not seen by English-speaking audiences, many of whom are reluctant to watch content with dubbing and subtitles,” he stated.
Mr. Mann emphasizes that the technology is not intended to replace actors and that voice actors are used rather than synthetic voices.
“We have found that providing the tools to the creatives and artists themselves is the most effective approach… it empowers them to create their art and enhances the final product. This contrasts with the approach taken by many other technology companies.”
However, Neta Alexander, an assistant professor of film and media at Yale University, cautions that while the prospect of broader distribution is appealing, using AI to reconfigure performances for non-native markets carries the risk of eroding the distinctiveness and texture of language, culture, and gesture.
“If all foreign films are adapted to look and sound English, the audience’s relationship with the foreign becomes increasingly mediated, synthetic, and sanitized,” she warns.
“This could discourage cross-cultural literacy and disincentivize support for subtitled or original-language screenings.”
Moreover, she contends that the displacement of subtitles, which are a vital tool for language learners, immigrants, deaf and hard-of-hearing viewers, and many others, raises concerns about accessibility.
“Closed captioning is not merely a workaround; it is a method of preserving the integrity of both visual and auditory storytelling for diverse audiences,” Prof. Alexander argues.
Replacing this with automated mimicry, she suggests, indicates a concerning shift toward a commodified and monolingual film culture.
“Rather than focusing on how to make foreign films more accessible to English-speaking audiences, we might better consider how to cultivate audiences that are willing to engage with diverse cinema on its own terms.”
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