AN ANALYSIS OF DARK HUMOR AND SARCASM TRANSLATION IN THE INDONESIAN SUBTITLE OF VENOM LET THERE BE A CARNAGE (2021)

This study investigates the translation of sarcasm and dark humor in the Indonesian subtitles of the movie Venom: Let There Be Carnage (2021). As a form of audiovisual translation (AVT), subtitling presents unique challenges due to time and space constraints, especially when dealing with culturally nuanced humor. The research adopts a qualitative descriptive method, employing Attardo’s General Theory of Verbal Humor (GTVH) to classify the types of humor, Molina and Albir’s (2002) taxonomy to identify translation techniques, and Nababan et al.’s (2012) model to assess translation acceptability. A total of 101 data points were analyzed, consisting of sarcastic and dark humor utterances in the film and their Indonesian translations. The findings reveal that dark humor (53.4%) is slightly more dominant than sarcasm (46.5%) in the film. The most frequently used translation technique is literal translation (78.2%), followed by modulation (10.8%) and adaptation (8.9%). The acceptability evaluation shows that many humorous expressions are less acceptable due to awkward phrasing or lack of cultural equivalence. These results highlight the complexity of humor translation in subtitling and emphasize the need for linguistic creativity and cultural sensitivity to maintain comedic effect across languages. This study provides both theoretical and practical insights for translators working in the field of AVT, particularly when translating complex forms of humor.