Two Countries Separated By A Common Language

Two Countries Separated By A Common Language

Posted on Tuesday August 10, 2010, 14:51 by Helen O'Hara in Empire States

This is a blog about a really small but really irritating issue, so bring on the accusations of frivolity and mislaid priorities. I'd like to talk to you about Americanisms creeping into English usage in films, in particular in period pieces where such words make no sense. I first noticed it in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and spotted a particularly egregious case recently in Tinkerbell and the Great Fairy Rescue* (out this week in, er, some good cinemas).

In that film, a 19th century / early 20th century British man called Doctor Griffiths, living near London and voiced by Michael Sheen, uses the word "trunk" to refer to the boot of his fancy new automobile. His daughter Lizzy - who is, we are given to believe, equally English - rejoices in the fact that the house is near a "creek" rather than a stream**. And in both cases they sound like total idiots as a result, and I actually winced even more than I was already wincing.

This follows on from Charlie, where - rather mysteriously - Charlie and his entire family had British accents but talked incessantly about "candy" rather than sweets. In that case, however, a lady in the sweet shop offers Charlie two hundred and fifty dollars for his Golden Ticket, and apparently the explanation for all this inconsistency of accent and currency and behaviour is that Tim Burton intended the story to be set in some sort of nebulous non-country. To which I say: bollocks. That's justification after the fact, that is, and Mr Burton owes more to both his adoptive home and his native land.

I think I get what's happened here. Some test screening audience or studio executive has worried that people won't know what these funny words mean. What are these "sweets" of which Charlie speaks? How much is a pound worth? And where on Earth is the "boot" of a car? Especially in children's films, the script has been changed as a result, to better aid the understanding of the developmentally challenged (Americans, apparently).

And of course this is rather patronising, like changing the "Philosopher's Stone" for the "Sorcerer's Stone" for American audiences (originally done by the book's publishers, but repeated on film). If audiences don't get the specific reference immediately, who cares? They'll still follow the gist, and may even come away feeling a tiny bit smarter, or with their minds a little more open to the world. Heck, some American child might be tempted to look up the "philosopher's stone" on Wikipedia, and might discover that JK Rowling didn't just throw this stuff together. Equally, they might learn what a boot or a sweet is, and feel just a little more cosmopolitan and informed as a result.

In support of this, I can offer a wealth of anecdotal evidence. For years in university, and even occasionally since, I've spent summer holidays taking American teenagers around Europe. I can assure you, therefore, that while they don't use words including (but not limited to) rubbish, bin, brilliant, footpath, pavement, lift and queue themselves, they are pretty much always capable of FIGURING IT OUT. I am confident that even the little girl who asked me whether we were going to see fish from the train while going through the Channel Tunnel would have figured that out, had she given it a few more moments' thought. There's no need to deform the English language to cater to the very lowest common denominator - any more than we Brits would suddenly expect American characters to start talking about shops and pavements and flats instead of stores and sidewalks and apartments. Admittedly, the lack of understanding of regional dialect can sometimes have funny consequences: the makers of Buffy being able to get away with having Spike say "wanker" on occasion, or Jean-Luc Picard saying "Merde" (in, OK, another language rather than another dialect) in the first ever episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. But where you end up using inappropriate words for certain accents, you just look dumb.

I understand that cultural imperialism is a strong force, I understand that no one wants to lose the audience. But pretending that differences in language don't exist are more apt to increase the scope for misunderstanding down the line, and do nothing to teach children that it's a funny old world, and not everyone lives in the same way that you do. I find it hard to believe that American kids, all agape at the fairies and the funny animals and the bright colours, would have been fatally confused by mention of a boot (which, incidentally, the father immediately opens - demonstrating what he was talking about) or a sweet shop. Just give them a chance, eh?

*Look, it's not all screenings of Scott Pilgrim around here! Sometimes we have to take one for the team (or, in this case, a four year-old and an 8 year-old of my acquaintance who were dying to see it) and see something that's rather further outside the comfort zone.

**A New Zealander friend reminds me that the word "creek" can, in English English, mean tidal water channel. In the usage in this film, however, it's clearly used to mean "stream" which is not correct.