I HAVE realised I am in the wrong profession, or at least the wrong strand of my profession. As a film journalist I get to see films before they are released in salubrious surroundings, with food and, more importantly, drink laid on. I occasionally receive a gift such as a hat with Jurassic Park written on it that is frankly unlikely ever to touch the top of my head, or a film soundtrack CD which can be traded in at my local record and tape exchange for something with a slightly closer resemblance to music.

I have a large collection of film stills, which is of no conceivable value whatsoever, and am able to impress children by saying "Seen that," every time they mention a movie. And that's about it. I was happy with my lot. "It's a dirty job," I would smirk to every office worker I knew, "But somebody's gotta do it." But then, by some journalistic accident, I got sent on a motoring assignment.

I am not an ideal candidate for motoring journalism, since I still have no more idea how the internal combustion engine works than the average neolithic man. How we got from the wheel to the latest model Saab is of no interest to me. As far as I am concerned, cars are operated by keys. If something more complicated than losing one's keys occurs, then it is time to call a mechanic.

Inevitably, throughout my long and often unpleasant relationship with the motor vehicle, something more complicated has always managed to occur. My first accident cost £130,000, which is not a fact that has endeared me to insurers and made even less impression when I casually mentioned it to the PR from Range Rover who was entrusting me with £40,000 worth of high-tech motor to drive off-road across the Alps.

"So," he said nervously, as I ground the gears attempting a three point turn on a rocky mountain path, with an overhanging boulder on one side and a 3,000 foot, sheer vertical drop on the other, "why exactly did they choose you for this assignment?"

"I'm buggered if I know," I replied, "But I'll tell you what, as soon as I get my licence I'm gonna do some more of this."

At 10,000 feet, no one can hear you scream. Except for the odd goat.

Which is all beside the point. What really made an im-pression was that I discovered the collective noun for motoring journalists is a freeload. Twelve of us were flown first class to Geneva, whisked off by helicopter to a French mountain resort, put up in a splendid Alpine hotel, fed on the delicious gourmet French cooking of some especially fine restaurants, given a tab at the hotel bar, the keys to an expensive car and unleashed in the mountains to work, mostly on our tans.

Late at night in the bar, preparing for the next day's arduous cross-country driving by consuming massive quantities of alcohol, the assembled freeload regaled me with tales of luxurious foreign travel and outrageous freebies.

"It's a dirty job . . ." said a 50-year-old on his fourth cognac (and recovering from his second heart attack). I did not let him complete the sentence. I am contemplating renaming this Off-Screen column Off-Road and am open to offers from any motoring manufacturers with ideas for cinematic tie-ins. Bring back Herbie, The Love Bug is what I say, a much neglected classic of the sixties.

While in France, I got to watch a little of the local TV, though only long after midnight when I was finally unleashed from the clutches of the freeload and allowed to stagger to the comfort of my mini-bar. Inevitably, the channel that intrigued me most in that state was the porn channel, which I watched for half an hour before I realised the TV had not been supplied with a decoder. It is like watching a sexual encounter between two amorous bar codes, as the lines swell and pulsate into one another amidst sounds of groaning ecstasy.

Finally tiring of watching a throbbing penis with even more lines on it than my own (at least I think it was a penis) I flicked over to a movie channel where I was amused to find Sean Connery speaking fluent French without a hint of sibilance of his trademark Scottish burr in a poorly dubbed version of The Name Of The Rose, or rather Le Nom De La Rose.

Dubbing is a phenomenon that never caught on in English speaking countries, where the memory of obscure Spanish actors talking out of sync in the Spaghetti Westerns of the sixties remains a potent source of humour. So much of an actor's character and expressiveness centres on the voice that the idea of having performances remodelled by someone whose thespian experience has been limited to a sound-booth is enough to drive any semi-literate person to subtitles.

But in Europe and many other foreign markets, where the bulk of cinematic product is imported in the foreign language of English, dubbing is de rigeur. And indeed, it has become something of an art form in itself, with one actor tending to portray an individual star, and the top-dubbing artists priding themselves on their ability to match conflicting vowels.

