The last two movies I've watched about Nazi Germany - Valkyrie, and The Boy in Striped Pajamas - have had no German dialects. All the accents in the films were English.

I'm watching Valkyrie - and Hitler is speaking with something that sounds like a freakin' Welsh accent.

What is this about? Any theories?

Why has the German dialect fallen out of favor with Hollywood? Why not have actors speaking in German with proper accents and then subtitle it?

Is this a case of filmmakers being cheap and lazy, or is there some subtle psychological manipulation going on?

Half the actors in this movie are American, and even THEY are speaking in an English accent of one sort or another.

It's really making me confused. I rent a movie about Nazi Germany, I expect to see Germans and hear German dialect. Instead, I see British and American actors, and hear them force English accents - nearly every one of them.

The Boy in the Striped Pajamas just couldn't engage me as a viewer. It could have been such a good movie - it was a great story. But every five seconds I found myself thinking - wait, did my History teacher lie to me, were the Nazis really from Cornwall?

It's distracting, and annoying, and a little insulting. Can anybody offer me a theory as to why this is happening?

I think it's a degree of laziness/marketability in Hollywood...

I used to work in a record store and sometimes people would bring back subtitled films because they didn't want to "read a film" - seriously, there was at least one incident of this a day and that was people that accidentally picked them up, there were a lot of others that would actively avoid subtitled films.
I think Hollywood avoids producing subtitled works for that very reason, that a lot of people won't see something with subtitles...

Also "actors" are perhaps not as dedicated to their art these days and won't go to the trouble of learning a realistic accent.

Personally I have no trouble with subtitled material, but I find someone doing a poor imitation of an accent very off-putting and would rather have an actor just perform in their normal accent rather than make a pigs ear of it.

Well, I watched Valkyrie on DVD. The movie was excellently dubbed into the german language and was quite enjoyable. The german synchronisation team did a great job. I then switched over to english and couldn´t take five minutes of it. It´s just loses all authenticity when germans don´t sound like germans. Use english speaking german actors!

Another horrible example of this accent missmatch was "Duel: Enemy At The Gates". Russian snipers with Manchester accents? Two thumbs down!

The best German WW2 movie ever made that comes across totally authentic not only in german, but also in english, has to be Das Boot/The Boat. Absolute masterpiece.

Also just a little note.

Hollywood is run by Jews so they don't want to learn german nor let anyone german be in the film. And doing it in english would allow americans to understand they're agenda easier and allow them to hate nazis even more.

the moment the producers decided to make an English speaking movie, why would they need to speak in German accents? As it is obviously Hitler and all the other German roles would never have spoken in English and in German instead, so whatsoever accent is like nonsense.

So just speak English and for the German market dub it in German would be much better and easier for the international market.

Originally posted by Dallas87
Also just a little note.

Hollywood is run by Jews so they don't want to learn german nor let anyone german be in the film. And doing it in english would allow americans to understand they're agenda easier and allow them to hate nazis even more.

You do realize the Jewish population in Germany is about 120,000 right?

I suppose they don't speak a word of duetshe if you theory is true.

Hollywood screws up accents all the time. If a character is supposed to be from Tidewater Virginia, but is 'Southern', more often than not, the character has some 'Georgia Peach' accent, which is beyond wrong. It isn't conspiracy, just ignorance.

Subtitled films aren't as commerically viable as English-language films in America.

To be able to afford an actor like Tom Cruise, a film--especially a period film--needs to have a fairly large budget (according to wiki-rumor, the budget for Valkyrie was about eighty-million). Without a star like Cruise, a producer's less likely to raise that kind of money.

Even if Tom Cruise spoke fluent German, there'd be financial pressure for the film to be shot with the dialogue in English.

I couldn't agree more, WyrdeOne, it's a shame that this is the way it is. Otherwise, in my humble opinion, Valkyrie is a very good movie.

And as for that German production, Das Boot--yeah, it's good, but the book is superior.

F

Yeah I saw a German movie the other day where the English/Americans in it were speaking German.

Originally posted by WyrdeOne
Hold on - speaking English is one thing - speaking with an English accent is quite another.

I take your point on board . What I said is still valid thou for instance take the 1957 film at least Hardy Krüger who plays Franz von Werra is a German actor . Hence from memory he speaks with a German accent in the film .

My beef is that even the American actors in these silly movies were putting on English accents..to play Nazis.

Oh BTW I completely agree with you .
Look have you consider that you are just simply a bit more discerning then a lot of movie goers ?
IMO what you describe is a part of the dumbing down of society rather then a specific conspiracy theory to the cinema .

You get what you deserve if you waste your time with fiction, even fiction based on non-fiction.

Hollywood gives you what they think you want, not necessarily what you actually want.

It has to cater for the many, not the few.


As they had a "Cornwall" accent, I trust they said 'oss-#e' when they where none too pleased?