MovieChat Forums > Green Street (2005) Discussion > His accent...

His accent...

posted 15 years ago by david.thomp
22 replies | jump to latest

I guess this will be a question more for us Brits. Did anyone else think that Charlie Hunnam's accent was pretty rough. He was verging on being Dick Van Dyke at some points. I have never heard him in an interview, so I haven't heard his normal accent but being from Newcastle I think he's had some training to make him sound like a cockney. Just an observation really.

Apologies, I've just seen a lot of other people have commented on the same thing.
Still doesn't detract from the fact that they could have found someone....anyone!

[–] mikeyg24 15 years ago

I lived with two Essex boys for a year and they told me I did a better Cockney accent than him and I'm from the West of Ireland. It was woeful.

Good guys may not finish last but they sure as sh*t don't finish first!

[–] tilldanny 15 years ago

I thought his accent was perfectly in keeping with this godawful shocker of a film.

[–] yarders83 15 years ago

it was cronic, i thought he was been dubbed for the first 5 minutes. and what was with his walk? it was like he was trying to impersonate a chav. i arent slagging the actor off but this film is embarrassing.

[–] xtinevelvet 14 years ago

That guy is just all around awful.
You should see him on Sons of Anarchy. It's almost painful.

[–] media_hero 12 years ago

"and what was with his walk? it was like he was trying to impersonate a chav."

I thought his walk was really odd too, but he does the same walk a lot in Sons of Anarchy, and I think he did it in Undeclared as well. It's just his actual walk.

[–] adamseven7 15 years ago

yep, awful accent, took away from the grittier side of the movie for me, hunnam has accent issues, i remember thinking he must have been an american actor first time i saw him in nicholas nickelby, as the accent was a strange hybrid!

always amazes me, the way casting chooses these inferior accents for a fairly heavyweight role

_________
H is pronounced Aitch NOT Haitch !

[–] The_Optimist 15 years ago

Agreed. It nearly ruined the film for me too. Upper class boy pretending to be a cockney. I saw this straight after Football Factory, which didn't help. Any of those actors would have been perfect.

[–] laymonite-2 14 years ago

TBH his pronunciation was really bad and unrealistic. Didn't spoil the film but it was noticably bad.

It sounded a bit gay with his weird deliberate pronunciation - completely unbelievable in context.. Then again the West Ham song really can't be sung without sounding completely gay - and it was used frequently...

I think big blue eyed baby faced yank Elijah Wood as a football hooligan was possibly less believable anyway :)

[–] john_lennon 14 years ago

Damn right! just embarrassing! makes you wonder who the accent coach was, and also you wold think the fellow actor who I assume are cockneys would say something...

[–] fuhgeddaboutit01 14 years ago

would it have been hard to cast a London actor in the role? Failing that, hire an actor who can do a half decent London accent.

He sounded Australian in parts. Couldn't take him seriously leading an East End football firm, talking like that.

[–] Squeeth2 11 years ago

~~~~~Then again the West Ham song really can't be sung without sounding completely gay~~~~~

Marlon, Claudia and Dimby the cats 1989-2005, 2007 and 2010.

[–] sajmeister2000 12 years ago

So true, that Charlie Hunnam did have a dodgy London accent, it felt like I was listening to Dick Van Dyke from Mary Poppins, someone thought this was Channing Tatum that's why it was dodgy but look at Stephen Graham, who played Tommy in Snatch (200), no one would believe he was a scouser cos he pulled off a really good London cockney accent. I saw his interview in the DVD extras and when I heard his Liverpool accent, I was so surprised cos I thought he was a born and bred Londoner unlike Charlie Hunnam in this film!

http://imdb.com/title/tt0109872/board/nest/54510162

[–] lisaBrit 12 years ago

Cold-blooded murder of the Cockney accent. Should be ashamed of himself.

Have a good time, all the time...

[–] HelveticaFont 12 years ago

But then how often have actors murdered the Geordie accent, so Hunnam's accent is almost revenge.

[–] 12 years ago

[deleted]

[–] andrewwisniewski 12 years ago

In this regard here, I'm lucky I'm American. I can't really tell how bad someone is doing a British accent, unless it's one of us doing a poor one. But to most of us yanks, most British accents sound the same. Lucky us!

[–] HelveticaFont 12 years ago

In all fairness though how many Americans are exposed to a wide variety of British accents?

The majority of British accents that Americans tend to be exposed to are from England and even then it's the same one or two.

London(Cockney), England
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5LQYMil8D04

Birmingham(Brummy), England
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4U2UaEGWq2E

Bolton, England
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YH5vSHiAOAE

Manchester(Manc), England
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1QUk9asJGE

Liverpool(Scouser), England
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5YcWkvkEZUg

Newcastle(Geordie), England
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IUpz_mL7zqU&feature=relmfu

Glasgow(Glaswegian), Scotland
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QvOQxeQKrdw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5uT6wmKgMys

Carmarthen, Wales
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UorpjinrGKE

[–] jukebox_lucky 12 years ago

I dunno about that, andrew. I can definitely tell the difference most of the time.

GK: Every show is your last show. That's my philosophy.
Rhonda: Thank you, Plato.

[–] JonHell 11 years ago

Jesus, I only just found out he's a geordie, I thought he was american hence the dodgy accent...

...all questions exhaust me...

[–] ragdiman 11 years ago

Hell, i just find out he was a Brit. So he is from the same country that all these accents are and he couldn't pulled it off!?!?! Really? SAD!

[–] david_buthlay 10 years ago

I kind of let him off a tad as I assumed he was American. The whole of Scotland can fake a better cockney accent than that, someone's pulling strings for this lad in Hollywood.