Help with French, please?!

[stoney321]

Can anyone out there who speaks French tell me if this is a correct translation? (I don't necessarily trust Babelfish.)

For "Don't you want this to be authentic?" I have: "Vous ne voulez pas cet être authentique? " Oui? Or No?

and for "I want this to be real" I have "Je veux ceci être vrai. " GOT IT! Thank you savoytruffle and gillo!!!

As a thanks, I give you men in underwear.






Heeeeee!! <3

Comments

[trepkos.livejournal.com]

Vous ne voulez pas cet être authentique? "

I think I'd go for "Ne voulez-vous pas que c'est authentique" but my French is rusty, so I'd defer to anyone who thinks this is wrong!

and for "I want this to be real" I have "Je veux ceci être vrai."

I had a feeling that the "Etre" should be substituted with something that sounded like "soit" and Babel fish supplied the spelling.

So maybe the "c'est authentique" in the first sentence should be "ce soit authentique" - I think it's a subjunctive.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

Ooooh, thanks! I speak Spanish (um... barely) and know NO French at all, so I appreciate this! I'll go with your comment unless someone has a better answer!

Thanks.

[trepkos.livejournal.com]

I'd feel happier if someone else would at least give an opinion.

[moosesal.livejournal.com]

My French was one year back in middle school, so I am of no help. Sorry.

But underwear! Yay!! *mwah!*

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

haha, I speak NO French, but - as John Cleese said - I speak in an outrageous accent!

UNDERWEAR! (I love Will Ferrell. I love that he had a photo shoot where he imitated an ad for y-fronts in the 70s. Ahahaha.)

[moosesal.livejournal.com]

*blush*

I was so distracted by the underwear, I didn't even notice that was Will.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

Hahahaha! It's from his GQ photo shoot last year. :D

[moosesal.livejournal.com]

Well we're not all obsessive fangirls to know things like this.



(Says the girl who's currently perving on a 17-yr-old pro skateboarder. *cough*)

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

Ahahahahaha.

(Ooooh, who?!?!? Gah. SKATEBOARDERS. I will never stop love them.)

[moosesal.livejournal.com]

Ryan Sheckler. He's awesome and adorable and very, very young. So very young.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

Ahhhh!!! In the pics I've found he looks 13!!!

(I did see a recent pic. Green eyes? Full lips? Loose bangs? Yeah.)

[moosesal.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I know. The fact that he looks younger than he is makes me an even bigger perv. Although, I have to say that seeing him competing, he looked his age. Kind of. *g*

[savoytruffle.livejournal.com]

what's your context for the french? who's speaking to whom?

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

One man is speaking to another. They are playing a role in a movie and... practicing outside the movie. :)

Does that tell you enough?

[savoytruffle.livejournal.com]

well if the two people are reasonably informal with each other, you're going to use the "tu" instead of the "vous" form. "vrai" might be a little closer to "true" than "real." you do need the subjunctive here, so you'd get:

Tu ne veux pas que ce soit authentique?

or

Vous ne voulez pas que ce soit authentique?

and

Je veux que ce soit reel. (reel needs an accent going upward on the first "e".)

I think you can stick with "ce" as opposed to "ceci" unless you want to put a lot of emphasis on the "this" in the sentence.

But I won't claim to be a French expert. I'm always better going out of French into English than vice versa.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

*blinks*

I speak NO French. None. So. I'm going to take the first options, as they are intimate with each other, and you are officially my French Expert. (Hee!)

THANK YOU, C!

[savoytruffle.livejournal.com]

perhaps in keeping with gillo's addition (which you should totally trust), another way i just thought for the first one is "tu veux que ce soit authentique, non?" which would be a shorter way for her "you want it to be authentic, don't you?" which seems right for your context. but i think she's right to put the question at the end that way in this case.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

Oooh, excellent! THANK YOU. (And with the two of you explaining it so well, it makes sense!)

[gillo]

Those facial expressions are hysterical!

You need the subjunctive, definitely. "Tu veux que ce soit authentique, n'est-ce pas?" would be right in an informal setting. And for the reality, perhaps, "Pour moi, il faut être vraisemblable" might fit.

I love the colour-coding of the men in the last pic. Secret service guys in multicolours!

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

Aren't those pics great? The first is just some random hotness. The second is an ad from the 70s. The third is a spoof Will Ferrell did for a GQ interview last year. <3

And would it change if the informal setting was during... coitus? (savoytruffle gave me some options just above your comment. Y/N?)

[gillo]

I saw them after I posted my comment. Just as in English, there are loads of slightly different ways of putting it. (Stop that smutty thinking at once. I mean expressing an idea.)

Definitely use "tu" - nobody that intimate would use "vous", even if there was a commercial transaction involved. I'd say either mine or savoytruffle's versions would do fine - depends on how long-winded you want it. "Pour moi, c'est très important qu'il soit réel." would also work - literally, "It's very important to me that it is real." Yes, the French really do use the subjunctive even in the throes of - er - strong emotions...

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

excellent, excellent! Thank you! And haha, I'm used to, shall we say, Latin lovers who are very to the point? ;)

I appreciate this! *corrects fic immediately*

[gillo]

Pas de problème, chérie! (My French is a bit slapdash but pretty fluent after over 40 years since I started learning it, and some time spent in France every year for the last two decades!)

I rather like the concept of being "used to" Latin lovers. I won't ask quite how many! ;-)

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

Hahahaha. I won't SAY how many! :D

(And thanks again!)

[violethamster.livejournal.com]

That Will Ferrill ad is hilarious. Oh 70s, you were so dorky and yet deluded that you were cool.

I take it that first one's not from the J.C. Penney catalog? o_O Is that one guy asking the other to cough?

I studied French for five years and yet I am completely useless.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

I know nothing of French, other than how to French inhale (thank you Grease) and kiss in their language. ;)

And that first ad is from Calvin Klein! I don't think it was for an exham, because he didn't turn his head to cough...