MovieChat Forums > Incubus (1966) Discussion > Shatner's Jerky Esperanto

Shatner's Jerky Esperanto

posted 21 years ago by nerdy_joe_not_included
7 replies | jump to latest

Heehee! As a huge fan of anything Star Trek, I feel that I have a right to poke respectful fun at William Shatner's horribly phrased Esperanto. I don;t speak Esperanto, but as someone who frequently watches foreign films, I do know that it is possible to ascertain a phrases emotional content from the way it is performed, regardless of understanding it. Shatner sounds like he's reading the script for the first time, looking up for a few words, pausing to look down at the script, then continuing. This awful cycle continues througout the entire film. This, and about a million other things about it make it the perfect candidate for the first ever Esperanto version of MST3K.

Buuuuut...... Still gotta love Ol' Shatner. I wonder if he'll ever do Iron Chef in Esperanto...

[–] 21 years ago

[deleted]

[–] orthohawk 20 years ago

I dunno about ALL the actors! The lady who played Marc's sister actually did a pretty good job.

And, actually, Bill didn't do all that bad, really. He was definitely better than those actresses who played the succubus sisters.; I can't really decide which one does a worse job, though if pressed I'd have to say the "older sister" of the two.

[–] 20 years ago

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[–] latrekker2004 18 years ago

Give the man a break...

[–] skiop 16 years ago

Well, if you want to listen to what Esperanto sounds like, there are some podcasts and archived radio broadcasts available on the Internet. http://polskieradio.pl/eo/ and http://radioverda.com/ are generally considered the best. You can also find some videos on YouTube, some presentations, etc. There's a spoken translation of Edgar Allen Poe's The Raven somewhere, which is really good (but you have to be fluent to keep up).

[–] scotbpens 16 years ago

"Shatner sounds like he's reading the script for the first time, looking up for a few words, pausing to look down at the script, then continuing."

That's how Shatner sounds ALL the time -- even when he's acting in English!

All the universe . . . or nothingness. Which shall it be, Passworthy? Which shall it be?

[–] nocomputer1962 13 years ago

scotbpens is exactly right. Shatner seemingly has a trademark on inexplicable pauses in mid-sentence, no matter what language he's speaking.