MovieChat Forums > Cape Wrath (2007) Discussion > The American accents are hilarious

The American accents are hilarious


I absolutely love this show, but holy crap! Tom's accent is so hilarious to me, as an American. Has anyone else noticed how stiff and fake it sounds?

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I'm American too, but I had no idea that the guy is really English. His accent isn't bad at all. There were a couple of times where he sounded like Cary Elwes doing an American accent, but this guy does it MUCH better than Elwes.

I sort-of understand where you're coming from when you say it sounds "stiff and fake", but it really didn't sound that bad. He even pulled off 'yelling' quite well, in that flashback with his wife.

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I disagree with you, DeAd_MiKe_187. I could tell in an instant he wasn't American. It's a horrible attempt at an American accent. He should stick to Irish or whatever accent he's channeling trying to sound American. I think Hugh Laurie is THE standard for a Brit doing an American accent. I don't think anybody does it better than him.

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I wondered if he was supposed to have a bad accent. They made him use it in the program so less people regonise him. He is always wearing the cap etc. If he did capture someone then he would have been in the news...?

Monkey Liikes Chicken.

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American here as well and his accent is fine

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Oh yeah, like American actors do perfect English accents. Yeah right! It would help if the average American started realizing that 99% of us don't talk like Prince Charles & Lady Di or say things like "jolly good show" and "pip pip old man". Still, you will believe in all that Hollywood crap won't you?

Ye gods!

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'jolly good show'

Lol..you just reminded about this book I read awhile ago called Secrets of my Hollywood Life where shes on about English people saying that Jolly means good and Bugger means bad. Lol.

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Shut up Pip. God damn Fog suckers.

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Californian here, where we *think* we have NO accent.... I knew it was an odd American accent, but just thought, OK, he's from somewhere I haven't been/heard the accent of yet... not too bad, just made me curious. Now I know.

As for other nationalities doing a really decent American accent, I vote for Julian McMahon of Nip/Tuck and Jason Issacs of Brotherhood and the Potter films.... who knew? They are THAT good!

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Until an American actor does a convincing British accent then you can't dismiss British actors for doing poor American ones. They have progressed however from Dick Van Dykes attempt in Mary Poppins....

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his accent is crap.... but it makes up for the BILLIONS of awful british accents we hear in american produced shows every year. Sometimes they're so bad, i dont even understand what they're saying. and usually for some reason, even when the actor is british, some american producer tells them to adopt this wierd 'way too posh' accent... probably because the whole of america is so used to fake british accents, they wouldnt actually recognise a real one.

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lol, what exactly is an American accent?
There are tons of different accents in the US if any others of you living there haven't noticed >.>

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A typical example of accents gone mad were in Frazier... Frazier's dad's English nurse has a genuine North West UK accent but was asked to change it into an American version of a North west UK accent that sounded so fake. Meanwhile, Frazier's dad who is British does a good US accent. You'd be really surprised at how many Brit actors there are over the pond doing US accents... Bob Hoskins, the black guy from 'Jerico', not to mention the slew of Australians doing US (half of 'Lost' are Brits/Aussies). You'd be surprised how many times one of our US cousins are surprised how good a UK accent a supposed US actor has (when he's really a Brit). And don't forget all those Scottish and Irish actors who do great Brit accents (Current Dr Who and Pierce Brosnan to name 2 off the top of my head)

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american actors doing british accents

Gwyneth Paltrow is passable, Brad Pitt as the pikey in snatch, though these are probably the only 2

I hate hearing Irish accents being massacred just a little more than English ones

Anyone who mentions Tom Cruise or Nicole Kidman is liable to get slapped

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Well, Nicole Kidman is Australian

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Johnny Depp does great English accents. I saw him on a chat show once doing London, Scouse and Manchester accents.

I liked his accent in 'From hell', but the Jack Sparrow accent just doesn't sound right to me. Then again, he is playing a quirky character and maybe they wanted a quirky accent to match.

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It is horrible-I think that they are going for a midwest accent- but they failed miserably. I'm hoping that it is on purpose and will be explained later. Pulling off accents is hard to do- on both sides of the pond.

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I didn't even know he was supposed to be American? Thought he just had a weird twang to his voice. Guy's supposed to be a nutter. Comes across like one. Fits.

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The guy did a pretty good accent, I think. He sound like he had no accent. Of course, I'm American from California. We have accents, of course nobody hears their own accents. I saw a thing on 20/20 about seven years ago that said Californians, especially the ones in Southern California tend to stretch our o's out, especially when we say 'to' or 'go'. Of course, every area has their own slang, and 'dude' is a word us Southern Californians say a lot. I'm from L.A., and I didn't nocite how much I said it till I went to college in San Francisco, and the Bay Area slang is different from L.A. slang. Hugh Laurie does a good American accent, but he isn't the only English actor to do a good American accent. Dominic West and Idris Elba, both who were on "The Wire", do good American accents, too. More kudos to Idris Elba, who did a good Baltimorian accent. I never been to Baltimore, but I'm used to it because my dad is from there.

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So it isn't just me. Yes, every time the actor speaks I'm so distracted by his "voice" that I'm totally lost to the content of the scene. But Tom is the only one where I notice a problem. BTW, this show is AWESOME!

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Totally there with you! I love the show, I even like his character, but I find his accent abysmal. Yes, there are plenty of British, or Australian actors who can do brilliant American accents (Hugh Laurie is one, Rachel Griffiths is another)this is just one example of one guy who cannot pull it off. I find his accent SO distracting! And the woman that played his wife in the flashback couldn't pull it off either. She sounded Southern in one instance, and then in another sounded completely different. I *believe* she was supposed to be American too but it was hard to tell. I guess they made him American (aside from being a Pulitzer Prize winner, which is an American award, though I'm not sure if the recipients have to be American or not) to show how far-reaching this Meadowlands idea is supposed to be. But he cannot pull off the accent effectively. It's such a relief when he puts that tee or whatever it is back in his mouth so we don't have to listen to him mangling the dialect anymore.

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I think his accent makes him sound a bit like Ray Liotta.

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I didn't realize the actor who plays Tom is not from the US. I'm American-- I've lived all over the States so I guess I've heard many variations of an "American" accent.

I agree with the poster who mentioned Dick Van Dyke's "Mary Poppins" accent. That one was terrible. Still not as bad as Madonna's everyday affected speaking voice! :p

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I would of never guessed he was English. Usually you can spot straight away if someone is putting on an accent. Its one thing that annoys me the most, when people cant pull off accents. And I haven't been annoyed once by any accent, I think they pull off it brilliantly

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I rarely find people on TV shows can do good accents. The only two people who have ever fooled me have been James Marsters on 'Buffy The Vampire Slayer' doing a British accent and Tim Roth in 'Reservoir Dogs' doing an American accent.

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Kate Beckinsale does a good generic American accent. I hate when she does it because I love her English one.

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Yeah Marsters was pitch perfect, I was totally fooled, but the best bit with him was when he did a fake texan accent "over" the english one. So you had a californian doing a faxe Texan accent with a fake english twang. Priceless.

Somewhere up there were 2 fine actors from the Wire who were perfect in the other direction, just to prove how good Idris Elba was playing Stringer get your hands on a copy of Ultraviolet starring him and Jack Davenport to hear his normal speaking voice.

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