M&E means music and effects. When the final, composite sound track for a movie (whether for TV or theatres) is recorded, a separate music and effects track, with none of the English, is also recorded. This M&E is then added when a foreign country puts in their own language. You should have the whole soundtrack, but usually, you don't. The problem is that, when the voice track is eliminated, in order to lose the English, all the sounds under the actor's voices also go bye-bye. These are sounds such as doors opening and closing; car doors and motors; footsteps; somebody dropping or breaking something; turning over in a bed; glass, silverware and plate sounds at the dinner table, etc.

Any sounds out in the open can usually be saved, but if people are talking over it, it's gone, along with the voice, and must be replaced.

Some sounds are not ideally done from library and it is best to re-create them on the foley stage. If an actor is rummaging through a box of metal junk, and talking at the same time, this sound will have to be re-created.

A foley stage is where the foley walker re-creates any sounds that are not done from library. These are usually sounds that the actors made during their performance. On the foley stage the foley walker does exactly what the actors are doing, while watching the movie. This includes footsteps, cloth sounds (bed sheets, putting on clothing, fights, etc.) and any other incidental sound like, pouring water, dropping a big metal pot on a table, or a saddle squeaking, etc.

Ignoring any of these sounds throws up a potential red flag and results in a track that would probably be rejected in most countries.

Let's say some producers in France are running their newly acquired American action movie with the dubbed French voices and they rack up what they think is a good M&E but,"voila!" There's no feet or cloth, doors are missing, someone's bouncing a basketball in dead silence, a lady sashays into an echoey museum in high heels without a sound ......"mon Dieu-quel horreur!"......big no-no! Instant rejection!