Costner's accent is horrible - Thirteen Days (2001) Discussion

[–] astoryweaver 20 years ago

He worked very hard with a dialect coach for that movie. He did a superb job...as he always does.

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[–] alexhed 20 years ago

It sucked, every other accent in the movie was better, I'd say even the Russian ones.

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[–] 20 years ago

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[–] Mil-Jor 17 years ago

He [Costner] did a superb job...as he always does.

Ha ha - good one... ^^

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[–] aquaade 15 years ago

Agreed!! Costner was excellent.

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[–] malonedave-1 15 years ago

I disagree. He sounded like a Kennedy. Only the Kennedys sound like Kennedys. His character was from Worcester, MA... about 40 miles west of Boston. He should have had THAT accent, or at least a Bostonian accent (which is NOT what the Kennedys have) if he wanted to do it right. Good actor... bad dialect coach, most likely.

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[–] slimone (7996) 5 years ago

Maybe because he hung out with the Kennedys he picked up the accent.

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[–] LittleVikingGirl 15 years ago

I am from Boston and have the real accent. Does anyone out there know why it's so hard to do a Boston accent and make it sound believable ?
The only person I have ever heard come close, besides the Wahlbergs, Matt Damon and the Afflecks who are all actually FROM Boston is John Ratzenberger when he did Cliffie the mailman from Cheers. It was actually not bad.
People seem to be able to imitate the NYC accent but not Boston...WHY?

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[–] bsantosu (156) 2 years ago

If you want to see a non-Bostonian do a good accent watch Tony Curtis in The Boston Strangler. It's subtle and works perfectly.

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[–] 15 years ago

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[–] mitchconn 15 years ago

OP is NOT wrong...the accent is horrible. But t make matters even worse I am now watching a special on the 24 hours after the JFK assassination, and they played an audio clip of Ken O'Donnell....and he doesn't have a Boston accent!
So Costner gave a lousy performance for no reason.

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[–] DrJellyfingers 20 years ago

That accent was terrible. When i first heard it I didn't think I could take it for the whole movie. There were a couple scenes where he forgot to use it.

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[–] 20 years ago

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[–] merrcherr 20 years ago

I definitely agree the casting of the Kennedies was bang on, but I had trouble with Costner in this role... was his accent supposed to be New England Yankee, Texan, or generic Southern?

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[–] Cleon 20 years ago

I was suprised at Kennedy's accent, namely that he didn't have much of one. I wonder if this was intentional on the part of the film makers or the actor didn't want to try to force a bad Boston brogue. Between the top three I think Bobby was by far the most believable.

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[–] FooFighter82488 20 years ago

As a citizen of the Boston area, I thought Steven Culp portrayed the accent the best of the three. Costner was indeed off, while Greenwood's was good in the sense that you couldn't even tell it was there. It just was.

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[–] dignityjec 19 years ago

Yes, Costner's accent was the only bad thing about this movie . . . his accent was horrible. The actors playing JFK and RFK did a good job with the accents, although the guy playing RFK did sound more British than Bostonian at times.
His accent aside, Costner still did a great acting job. Everybody in the film did. Excellent movie, particularly given the fact no big-name actors besides Costner starred in it.

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[–] jarturn 19 years ago

motha
Fatha
Pizzer
Cuber
Cah

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[–] Quasarsphere 19 years ago

Ah yes...accents don't appear to be Mr Costner's strong point, do they? he has a reputation for simply not bothering.

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[–] 19 years ago

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[–] mattwadleigh 19 years ago

He was awful accent-wise but I think he played the role well.

I liked the line, "this isn't a permission slip, this is a report caaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaard." The entire line had no accent except for "card" which was incredibly over done. I openly laughed out loud while watching the movie when he said that.

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[–] TheEarman 19 years ago

I liked "We're lighting off nuclear weapons like it's our own personal FARTH of July." Only accenting one word in a sentence makes it sound. . . fake.

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[–] LChalmer00 19 years ago

We watched this trainwreck p.o.s. in class... everyone was laughing at his awful accent. God this movie was terrible...everything about it... but Coster = what really made it suck.

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[–] bulldog65 19 years ago

Great movie but i'm from the northeast... holy sweet mother of god that accent sucked

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[–] clarkluby 19 years ago

Yes, the accent was terrible and I felt the same way that I wasn't sure if I could go the whole movie with it. Overall a good movie.

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[–] empressphoenix4 19 years ago

From the moment he started talking I felt like something was out of place...maybe his accent? >_< I just turned to my mom and said, 'Something's wrong with his accent? What's he trying to do?' I couldn't focus on the dialogue and had to rewind the DVD to listen in again because the fact that his accent was horrible was DISTRACTING. I tried to ignore it for the rest of the movie and his performance is great but I guess if he had a deeper voice it wouldn't sound as bad. His voice is just too...high I guess for this accent. Overall, it was a very powerful cast and a wonderful political thriller. Considering I'm only 15 and I wouldn't be normally into these type of movies. This movie's underrated IMO.

My parents have to take me out of Grobania every once in a while

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[–] 19 years ago

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[–] Renny_Sue 17 years ago

I saw it in the theatres and the entire THEATRE cracked up at that line.

Honestly, Costner would have been better going with no accent in this role. O'Donnell wasn't well known enough that it would bother people.

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[–] Goranjake 8 years ago

That is so freaking hilarious, I wish I could've seen this in a theater to hear the reactions.

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[–] 19 years ago

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[–] JebDaBush 19 years ago

I though he sounded like Elmer Fudd. Waaaabit

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[–] plostylzz 19 years ago

his accent was atrocious

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[–] jarturn 18 years ago

Yes, many people in Boston now use the term "Kevin Costner accent" when an outsider tries to mimic our lingo, like "Dick Van Dyke accent" is used in England for Americans who try to talk British.

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[–] aprilfools401_1991 19 years ago

what is IMO?

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[–] 19 years ago

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