MovieChat Forums > Hawaii, Oslo (2004) Discussion > about Leon/attn Scandinavians I'd welcom...

about Leon/attn Scandinavians I'd welcome response


Was he mentally deficient or psychologically impaired? His behavior was peculiar. Also have I noticed how non-reactive and passive Scandinavian characters so often seem to be in their films. When meeting they usually have tightly restricted reactions; they barely issue forth a slight verbal response. Major events will occur and they often stay still like "a deer in headlights" before reluctantly producing a minimal reaction.
Also their language in films is strange. One will see a subtitle translation of one or more words, but will hear spoken by the actor a wispy minimal sound. It's as if their languages are so reduced and abbreviated so that there is just a fraction of pronounceable phonemes left to represent a word.
When I was in Scandinavia I don't remember their speech being so reduced. I remember that the type of Norwegian that was considered to be equivalent to "country" or "hick" speech, I believe it was called landsmal, had a very pronounced intonation to it, and was distinctive and pleasantly musical sounding. But this dialog in their films is so scrappy one can often not be certain that anything was said.

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