F+tF accent

Nah her character had an Australian accent (not a strong one). Though im sure she was supposed to have been born n raised in Japan so i dont know how the aussie accent came into play.





"I asked for a refreshing drink, I wasn't expecting a f ucking rainforest..." - Bacon (Lock, Stock)

She certainly had an Australian accent in the movie. Her character was born in Australia and grew up in Japan - she shouldn't have an Australian accent.

Her character shouldn't have an Australian accent? Why not? Believe it or not, it's a lot harder to "pick up" a Japanese accent than it is to lose an Australian one.

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But she shouldn't have an Australian accent in the first place. If she lived in Australia till about the age the character is in the movie, then moved to Japan, then obviously she would have an Australian accent. But it is said in the movie that she grew up in Japan. Where she was born is irrelevent when it comes to accents. Nathalie Kelley herself is a good example - she was born in Peru, but speaks not with a South American accent, but with an Australian accent, because she grew up in Australia.

Not only that, she never knew her mom, so her last link to her australian heritage was cut off. She was raised by DK's granny. There was never a way for her to pick up the accent.

Add to that the fact that her spoken Japanese had an obviously foreign accent to it. Very well trained, but still foreign. This coming from a girl raised by Japanese people from her first memory onwards.

Lastly, in that one dialogue scene in private with DK (she being the adoptive relative of him), instead of using Japanese to converse, which should have been the natural choice, they used English instead. Not believable.

Wait, I just realized, if DK's granny adopted her, doesn't that make her like his aunt or something? eww...

IMO the scriptwriter/story creator might have stretched her character a little too far.

I know a lady who was born in america, she lived there for like 3 days then moved to australia and she has a heavy american accent.

That's probably from hearing her parents speak with American accents as she grew up. I seriously doubt a baby could pick up an accent like that like, a year before it even learns to talk!

Just saw the film, and to set the record straight she was likely born in Japan. In the exposition scene where Neela and Sean were eating from the vending machines she says her mother was right out of high school when she moved to Japan. All she knew about her mother was that she worked at a hostess bar due to the fact that her mother died when she was 10. In a later scene between Neela and DK it is clear that her mother was a prostitute and that she was an accident.

It seems that the filmmakers were using her exotic looks being half Argentinean and half French to suggest that her character was possibly half Japanese being fathered by a Japanese john (at least that was my interpretation.) As for the accent, her Aussie one comes out in the character but it wouldn't make sense that she would have it since she likely never lived around other Aussies besides her mother (which still isn't perfectly clear how much time she had with her.) Perhaps she got her toned down Aussie accent from hearing her mother speak English to her, but her Japanese is more true to form.

We of course don't know the full backstory of the character, whether she learned English first then Japanese, who she grew up with during her formative years (ages 2-5), etc. In my opinion her English was probably a little too good being that she likely rarely used it, especially after age 10, but then this is a film marketed to Americans...most of which won't see a film if it has subtitles in it. All the characters needed to be clear to the audience.

The irony here is that I probably have speculated this way beyond what the filmmakers have. I doubt her backstory was created with that much detail. It is after all The Fast and the Furious, not American Beauty or Lawrence of Arabia!