TopShelf TG Fiction in the BigCloset!
The link below states why the movie makers like to use British accents, don't you know, for film villains. Damn, I'm to old now.
http://www.msn.com/en-gb/entertainment/movies/reason-british...
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Comments
I would also point out......
That until recently, most of those people in the world for whom English is a second language were educated by teachers that spoke with an English accent. It follows that you generally learn to speak a language using the accent of the person that taught it to you.
The end result being that for decades anyone who spoke English as a second language spoke it with what we in the US would recognize as a distinct English flavor. Therefore, any foreign villain in an American film was depicted as having a British accent.
Eden
D. Eden
Dum Vivimus, Vivamus
British accents
With them portraying those with British Accents as villains, perhaps they'll get off those of us with Arab background? :)
Gwen
sorry Gwen
with more and more people from the Middle East being educated here in the UK your wish just won't happen.
My old boss in Riyadh spoke better (more Classic) English than I did. He'd been to public School here and then onto University.
Onto the topic of this thread.
Many years ago I read an article in a dead-tree publication where it seemed that many agents didn't put forward their US born clients for roles as bad-guys because they feared that playing one would harm their "reputation as a clean cut born in the USA good guy" for future roles.
This attitude does mean that some foreign thespians make a good living playing villians. The one that seems to crop up regularly at the moment is Toby Jones. He seems to delight in playing evil people. But there again, he's not exactly heart-throb material.
Besides, there is nothing worse that having a really evil bad-guy with perfect white teeth.
Samantha
Perfect White teeth
LOL
The scariest villian
The most terrifying villain I've ever seen (his name escapes me right now) has a decidedly American accent, affects facial contortions and wild gestures that make Mussolini look understated, and has grubby little rat paws. And while to me he radiates absolute untrustworthiness from the very first frame, the characters in these harrowing dramas never seem to see it until it's too late...
Well shit, I guess it really CAN happen here..,
.
Tiny Hands
Did you mean Gru from Despicable Me. I wonder what it will be like to be a Minion? I'm thinking Gru will continue to spread "alternative facts."
Jill
Angela Rasch (Jill M I)
A little selective imho
Funny how all of the villains in American Westerns have, hey, Western accents. Actually a lot of spy dramas have Russian or Eastern European accents. But, I agree with Eden, the rest of the world may effect English accents though American accents are getting more common too. I was in Denmark and some folks spoke English with English accents and others with American accents and some with *Danish* accents OMG ^_^.
It all depends on who is teaching them. But then again, Professor Moriarty did have a British accent and that may have stuck?
I Keep Imagining...
...Hannibal Lecter with an Australian or Canadian accent and start giggling uncontrollably.
Be kind to those who are unkind, tolerant toward those who treat you with intolerance, loving to those who withhold their love, and always smile through the pains of life.
Nawww
Laika is obviously correct. Reread and think about it!
Hugs and Bright Blessings,
Renee
How about the evil Aborigine
How about the evil Aborigine hating rancher who hired Tom Selleck in "Quiggly down under, That was an English accent, not Australian. Alan Rickman also had an English accent in the first "Die Hard" movie. In the 3rd in the series, the bad guy studdered and was speaking with a German accent.
Karen
PS( The Queen's English makes the villian sound educated)
Probably a tad biased
That probably sounds terribly British lol. But I have to admit that being married to a British guy. I love the British accent, although some Brit accents I find hard to understand. I'm sure he has probably played a villain but I can't remember any movie that he has. But I love Patrick Stewart's accent/voice. If there is a voice that sound like melted chocolate it's his. This probably winds my husband up somewhat. As he sounds more like Micheal Caine lol. I can think of a British actor who played a great villain. And that was Alan Rickman in Die Hard. Yes I know it's an action movie but even girls like action movies sometimes lmao. Admittedly though he used a German accent. I think 'cut glass' British accent is what makes the better villain though. To me it seems colder and more precise.
Cheryl
Of course, I'm going to have
Of course, I'm going to have to be pedantic here and ask: which British accent? :-) Of course I'm guessing you're referring to received pronunciation, but I've now got the image of a villain in a major summer blockbuster speaking with a thick Newcastle accent, which really would be too funny for words. :-)
Debs xxxx
Geordie
I, for one, would love to see (hear?) an actor with a Geordie accent.
OH Debs that was so funny
I've heard that one (accent) before. It think we would need subtitles for that. First time I met my husband's family I had problems as his Dad is from East London. Although to be fair I think he had problems with my Boston accent. That's Boston Mass not the British one lol. Yorkshire has a pretty difficult accent too. But I have to admit to some of the prettiest Countryside I've ever seen. We live in Sussex up to now I've been pretty lucky most of the time. But I will say that for a small but important Island. The UK has a lot of dialects/accents.
Cheryl
Always thought that willains have Russian accents ;-)
Especially funny is that article author's name suggests that she will be hard pressed to distinguish Soho accent from Picadilly accent ;-) My level of understanding from 25 years of speaking and hearing English is that when compared directly I can hear that people are speaking with different accents... And of cause I can easyly place Chinese, Indian, South American, and British accents ;-)
But there are legends that 100 years ago there were people who were able to tell what side of which street you were born on :-) But with mass culture, TV, movies, and everybody moving around it is more and more difficult to distinguish an accent....
Cod British
It is hard to imagine a movie villain saying:-
"It's a braw bricht moonlicht nicht the noo!"
Or
"Whar be gwine, Jarge?"
Or
"Whirr yer too?"
Liverpudlian/Scouse spoke proper would be indecipherable to many native Brits let alone Americans or non-native English speakers and Cockney with rhyming slang would leave most people befuddled, tripping over their own plates of meat in incomprehension.
Of course one of the most popular accents for villains used to be German, particularly after WW2. Who hasn't heard "Ve Haff Vays..."?
Don't forget
Robert Newton's, 'Arrrrh, Jim lad,' as Long John Silver with an exaggerated Devon accent. Though the greatest sailor of them all, Horatio Nelson, may well have had a Norfolk burr.
Angharad