Jesus Nieto, the 66-year-old Spanish actor who provides the voice for Peter Falk in Colombo, recently explained his craft. "You have a Spanish translation, but it's usually twice as long as the English. The art is in condensing it to fit the time Colombo opens his mouth. You've got to breathe when he breathes." Nieto follows the action onscreen, mimicking Falk's gestures and movements. "The only thing I don't bother with is the dirty raincoat," he claims.

But in future episodes of Colombo, Spanish viewers are likely to notice something amiss. Peter Falk will be changing his accent and, more than likely, gaining the ability to talk without moving his lips. Nieto, along with 1,200 other professional film and television dubbers, is on strike. The reason, they claim, is that, in order to save money, Spanish film distributors and TV stations have been bringing in inexperienced actors, many from the provinces, who are prepared to dub for 40 per cent less than nationally agreed union rates.

Arnold Schwarzenegger has already undergone a notable vocal alteration. In Spain, Arnie has never had those thick Austrian tones, but has been dubbed by now striking actor Ernesto Aura, who muttered his Terminator 2 catchphrase, "Hasta la vista, baby," with an authentic, gruffly macho latin twist. But for The Last Action Hero Arnie will be speaking with the voice of an inexperienced Galician actor, from Spain's northwest. This would be roughly equivalent here to the imposing superstar opening his mouth and chattering away with a Donegal twang.

Which, come to think of it, might have improved the chances of the movie at the box office. It is supposed to be a comedy, after all.

I was in the bar of my Alpine hotel with the full freeload of British motoring hacks when the news came through that English star Stewart Granger, "un legende de cinema" had passed away, aged 80. "How tragic," we muttered, "let's have another." It seemed a reasonable response.

But as we raised our glasses to this cinematic legend, a leading figure of the movies for over half a century, someone asked the immortal question, "What was he in, then?" We thought for a while but none amongst us - a freeload of well-read journalists spanning the ages 30 to 60, and including in our ranks an actual film correspondent (moi) - had the faintest idea what, precisely, Stewart Granger was famous for.

So how do you get to be a legend of the cinema without making one memorable film? On Saturday, back in the English speaking world, ITV interrupted its scheduled programming to show, as a tribute to Granger, one of his most notable performances, Beau Brummel. My 9-year-old had just settled down to watch a Disney film, followed by WWC wrestling and some cartoons, an ideal afternoon as far as he was concerned, and so was understandably upset to discover his plans were being altered for the sake of some septuagenarian thespian he had never heard of.

But having wormed himself into the most comfortable position on the sofa, he asked me what this Beau Brummel was like then. For once, I was unable to respond "Seen that." Wishing to maintain my position of pre-eminence, I pulled some film textbooks from my shelf to surreptitiously consult them before pronouncing a definitive and authoritative verdict.

I couldn't find Beau Brummel listed in any of them. One usually reliable reference book after another came up a complete blank. This was a film that never appeared to have existed, despite the fact that it starred a legend of the cinema (now deceased).

He watched it nevertheless, the effort of getting off the sofa being too much to contemplate. Later I quizzed him on it. "It was OK," he said, non-committally. "It was about a man who got sick at the end and his hair went white at the sides."

"Sounds thrilling," I replied. "Were there any swordfights, swashbuckling, that sort of thing?"

"No," he said.

"Any sort of action at all?"

"No," he said.

"Was it funny, or exciting?"

"Not really," he replied.

Being familiar with his unusual sleeping habits, and beginning to doubt that he had stayed awake throughout this apparently less than gripping experience, I asked if he had watched the whole thing? He had to give this some thought, before replying, "I think so."

"So what was it like?" I asked, exasperated.

"It was OK," he replied. "Except for the soppy bits."

Of such stuff are legends of the cinema made. I consulted my textbooks to find a quote from Granger with which to add a little flavour of the man himself to this sad occasion. All I could come up with was "I've never done a film I'm proud of."

Sounds like a fitting epitaph to me.