Q: Is this the first non-English language TV programme or film that you have watched? If so, how did you find this experience? Were you able to follow what was going on? How much did you rely on the dialogue / script / sub-titles?

For me, this is not the first foreign language film/TV that I have watched as when I was revising for my Spanish GCSE, I watched film and TV for revision. However, it was a little bit easier for me as I knew some basic Spanish and could identify what they are saying through my own knowledge. However, this was my first TV series I have watched without having any prior knowledge of the language it is in. Personally, not knowing the language and having to rely on subtitles was quite scary as you didn’t know exactly what they were saying and the emotions of the characters in the TV series, for example, when someone is angry, they might raise their voice. As I do not know Dutch and how they communicate facially, it was very confusing as I was unable to identify the emotions of the characters in the TV series.

Personally, I have never learnt Dutch or know any Dutch apart from the greeting “Hallo”, so watching this TV show, I had to rely on the English subtitles at the bottom of the screen. I found it was quite hard to analyse the mis-en-scene and the camera movements of this TV series because the subtitles were quite deceiving and my eyes were more focusing on the changing subtitles, rather then what was actually happening in the TV programme. I didn’t really like relying on the subtitles as it was translated from Dutch and there were some Dutch words that were not translatable into English, so the subtitles would show sentences that weren’t making sense, thus making me as the audience confused because it wasn’t translated properly into English for me to know and understand. It was also quite hard to follow on with the plot as they spoke relatively quickly, and it was hard to read the subtitles before they changed and the character spoke another line of speech.

I feel that if we watched an English version, it would be a lot easier to follow the plot as you do not need to focus on the subtitles to understand what the character is saying. Also, as we naturally speak English, we can identify emotions and the type of person a character is, so if we had an English version of this show, you’d be able to identify emotions and actions through their voices and physical actions.