I'm sitting on a plane to Rotterdam ten days before the world premiere of West 32nd at Tribeca. Why? Well, because I couldn't turn down an offer to go to a town that has space cake and possibly legalized prostitution (though I'm not sure about that). But I guess the main reason is that I have two babies. My first film The Motel which just came out on DVD was invited to screen at a small festival called Asiascope in Rotterdam. This was set up months and months ago and just coincidentally fell on the week before Tribeca. I had agreed to the trip long before we even knew about Tribeca. And as any good parent, you have to love all your children equally. Now I understand what my mother meant when she said she loved me and my brother Pete equally.
So what does that mean in terms of West 32nd and Tribeca? Not much. This morning, I did the final pass on the subtitles and that was the last thing that needed to be done so we could deliver a print (two weeks late) to Tribeca. I actually thought we would have to run into the movie theater on the day of our first screening with a hot print. But it seems like we will have it ready on Monday -- so in my mind we are actually early.
WARNING: The following section contains language that may not be suitable for all ages. Parental discretion is advised....
About the subtitles, there's about 25% of West 32nd that's in Korean. It's tricky trying to translate. Most of the characters in the film that are speaking Korean are young people using a lot of slang. You can't translate Korean verbatim to English anyway. The grammar is completely different to begin with. But more difficult is that there is so much in Korean language that is contextual. The language is not absolute. With the help of my assistant Andrew (who can actually speak Korean, unlike my pathetic attempts at it) sat with Marsha the subtitler at LVT and discussed intention versus literal meanings of lines. As an example, one line was literally, "Do you think that I am a toy that you can play with?" which we changed to "You think you can fuck with me?"
In Korean, there are a few swear words that get used over and over very commonly kind of like the way we Americans use the word "fuck." One of them is "Keh Shipp sekkya" or "shipp sekkya" and sometimes just "sekkya." Literally it means:"son of a bitch." But to me, "son of a bitch" is not a very strong curse in English. In English, "son of a bitch" sounds like something you would say if you lost a ping pong match. But in Korean "sekkya" can mean so much more depending on the context. It can be as harmless in use that someone can say it to their own children (though I have to disclaim that my parents never said it to me. My girlfriend swears her dad would say it to her and her brother all the time). "Sekkya" can also be as harsh as "motherfucker" or "fuck you." We had to figure out the degrees of "sekkya" in the film by judging their context and the who the speaker was. The curse we came up with would have to match the speaker. The funniest and my proudest is when we translated it as "shithead." I think when it happens in the film only me and Andrew are going to laugh our asses off. It was also translated as "fuck head" and "motherfucker" and "bitch." If you don't speak Korean and you see the film, see how many times you can catch a new meaning for "sekkya."
The most heartbreaking thing that we couldn't translate though was the word "Hyung." There is no English equivalent which I think says a lot about American society. There is so much meaning in "Hyung" and yet it can't be communicated in English. Literally the word means "older brother." But it is a term of respect that Korean men say to older men whom they consider close, like a mentor. You're "Hyung" is someone you would do anything for if they asked. You would never question your "Hyung." If your "Hyung" was in trouble, you'd be right there. It denotes true loyalty and respect. Koreans don't use the word lightly. In the movie, it's not translated well at all. Sometimes we used "Boss" which is too formal. Other times, we replaced it with the character's name, but that is way too disrespectful in Korean because of its informality. You would only call someone who is your junior or subordinate by their first name.
If you hear the word "Hyung" in the film, you can refer to this definition: "One who is older than me who I hold in reverence and respect and may or may not be biologically my older brother."
On a side note, it was during the filming of this movie that anyone ever called me "Hyung" for real. I think that was one of my proudest achievements in making this film.
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