TOKYO, Japan (M&C) – The hearing impaired are raising cain in Japan over the lack of Japanese-language subtitles in prints of the Academy Award nominated ‘Babel.’
Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu’s pic, which presents multicultural interwoven stories, in the Japanese section depicts the struggles of a hearing-impaired girl, played by Academy Award nominated Rinko Kikuchi, to communicate.
While Kikuchi is not hearing impaired, the film did feature several hearing impared actors.
Ruruka Minami, a sign-language translator involved in casting of 'Babel,' has started a petition to persuade Gaga Communications, the film’s distributor to offer subtitled prints for the pic's April 28 release. Minami reportedly also met with representatives of Gaga to try and persuade them
As of the end of February, the petition had 15,000 signatures.
A Gaga spokesperson said they are considering the request but have not yet decided how many prints to subtitle, explaining "resubtitling all the prints would be impossible."
Your Talkback on this Story