Introduction
Having limited channels on cable, I was thrown into FOX “action movies”. The treat that befell me was one of the many, many poor American cinema adaptations of Robin Hood. As the bad guy started to do his usual crap speech about taxes, the “working class” people of Nottingham began to speak up about their disdain for said tax.
I have a lot of friends from Nottingham, they have a unique accent. What they don’t have is an Irish accent, but apparently in 16th, or 17th century, I mean what does it matter Robin Hood was made up for fuck sake, but all the working class people are Irish???
Actually this is not a new thing and has got to such a level that it has been parodied in the odd movie (more on that later)
Englishmen are the bad guys
When you combine the fact that the US fought the UK for independence, with the fact the Americans genuinely believe we all sound like Hugh Grant, and taking into consideration the large Irish community in America, then it is impossible to have an English working class hero. To Americans the English are just upper-class twats. Which is a bit offensive. Imagine my American friends if we thought all of you were Trump voting Kardashians? It’s not nice is it?
The Titanic precedent
For those few of us who care about this outrage, Titanic proves point and case. The English upper classes prove to be the “bad guys”, the sole “American” represents “new money” and the American dream, whilst every lower deck working class person is an immigrant, or Irish. I mean there’s cinematic license and there’s just frankly taking the piss.
Churchill the Hollywood Years
Which brings us to one of the greatest spoof movies of all time: Churchill the Hollywood Years. The basic premise of this colossal failure of American cinema is that Winston Churchill was a made up figure to hide the real “American” hero that won the war. An absolute movie masterpiece that plays at films such as Saving Private Ryan and, well pretty much every other movie where America pretends that it won the war without any help. It’s not the first time Americans saw themselves as the heroes without help. American cinema never caught onto these guys who joined the Khmer Rouge.
In the context of this article though, you get Gareth from the Office playing an “Irish Cockney”, who represent the British working class, from wherever else but “Ye Olde Dick Van Dyke Street”. Yeah we remember the worst ever cockney accent ever, thrown not just onto American cinema, but onto the entire cinematic world.
So, overall fuck you American film makers, our working class are just as poor as the Irish.
