MovieChat Forums > The Three Musketeers (1993) Discussion > Never have American accents seemed so ja...

Never have American accents seemed so jarring and out of place

posted 13 years ago by Zuider_Zee
9 replies | jump to latest

Sean, Sutherland, Platt, O'Donnell were horribly miscast, they didn't seem at all European, much less French.

[–] pnayballer10 13 years ago

I take it you never saw Robin Hood Prince of Thieves.

Had no problem with the accents.

[–] Zuider_Zee 11 years ago

No, I refused to watch that one. Costner? Ha ha! NO WAY!

[–] whoanelly (1592) 2 years ago

Too bad! Alan Rickman’s performance is worth tolerating Costner’s.Nobody has ever — before or since — chewed the scenery as superbly as Rickman does in Robin Hood.

[–] 11 years ago

[deleted]

[–] Zarathustra_Speaks 11 years ago

Amusingly even though everyone is French the villains (and also the King and Queen) have upper class English accents and the heroes are all-American boys.

Which is at least sort of weirdly consistent.

What I can't stand is d'Artagnan alone being American and everyone else sounding English as in the absurd 2011 film.

[–] Blueghost 11 years ago

by Zuider_Zee » Tue May 29 2012 09:09:46
IMDb member since June 2011
Sean, Sutherland, Platt, O'Donnell were horribly miscast, they didn't seem at all European, much less French.

They weren't meant to. It's a crap film. I think Disney should have steered clear of the Musketeer property.

The musketeers were about romance, intrigue, patriotism, and a good fight. In French culture that means viva la France because you can discreetly (or not so discreetly) go around sleeping with other people every now and then, and look down on the rest of the world because of your cultural contributions to the world in the arts and sciences.

I think the folks at Disney missed out on this.

[–] vicky_lc2001-1 11 years ago

I disagree, why would English accents be more legitimate than American accents? Also in Delon's Purple Noon, the main characters play Americans yet have French accents and spoke in French, yet it's considered a classic film. Westerners are so weird sometimes, I don't get it.

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[–] emuir-1 10 years ago

I would prefer they used uniform standard English than fake French ooh la 1a ze villane eez waiting pour moi. Mon dieu! accents. What is jarring is the occasional distinct American voice. Chris O'Donnell's voice stuck out like a sore thumb (bad simile but I could not think of a better). For Crying out loud, these people are highly trained professional actors. Surely they did voice production in their classes to smooth out the distinct regional accents?

[–] alanparsons (560) 3 years ago

>they didn't seem at all European

Well, ethnically they are all European. They just have American English accents... =p