Ranzato, Irene and Zanotti, Serenella (2018): Reassessing Dubbing: Historical Approaches and Current Trends. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company. 287 p.

This volume opens with a fascinating chapter by Dwyer, “Undoing Dubbing.” The author uses the film Singin’ in the Rain as a case example not only to exemplify the manipulation around sound dubbing, but also to analyze the deeper impact that location of the voice has in a film. Dwyer notes the audience’s visceral reactions to the “talkies” when they first came out; the technical processes involved in dubbing, both from a sound and linguistic perspective; means of production and import/export of films; and “the voice/language issues engendered by dubbing” (p. 36). In a few pages, Dwyer aptly explains many issues, in a chapter that is likely to become essential reading in Audiovisual Translation Studies (AVTS) and Film Studies. The second chapter (Mingant) provides a unique perspective in AVTS. The author explains how Hollywood films were dubbed into Arabic in the 1940s, concentrating not only on the translation issues that entailed the presentation of Hollywood films in the Middle East, but also the technological aspects, and, most importantly, the political and financial ones. In the former, Mingant explains the repercussions of the Sykes-Picot agreement in film distribution and dubbing in the Middle East during the 1940s, and how both colonial powers—the United Kingdom and France—imposed their official languages in films that were to be distributed in their specific areas of geo-political control. This, Mingant explains, was done with mixed results. Mingant also deals with the topic of “the success of Persian-dubbed films” (p. 53), albeit briefly. This is understandable, though, as the article concentrates on dubbing into Arabic. Mereu-Keating retraces the origins of AVT in Italy, and describes how Fascism affected its development. The author also explains how the Federazione Nazionale Fascista degli Industriali dello Spettacolo (Fascist National Federation of the Industrialists of the Performing Arts) wrote a law that aimed “to prevent, from a certain point, the screening of Italian cinemas of films which contain scenes spoken in a foreign language” (p. 64). The author also explains how, because of national and foreign commercial interests (p. 75), dubbing remained the preferred practice when it came to film consumption in Italy, even after the “short-sighted ethnocentrism” (p. 75) of Fascism. Zanotti’s article deals with a subject of much interest, Stanley Kubrick’s treatment of foreign films, a topic “rarely if ever remarked upon by Kubrick scholars” (p. 80). The author’s passion for Kubrick permeates the article, as it is full of fascinating tidbits, interviews, and correspondence between Kubrick and various interviewees, which will definitely be of interest to both AVTS scholars and cinephiles. Zanotti synthesizes these two areas, describing Kubrick’s concern over the translations of his films (p. 86), and the control he exerted on them through the adaptation (or localization) of specific scenes, the dubbing and the translations of his films, and the voice casting that was going to be used. The second part of this book concentrates on “New trends in dubbing research and practice” (p. 101) and starts with a chapter by Chaume. This article is extremely critical of the role the industry and translators have in “the shaping of opinions and identities, […] give rise to certain ways of thinking, solidify beliefs, reinforce negative attitudes or foster positive judgement” (p. 121). Chaume explains the role that consumers have as “co-creators in audiovisual production” (p. 115), but that “manifestations of traditional passive consumption of audiovisual translation are still part of the agenda of many distributors and producers” (p. 115). The author takes the reader around the world, explaining these issues—and the role dubbing has in them—in Japan, Greece, Turkey, Italy, Iran, Latin America, Africa, and others, in a …