Stop The Madness!

It's hard to overestimate the horror experienced by cinemagoers when, while watching Shrek 2, they found world-renowned journalist Larry King's lines replaced by the witless wamblings of Jonathan Ross. It would have been enough to incite people to violence had they not then noticed that Joan Rivers was re-dubbed by Kate bloody Thornton and been forced to take their own lives. Fast forward several months and, with the scars healed and the bodies buried, most have managed to erase The Incident from their memories. Studio bosses, however, are planning a repeat of the whole fiasco and will be adding the voice of GMTV's Fiona Phillips to Will Smith's animated comedy, Shark Tale. Replacing the vocal stylings of American reporter Katie Couric, Philips will record her own whiny tones for the UK release of the film, butchering the role of piscine reporter Katie Current - and making a nonsense of the (admittedly rather weak) pun. What's that you say? A C-list celebrity with no acting experience whatsoever is exactly what a star-studded blockbuster needs to give it credibility on our parochial shores. Well yes, you may be right. We are, after all, an island and one that has no contact with the outside world and no knowledge of any culture but our own. Honestly, are British audiences so mentally challenged that we're incapable of identifying humour unless it's fifteen feet high, equipped with flashing lights and a speaker that announces 'danger, joke reversing' every few seconds? And with a film as big as Shark Tale is it really necessary to fall back on such dubious talent for the sake of a few puff pieces and one-off specials on ITV? No. Leave these films alone! Empire would like to a stand right here and now to make sure this practise of dumbing-down our imports is stamped out forever. We're drawing a line in the sand, standing up for the good of moviegoers everywhere and refusing to allow this injustice to continue. So join hands and say it with us now: 'Stop the madness! Keep crap TV celebs out of our films!'