For some time now I have perversely enjoyed the films of Jason Statham. They are perpetually so bad that they are sometimes good. So cheesy, so predictable and yet paradoxically watch-able. Sometimes. The real reason I enjoy some of his films is his accent. Coming from England like Mr. Statham I have been subject to American accents on TV and films all my life. Yet no-one has ever spoken like he does in his films, because, he cannot do the American accent.
Unless you are Hugh Grant and essentially play the same pathetic character in all of your films there comes a time when an aspiring or even established film star from the UK will be required to produce some kind of American accent, be that West coast, East coast or mid Western. Statham's accent is lost in the mid-Atlantic. It is literally so bad it is good.
For the life of me I do not know why Hollywood directors who cast him in so-called action films don't just get him to play an English character, they often get him to play an American. His accent is is convincing as Jean Claude Van Damme's 80's and 90's efforts though not as bad as Dick Van Dyke's or Keanu Reeves' British accents of times gone past. Often Statham's accent veers from a bad American effort to a Londoners voice but each scene is hardly ever the same as the previous one. To put it another way, he simply cannot talk in a straight line.
For my sins I downloaded his latest effort, The Expendables for a laugh this weekend and to kill some time. Expecting nothing but a bad accent I watched and was surprised to find that for the majority of the film he stayed in UK accent mode. Curses, but I guess even a stopped watch is right twice a day. Statham without 'the accent' is like a sandwich without bread. Anyway not surprisingly the film is rubbish and I've already forgotten the plot, so bad was it. May Statham's accent tribulations continue.
No comments:
Post a Comment