MovieChat Forums > Far and Away (1992) Discussion > Accents...

Accents...

posted 13 years ago by gabeper78
7 replies | jump to latest

I've recently became a member of IMBd, so the majority of my posts come rather late. I post when a particular topic strikes a nerve with me. I came to the page for Far and Away, hoping for intellectual discussions of this film. However, the majority of the threads and posts are in reference to accents in films in general and this film in particular. Here I go...

I'm an American with an interesting, historical factoid...apparently the ancient Romans spoke modern English and with a modern British accent (as seen and heard in Rome, Spartacus, Centurion, Arthur, The Last Legion, Empire, Augustus...etc, etc, etc).

I've really enjoyed these excellent films and programs. Despite the obvious, historical flaw that British-English rather than classical, vulgar, or even ecclesiastical Latin has become the standard spoken language of Romans in the cinema and television (However, I appreciate it, given my limited education of the Latin language). Although, there have been attempts at performing theater productions, films, television programs, etc in the original Latin language, but I can only assume that if an ancient Roman were to hear a modern person's feeble attempt at speaking any of the various forms of "proper" Latin as in the aforementioned list. I've never really thought to complain about it...until now.

As to the topic, where do all these Spuds get off on complaining about Americans failing horribly at using a "proper" Irish accent? I've seen Daniel Day-Lewis' name being thrown around a lot. I didn't see anyone complaining about him portraying the American New Yorker, Bill "the Butcher" Cutting in Gangs of New York, Southern Californian Daniel Plainview in There Will Be Blood, or Hawkeye/Nathaniel Poe in The Last of the Mohicans. He gave a fantastic performance in these films and his interpretation of the various American accents by region and time period were interesting and didn't bother me at all. I could continue on with more examples such as Pierce Brosnan, Liam Neeson, Gabriel Byrne, Colm Meaney, Colin Farrell, Jonathan Rhys Meyers to name a few. All of these actors at some point in their careers as actors, have portrayed Americans. They're all outstanding actors and I applaud them for their effort in making a genuine attempt to properly portray Americans in film and tv.

All in all, Far and Away is an excellent, epic film and it's certain to become a classic despite all the negative ranting and raving by all the "authentic" Irish folks.

I'll leave everyone with this final quote by the famous Irish nationalist Thomas Davis when answering the question of Irish identity and that which defines "Irishness": "It is not blood that makes you Irish but a willingness to be part of the Irish Nation."

Si vis pacem parabellum!

[–] lorcanryanblack 12 years ago

Irish accents are extremely difficult to fake, the drawn out vowels, the emphasis on certain consonants, and we understand it's not easy to pull off, but you have to try to understand that watching a film with actors portraying an 'Irish' accent badly makes it very difficult for us to take it seriously because it's so awful it's distracting. No-one generally complains about non-American actors pulling off American accents because it's not a complex accent to fake, especially for Irish people. Our accents are generally flat, which makes it much easier for us to emulate British or American accents, but it seems not to work in the reverse which is understandable.

It's not something that really, seriously bothers us- like I said, we know our accents are difficult to emulate, but it's still irritating when you want to take a character seriously but then this ridiculousness is all you can hear.

It's a good film, and it's aged surprisingly well, but it's just a bit hammy (which is unfortunate because it doesn't mean to be) :p

I think probably the nearest thing to a decent Irish accent I've ever personally heard in a film, was Johnny Depp in Chocolat. Gotta say, he did a pretty good job!

[–] amber_nicole333 12 years ago

I am a 30 year old female from texas with a strong southern accent...when I was 17 in highschool, I was apart of "one act play". I was cast as an irish woman (the only one in the play) and the director had me study only true irish actors and accents for months and the weeks we had a performance, she had me stay in character with an accent all week while at school...it is definitely a hard thing to master and takes discipline and while I am by no means fluent in the accent I am quite proud to have gotten to learn such a beautifult form of language and its fun at parties!

"You gave him what he asked for...I gave him what he needed!" ~Legion~

[–] Spamlet 10 years ago

First of all, there is no such thing as an American or Irish accent. If there were everyone would sound basically the same all over their country. They clearly do not. Instead, the dialect we all have is extremely specific; based not only on where you are from but everywhere else you live in life and also on the influences of others grown up around. Therefore, even in any major city the amount of different dialects varies wildly. So, by using such generic measurements and expectations the people in this discussion are both equally unqualified to judge the authenticity of non-native speakers of either country.

