Lost in Translation
Illustration
by B. and J. Leslie-Melville

Before movie companies were careful about translations assuming no one in the U.S. would understand a language like Swahili, directors would have someone write something that sounded like it fit the part of the scene. So, in one movie the director needed an African messenger who was to gasp out a sentence to the big chief. The messenger is to be collapsing as he delivers his message, because he had run for days with this vital news. A local Englishman who spoke Swahili was asked to write an urgent-sounding sentence in the language. He did, tongue in cheek. An American actor played the part beautifully. All went well until the movie was shown in Nairobi (where everyone spoke Swahili, of course). The drama of the moment was reduced to high comedy. What the messenger actually said as he threw himself, exhausted, before the chief was, "I do not think I am getting paid enough money for this part."

ChristianGlobe Networks, Inc., Elephant Have Right of Way, by B. and J. Leslie-Melville