I downloaded Sluzhebnyiy Roman (Offfice Romance) from Memocast, but somehow messed up on the subtitle file. It was too late to go back and re-download it.
I probably could have asked the Memocast people for help, but instead I found English subtitles elsewhere. Unfortunately, they were in two files, while the movie was in one.
And the timings were way off — the words appearing well after the words were spoken. I didn’t mind that too much for language-learning purposes. Using the first of the two files, I got a chance to listen and process what I was hearing before getting to see the subtitle. But this wouldn’t do when Myra watches the film with me.
It didn’t take long to find a tool to help fix things up. I used Subtitle Workshop from URUworks. I learned about it at the Videohelp.com forum, where there was also a good description of how to use it to combine two subtitles files into one.
That program can also be used to fix the timings. I plan to use it for other subtitle files whose timings are just fine. I can use those files as is when watching films with Myra, but create a separate version with long delays for use when I’m trying to work on my Russian listening skills.
Office Romance is an Eldor Ryazanof film. It’s not quite as good as Irony of Fate or Railway Station for Two, but it is definitely worth watching. I don’t know if it’s giving me an accurate idea of what an office worker’s job may have been like in 1980s Russia, but it seems to be a plausible if partial picture. Russia doesn’t have Scott Adams and Dilbert to chronicle such a culture, but it has Ryazanov.