The official language should not only strengthen the cinema / day

Cinemas can still watch movies duplicated in Russian, namely animated films for children’s audience under the age of seven. The Film Law calls for the inclusion of changes, stipulating that in the future the audioel is only in Latvian, but the original language is allowed to be shown up to 80% of the repertoire of the day. Similarly, publicly screened films must be subtitles in Latvian so that they are accessible to the hearing impaired. The industry, however, encourages them to look more broad about this issue, as cinema occupies the smallest part of the audiovisual offer, the biggest problems with the official language are in commercial TV and streaming platforms.

Subtitles in both languages

Looking at the repertoire of one Riga cinema, you can make sure that most films are screened in English, but with subtitles in both Latvian and Russian, in rare cases they are only in Latvian. Duplicate the animation film for the youngest part of the audience – either in Latvian or in Russian. If they are played in Russian, there are subtitles in Latvian. However, it is only available in English with a Latvian path. Adults are also shown in the original language without translation in Latvian. One of them was Japanese with subtitles in English.

The Ministry of Culture (KM) supports amendments to the Law on sound or lane only in Latvian, but encourages this issue to be viewed more broadly, stating that the language issue is not the task of the film law, as it aims to develop the Latvian film industry by supporting their creation, distribution, preservation, protection and availability. The provision of subtitles in Latvian, on the other hand, should include the provision of content to heard -impaired, in the law of access to goods and services, developing changes with the Ministry of Welfare. There are already good examples in theaters, for example, this issue is well resolved at the National Theater, explained Signe Grube, Parliamentary Secretary of the Saeima Education, Culture and Science Commission, adding that it is not possible to agree with the law. Those that are backed up in Russian are animated films for children of preschool.