Discuss Johnny Was
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Most clever use of accents in a movie
posted by rooprectSTAFFMOD on December 26, 2023 at 4:37 AM
Johnny is Irish but he speaks with a London/Cockney accent.
Julius is from London but speaks with a Jamaican accent.
Rita is Jamaican but speaks with an Irish accent.
Each person has a different reason which fits their character perfectly. Johnny says that growing up, he was bullied by the London boys who “beat the accent out of him, but the whole time they were beating the Irish into him.” (He became an Irish “terrorist” operating covertly.)
Julius is sneaky & never to be trusted. As the Jamaican drug lord he speaks with a thick Jamaican accent, but as we learn later he was born & raised in East End London. His entire accent is an act.
Rita goes with the flow in order to survive but retains her core identity. She’s neck deep in the Jamaican drug scene but oddly speaks with the Irish dialect she was raised on.
Given that accents & backgrounds are such an important part of the movie, I’m sure there was interesting stuff going on with other characters too, but I’m not familiar enough with UK accents to place them all. I bet even within dialects there are important distinctions, like Flynn’s Irish vs Jimmy’s (Roger Daltrey). All the characters have strong political, cultural & moral divisions, even if they grew up on the same street.
There’s a lot more to this movie than just a crime thriller. A nice surprise.
Reply by bratface
on December 26, 2023 at 9:06 PM
I just watched the first 25 minutes or so (will watch the rest later) but as for Vinnie's accent in this, it's pretty close to his own (here is a video below of him being interviewed on Top Gear). Maybe he has trouble with accents. Haven't heard Rita speak yet & Lewis' (Ras) accent is a bit thick but his parents were Jamaican so he comes by it honestly. Here's a bit of trivia about Lewis' appearance in this movie, he spent his honeymoon in the UK filming this movie. I was surprised that Bergin's accent was barely perceptible though, his accent is usually a bit thicker.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_DtclkqSKjo&t
Reply by rooprect
on December 27, 2023 at 3:31 AM
Cool I’d never seen Vinnie Jones before, so I didn’t know if he (or anyone) was faking an accent or if that’s how he actually spoke. Given that the accents are written into the script (the scene where Johnny & Rita meet, and the scene where fishman talks about Julius faking his Jamaican accent), they might’ve cast the movie based on actors’ normal speaking voices.
I rewatched Roger Daltrey’s (Jimmy’s) scene and noticed he doesn’t seem to have an Irish accent at all; if anything he’s exaggerating the dirty London dialect like Vinnie (Johnny). But there’s a line where Flynn may have explained this.. in the club when he’s talking to them he says, “I’m caught between London Irish [Johnny] and London dairy [Jimmy].”
Not exactly sure what that means but he refers to them both as London.
Reply by bratface
on December 27, 2023 at 2:19 PM
Jones' first movie (after he retired from football/soccer) was "Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels'.
He's referring to the big difference between an Irishman living in London & an Irishman living back in Londonderry (the city in Northern Ireland).
Lennox Lewis (Ras) generally speaks with a slight British accent. He was born in the UK but moved to Canada when he was 12.
Eriq La Salle is an American, born & raised in Connecticut, probably why his 'accent' is so thick. I find that a lot of American actors often overdo some accents (especially African & Caribbean ones).
Samantha Mumba (Rita) is Irish, so the accent is real (although I don't know how thick her real accent is). She started as a pop star when she was a teenager.
Only caught a bit of Daltry, the scene when he was waiting for Flynn & the kid (but the cops showed up & he skedaddled out of there). I heard just a tiny Irish inflection but...?