LookAtVietnam – While famous faces are often used to sell films, there are some actors and actresses – integral to the movie – whose face you never see on screen. Most viewers don’t even know their names.

Sounding off: An actress records dialogue for a film. Some actors, known as ‘dubbing artists’, are used to record their eloquent and sonorous voices over the voices of the on-screen actors and actresses.

Sound off

Dubbing first became popular in the 1950s and 60s, when Viet Nam Film Studio started making black and white films like Chung Mot Dong Song (Sharing the Same River) in 1959 and Lua Trung Tuyen (Fire on the Middle Front) in 1961. Prominent among the country’s first group of dubbing actors in early Vietnamese cinema were Luu Xuan Thu, Ngoc Lan, Viet Ha and Ho Kieng.

“In my time, we didn’t think of money when we dubbed for films. We just thought of it as a job we had do to. Of course we didn’t think of the fame,” says Kieng, who has dubbed for 195 films.

“Sometimes dubbing artists were satisfied with praise from the director. If we helped make a film more interesting, we were very happy.”

After Kieng, a new wave of dubbing artists came to the fore, including Hong Phuc and Minh Khanh, who had already retired from other jobs. Veteran director Le Dan says in the early days of Vietnamese cinema, the films, made in war time, were difficult to shoot and dubbing took a lot of time.

These second and third generation dubbing artists, such as Tu Trinh, Quoc Thao, Khanh Hoang and Minh Hoang, are now aged between 40 to 60.

Curtain call?

Recently, rumours have surfaced that new technology is heralding the end of dubbing. Now actors’ voices can be recorded as they are filmed. The sitcom Lang Hoa Tinh Yeu (The Flower Basket), made in 2004 was such a production.

But a look to the global powerhouse of film – Hollywood – would suggest that there is still room for dubbing artists in the industry for animated films and video games.

In Viet Nam, while actors’ voices are recorded directly in Nguoi Me Nhi (The Little Mother) and sitcom Co Gai Xau Xi (Ugly Girl), dubbing artists were still used in Bong Dung Muon Khoc (Suddenly Want to Cry), made in 2008.

Director Le Hoang says dubbing artists still have an important role to play.

“If a film studio doesn’t have the right equipment, producers will still need the dubbing actors. That’s why there are still young actors attached to the job,” he says.

Heard, not seen

Before 1990, most dubbing were theatre actors, television presenters or voice over actors. Most admit they learned the skills from the job and didn’t go to any school.

For viewers, the dubbing artists play an important part in creating the on screen character. The only difference is they are not seen, only heard. Director-actor Ai Nhu, who has dubbed for many characters, says: “The dubbing artists’ voice must be expressive. However sometimes, when they have to repeat their sentences many times, the expression lost.”

Actor Truong Minh Quoc agrees.

“If a dubbing actor does a bad job, it can ‘kill’ the character in one fell swoop.”

Director Xuan Phuc says: “The dubbing actors contribute 40 per cent to the success of the film because the voice can really spice up an actor’s acting. This is especially true in films where the actor has to speak the regional language.”

It’s a shame dubbing does not receive enough praise, the director says. “Even the country’s Cinema Association has not thought of admitting members who are dubbing artists.”

It’s a hard and undervalued job, says one dubbing artists who doesn’t want to be named. “Dubbing for Vietnamese film is much more difficult than voiceovers for foreign films, because the speed is quite slow and the lip movements very clear, so dubbing actors have to work very hard so audiences don’t recognise that the voices are spoken by someone else.”

Dubbing helps enliven performances where technology doesn’t allow live recordings, so demand for dubbing artists is still high, says dubbing director Xuan Tam.

“It may be a thankless job, but if dubbing artists want to work, there’s still plenty of jobs available.”

VietNamNet/Viet Nam News