A Preliminary Study of English Movie Title Translation

As an important medium for cultural exchange, film has been attracting every nation’s attention and thus plays a significant role in cultural exchange. Therefore, the translation of films, with the translating of the titles as the key, is viewed as a direct and easy way of introducing the foreign culture as well as spreading the national culture. A good translated film title not only makes the film more charming but also has its own specific features. The paper first analyses the two primary elements: cultural and language element and nonverbal element, which influence the translation of the film title. Then it presents some main theories on the translation of the film title. Finally it concludes several common methods of translating film titles by abundant examples, which include: literal translation, transliteration, free translation and so on. And this author believes that the phenomenon of one title with several translating versions is acceptable as long as they gain the audiences’ satisfaction, the producer’s agreement and the government’s approval.