diff --git a/build.xml b/build.xml
index 3d2ee2e7..34a195b0 100644
--- a/build.xml
+++ b/build.xml
@@ -119,6 +119,10 @@
 				<include name="org/codehaus/groovy/**" />
 				<include name="META-INF/dgminfo" />
 			</zipfileset>
+			
+			<zipfileset src="${dir.lib}/icu4j.jar">
+				<include name="com/ibm/icu/text/**" />
+			</zipfileset>			
 
 			<zipfileset src="${dir.lib}/sublight-ws.jar">
 				<include name="net/sublight/webservice/**" />
diff --git a/installer/webstart/filebot.lib.jnlp b/installer/webstart/filebot.lib.jnlp
index d0a7e176..22f7189c 100644
--- a/installer/webstart/filebot.lib.jnlp
+++ b/installer/webstart/filebot.lib.jnlp
@@ -25,6 +25,7 @@
 		<jar href="sublight-ws.jar" />
 		<jar href="xmlrpc.jar" />
 		<jar href="json-simple.jar" />
+		<jar href="icu4j.jar" />
 	</resources>
 
 	<component-desc />
diff --git a/lib/icu4j.jar b/lib/icu4j.jar
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..a97d575b
Binary files /dev/null and b/lib/icu4j.jar differ
diff --git a/source/net/sourceforge/filebot/ui/panel/subtitle/SubtitleUtilities.java b/source/net/sourceforge/filebot/ui/panel/subtitle/SubtitleUtilities.java
index 4fda77dc..2d368da7 100644
--- a/source/net/sourceforge/filebot/ui/panel/subtitle/SubtitleUtilities.java
+++ b/source/net/sourceforge/filebot/ui/panel/subtitle/SubtitleUtilities.java
@@ -5,14 +5,15 @@ package net.sourceforge.filebot.ui.panel.subtitle;
 import java.io.File;
 import java.io.FileOutputStream;
 import java.io.IOException;
-import java.io.InputStream;
-import java.io.InputStreamReader;
+import java.io.StringReader;
 import java.nio.ByteBuffer;
 import java.nio.channels.FileChannel;
 import java.util.ArrayList;
 import java.util.LinkedList;
 import java.util.List;
 
+import com.ibm.icu.text.CharsetDetector;
+
 import net.sourceforge.filebot.subtitle.SubtitleElement;
 import net.sourceforge.filebot.subtitle.SubtitleFormat;
 import net.sourceforge.filebot.subtitle.SubtitleReader;
@@ -22,12 +23,19 @@ import net.sourceforge.tuned.ByteBufferInputStream;
 final class SubtitleUtilities {
 	
 	/**
-	 * Decode subtitle file even if extension is invalid.
+	 * Detect charset and parse subtitle file even if extension is invalid
 	 */
 	public static List<SubtitleElement> decode(MemoryFile file) throws IOException {
-		LinkedList<SubtitleFormat> priorityList = new LinkedList<SubtitleFormat>();
+		// detect charset and read text content 
+		CharsetDetector detector = new CharsetDetector();
+		detector.enableInputFilter(true);
+		
+		detector.setText(new ByteBufferInputStream(file.getData()));
+		String textfile = detector.detect().getString();
 		
 		// gather all formats, put likely formats first
+		LinkedList<SubtitleFormat> priorityList = new LinkedList<SubtitleFormat>();
+		
 		for (SubtitleFormat format : SubtitleFormat.values()) {
 			if (format.getFilter().accept(file.getName())) {
 				priorityList.addFirst(format);
@@ -38,23 +46,19 @@ final class SubtitleUtilities {
 		
 		// decode subtitle file with the first reader that seems to work
 		for (SubtitleFormat format : priorityList) {
-			InputStream data = new ByteBufferInputStream(file.getData());
-			SubtitleReader reader = format.newReader(new InputStreamReader(data, "UTF-8"));
+			// reset reader to position 0
+			SubtitleReader parser = format.newReader(new StringReader(textfile));
 			
-			try {
-				if (reader.hasNext()) {
-					// correct format found
-					List<SubtitleElement> list = new ArrayList<SubtitleElement>(500);
-					
-					// read subtitle file
-					while (reader.hasNext()) {
-						list.add(reader.next());
-					}
-					
-					return list;
+			if (parser.hasNext()) {
+				// correct format found
+				List<SubtitleElement> list = new ArrayList<SubtitleElement>(500);
+				
+				// read subtitle file
+				while (parser.hasNext()) {
+					list.add(parser.next());
 				}
-			} finally {
-				reader.close();
+				
+				return list;
 			}
 		}