When you then add period setting onto this debate it becomes essentially pointless since no one is still living from the 1890's to ask and we are essentially (with very few exceptions) without sound recordings to refer to in order to substantiate our suspicions. What we do know, though, about dialects in the modern age is that, however thick and heavy and incomprehensible some of them may seem today, they are far less so than back then. The proliferation of broadcast media and mass transportation has resulted in a contamination from outside influences. There are very few places left on earth that are safe from this over-saturation which can retain the purity of tone they once possessed.

In other words: if you are from Ireland, you'd be foolish to expect that even people who were from the same street corner as you are would have talked or sounded the exact same way there over one hundred years ago.

The "accents" in the film which sound so silly and exaggerated based on today's versions are arrived at via careful historical research. I'm sure the way they dress isn't at all similar to what you wear now either and it's just as dumb to expect their way of speech to match this era.

Unfortunately, to the Texas lady who listened to a bunch of different real Irish actors: your performance was likely just as inaccurate since you had too many different voices to attempt to emulate. You can only really pick one of those people and mimic them if you want to succeed, because, again, specificity is the key ingredient to authenticity. Meryl Streep hired a Polish woman for "Sophie's Choice" so that she could speak exactly as that one woman did. It's really the only way to achieve absolute precision.

Maybe I'll live so long that I'll forget her. Maybe I'll die. Tryin'.

[–] filmfan1986 10 years ago

Everyone takes the piss out of Toms accent in this film however this film is set In 1892 when rural, country folk spoke in a far more harsher tone then they do today. I'm Irish and tbh I think his accent was spot on.

[–] chilone 9 years ago

rish accents are extremely difficult to fake, the drawn out vowels, the emphasis on certain consonants, and we understand it's not easy to pull off, but you have to try to understand that watching a film with actors portraying an 'Irish' accent badly makes it very difficult for us to take it seriously because it's so awful it's distracting.

Maybe you. Not "us".

I don't love her.. She kicked me in the face!!

[–] coolaree 9 years ago

With all the hoopla and mockery surrounding the Irish accents in this film, I didn't even notice.

Don't know why it's so lowly rated, either, its a fine, rousing film, hardcore cynics need not apply though.

[–] shadowcat60-124-27743 9 years ago

The thing that really bothers me is that some of the accents have got to be incorrect.

The character Shannon is a member of the Protestant Ascendancy in the 1890s: back then it was very uncommon for a Catholic Irishman to be a rich one. Most lived on tiny plots of land as tenants. (the surname Christie is not a native Irish one, say, like O'Donnell or Heneghan is. It would be a name more likely for a Protestant transplant from England centuries before the events of the film; it would take another entire film to explain that bit of history.)

Most wealthy Protestant landlords sent their kids away to boarding school or finishing school and did not mix socially at all with anyone who was not just like them: Victorian Britain had a rigid class system that they exported to Ireland, and if Shannon started yapping in a brogue they would have crucified her because nobody in the upper classes wanted their child to sound "common", and in Shannon's case, like the poor tenants on her father's lands. It would be very unlikely for Shannon to have a brogue. She would probably sound much more English, especially if her parents chose to educate her. (Don't believe me? Listen to Rudyard Kipling; there are recordings of him lying around. He would have been a little older than Joseph by only a few years. You would never know he was born in India unless you asked him to speak Hindi; at the time remember SERVANTS from the local population reared the children of wealthy members of the British Empire.

Now for Joseph: I suspect this film was filmed at least in part in western Ireland. Dear sweet God, you're kidding me, right?! I remember a part of the film where somebody cracks a joke in Irish, but Tom Cruise's character doesn't speak a word. That would be nearly impossible for the period. Look, my own great-grandfather was born the year that these fictional characters took part in the land rush in Oklahoma. He was born in Tourmakeady and both he and his wife spoke Irish fluently; it is still part of the Gaeltacht and in the 1890s that patch of Irish speaking would have been much bigger than today's pockets of Galway or (in my family's case) Southern Mayo. He learned it from his parents and only used it after he emigrated to New York when speaking to his wife or chatting with parishioners, immigrants like him. He has been dead for many years of course, but my whole family remembers how he spoke, what accent he had, and my grandmother even knew a few words of the language herself: my point is that language gets handed down like a chain, and my great grandfather's generation would have learned from men like Joseph.

The character Joseph Donnelly should be speaking a lot more as Gaeilige, especially when talking to the rougher elements in Boston.

Why is Joseph not speaking a word as Gaeilige?!! WTF?!!