Japan Gets Dumb Too

'What are Nazis?' Today's kids can't handle movie subtitles

Subtitle length, however, is just one of the problems related to viewer comprehension.

“After a preview test showing of a certain spy film, members of the audience really surprised me by posing questions like, ‘What is the Soviet Union?’ and ‘What are Nazis?’” a production manager tells the newspaper.

“It appears that growing numbers of young people are unfamiliar with names and words that most Japanese take for granted,” remarks Koji Kikuchi, a veteran subtitler who has worked on some 1,000 films.