To find bad accents so off-putting?

[FrostyChocolateMilkshake]

Watching a film on Netflix and I cannot get past the terrible American accent of the male character, played by a British actor. His English accent keeps slipping in and it distracts from the storyline.

I just find it so annoying and off-putting - surely they could have cast an American actor as the lead role!? It's one of my biggest bugbears.

Does anyone else find this irritating or has lockdown turned me into an accent-ravaging arsehole?

Arrrghhh

I'm the same. Although mostly I can only recognise it as being particularly bad when it's my own accent. I had to stop watching Sons of Anarchy when they had the Belfast characters because I was laughing so hard at the appalling accents and sets (pigs trotters in a jar on the counter of the corner shop) that I couldn't buy into the drama at all.

Eddie Redmayne was it?

I couldn’t watch Broadchurch because the accents were so bad.

A local event was dramatised for tv a while ago. One of the main ‘characters’ was someone I knew IRL. The person I know has a local accent as did a lot of the other people involved. No one actor used a local accent.

I'm from the N. E England, it's a sad state of affairs when the best Geordie accent is Keith Fit's character from Giggle Biz 🤦‍♀️

@StanfordPines oh Christ, that sounds like an absolute train wreck. You'd have thought they would at least research the bloody accent first!!

No not Eddie Redbourne @takeoutyourhen it is a horror film called Malevolent. The lead actress is British (Florence Pugh) and her American accent is pretty convincing - to me anyway, I am not a connoisseur of American accents by any means.

It is the guy who plays her brother- good Lord is accent is jarring as hell. Just awful.

Redbourne? Damn autocorrect! Redmayne that should have said.

I’ll watch out for that. I watched The Trial of the Chicago Seven and Eddie was a bit 😬 at times but sometimes even Sacha Baron Cohen slipped and he uses a lot of accents anyway!

I couldn’t watch Broadchurch because the accents were so bad.

I think this ties in with my theory that I can mostly only recognise a bad accent when it's my own accent. I didn't notice bad accents in Broadchurch, presumably because of my lack of knowledge, not because the accents were so good.

I thought Eddie Redmayne was really skilled with accents so I'm surprised he wasn't great in that movie.

I just don't understand why they don't cast Americans as Americans and Brits as Brits. Unless that is me being narrow-minded?

I agree. I've really struggled to get into "The Boys" because of Karl Urban's "Cockney" accent. Honestly, if it wasn't for Dick van Dyke it would probably be the worst version of that accent I have ever heard.

Yanbu. Growing up in Wales, Dr Dolittle was absolutely Ruined for me! And I usually love RDJ 😕

@Eleganz

I agree. I've really struggled to get into "The Boys" because of Karl Urban's "Cockney" accent. Honestly, if it wasn't for Dick van Dyke it would probably be the worst version of that accent I have ever heard.

I like Karl Urban in most things, but I thought his character in "The Boys" was supposed to be Australian and had a bit of cognitive dissonance when I realised he was a Londoner. It was a terrible accent, although I don't think it was the only reason that I couldn't get more than halfway through season 1. After The Boys I was a bit wary of him in Judge Dredd, but he was excellent.

Ewan McGregor in Fargo.

As I brummie I struggle with peaky blinders so much! Most brummies think the accents are appalling.

I couldn’t watch Peaky Blinders either. I’m not a Brummie but I have enough family that are to know the accent is laughable.

Haha YES the lead in sons of anarchy is from Newcastle and his fake American accent is pretty shite. But the Northern Irish season was just wild 😂 Jimmy o'phelan was soooo fucking weird

I'm about to to finish this show now and I can't wait to never hear jax tellers crappy accent again

@noblegreenk was Cillian Murphy's (main character) accent any good? I am not Brummie so probably can't comment but I thought he had nailed a Brummie accent? To say he is Irish too I think he did a great job.

Ditto Karl Urban in The Boys ( but he's a bit of a sort so I can see past it )
But the accents in The Haunting of Bly Manor just ruined the whole thing for me.

I'd forgotten Sons of Anarchy, comedy gold
I find it more noticeable when there is a mix of good and bad OP.
So if it's supposed to be set in Ireland and everyone is not Irish, or not from the part of Ireland it's set in, and the accents are all bad I just go with it.
But if it is one character out of a whole cast out of sync it distracts me.
I really liked Bridgerton for example but the difference in accent between Daphne who sounded like The Queen but wasn't titled and The Duke who sounded generic English to me (Irish) was jarring.

[quote FrostyChocolateMilkshake]@noblegreenk was Cillian Murphy's (main character) accent any good? I am not Brummie so probably can't comment but I thought he had nailed a Brummie accent? To say he is Irish too I think he did a great job.[/quote]
I personally didn't think it was great but it wasn't the worst either. The problem with the brummie accent is most actors overdo it and it ends up coming out more black country sounding and there is a huge difference. Most people from other regions wouldn't know the difference but it's stands out a mile to us brummies. I heard a accent/dialect coach say (on the radio) that the birmingham accent is one of the most difficult accents to mimick correctly.

@Karmagoat

Ditto Karl Urban in The Boys ( but he's a bit of a sort so I can see past it ) But the accents in The Haunting of Bly Manor just ruined the whole thing for me.

I heard how bad the accents are so I refuse to even give it a try haha

@noblegreenk I get what you're saying. I live in Yorkshire (originally from Derbyshire) and until I moved here I assumed all Yorkshire accents were the same (naive of me I know!) But there's Barnsley, Rotherham, Wakefield, Leeds etc; not massively far from each other logistically but the accents are so different. I imagine Brummie is the same.

Try being Scottish and hearing the accent and dialect being mangled badly!

I have a particular loathing of non-Scottish actors playing Scots.

For a tiny country, we have a ridiculous numbers of accents and dialectical variations - somebody who grew up 20 miles away from where I did will have a different accent - yet Hollywood persisting its belief in the 'generic Scottish accent'.

Rips my knitting, so it does.

'Persists' - damn you, autocorrect.