#9: The German Dialogue Was Wobbly
The supposed German spoken by Gruber’s crew included awkward grammar, pronunciation, and lines that sounded absurd to fluent speakers. English-language audiences heard sinister foreign chatter; German viewers heard professional criminals losing a fight with basic sentence construction. Dubbed releases had to adjust dialogue and, in some cases, rethink the characters’ backgrounds. It is difficult to maintain sophisticated menace when half the audience is wondering whether the hostage takers accidentally ordered sandwiches instead of detonators downstairs.
