Comments on: Non-Arabic in Movies

By: Torstein

Torstein — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 09:13:51 +0000

In that x-files episode, hasn’t one of the men the name Trondheim?

Trondheim is one of the largest cities in Norway. It’s like calling someone London

By: uraeus

uraeus — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 16:09:04 +0000

@Hannes: As far as I recall they had just rounded up some American-Norwegians to play the Norwegians. Which is why it sounded so stunted, as these where people who barely spoke they language themselves

By: Ian

Ian — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 14:32:50 +0000

Stormking: “Hollywood sells so well – at least here in germany – because we germans are *not* humorless. ”

LOL, good point. If every American in a German movie was named Bush or Cheney I’d probably laugh my ass off.

Matthew Walton: “Hollywood is pretty bad at portraying the English too – let alone the Scottish or the Welsh. As with all countries, English people come in many variations. We aren’t all villains, and we don’t all speak like the Queen.”

Yeah, what’s up with that anyway? What grudge could Hollywood possibly bear against you guys? Are they still not over 1812 or what! Probably it’s just a tradition, but man, how did that get started in the first place?

By: Matthew Walton

Matthew Walton — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 10:54:26 +0000

Bruce: What’s an ‘English’ accent anyway! RP? Cockney? Estuary? Cornish? Brummie? Geordie? Mancunian? Liverpudlian?

Hollywood is pretty bad at portraying the English too – let alone the Scottish or the Welsh. As with all countries, English people come in many variations. We aren’t all villains, and we don’t all speak like the Queen.

By: Janne

Janne — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 10:08:06 +0000

Well, Linus is member of the Swedish-speaking minority in Finland, but they only speak Swedish to each other (and Swedes of course). had his lawyer been Finnish-speaking, he would have most likely spoken Finnish.

I would guess that most of the Swedish-speaking Finns spend most of their time speaking Finnish.

By: Hannes

Hannes — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 10:07:40 +0000

As for the X-Files episode mentioned… I can’t recall that the “norwegian” they spoke sounded like any norwegian I’ve ever heard. I am swedish, so granted, I have not heard every possible norwegian dialect, but this just sounded very…rehearsed?

By: Stormking

Stormking — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 07:06:36 +0000

@Ian:

Hollywood sells so well – at least here in germany – because we germans are *not* humorless.

By: Mick

Mick — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 05:28:55 +0000

At least your not Irish! I shudder at some of the representations Hollywood (and even London) has made of the Irish. On the other hand, representation of Americans on non-US media can be tends to be cliqued also.

By: Mick

Mick — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 05:28:55 +0000

By: Ian

Ian — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 23:46:31 +0000

Heh, I’m feeling contrary and want to defend Hollywood here, but I can’t think of a good angle for it. Truth is they really ARE this bad all the time. I guess if I was dead set on being a Hollywood apologist, I’d say something like, well, they’d get it right if their Audience (Americans) knew Sweden from Switzerland (good luck there), but till then why should they care? But even that line of defense fails, cause I think Hollywood makes more money globally than it does in the US. Fail!

But along those lines a question arises: how does Hollywood sell so well outside the US if it constantly screws up this kind of routine stuff? Any ideas?