>Nope. I haven't noticed it. I do think a lot of people confuse
>British with American patrician, but that might not be the
>case. There are enough American period pieces where Americans
>(or Brits, French or whatever country the actor comes from)
>use the appropriate American accents for the time period for
>me to think what you're saying you hear is not that common. If
>you have a specific example (few have been provided so far)
>I'll see if I hear what you hear.
>
Try There Will Be Blood, for instance. Or even Daniel Day Lewis' performance before that in Gangs of New York. Two great movies, but his accent in them was way off the wall, and directly clashed with the accents of the other characters, all because he based it on a certain figures approximating the period, or even a way the hell off estimation.

The accents people for 'confusing' for British is certainly NOT American patrician. There's a pretty huge difference between that and the faux-British accent that's often used on screen. I know some actors will research heavily prior to a role, but I think you might be giving many of them far too much credit.

>None of this has anything to do with the initial question. I
>think everyone is addressing different things. Yes, a Swede
>can play an Italian. A Brit can play a Frenchman. None of that
>goes against what I've posted. I didn't use those specific
>examples but yes, people from one nation can play people from
>other nations. There's nothing odd or inappropriate about that
>and that's what the post is about, oddly placed accents, not
>playing characters from different backgrounds.
>
My point was that the accents were all over the place, and a large number of the characters in the movie were supposed to be British, although there was absolutely no cohesion and the guy playing the Frenchman ending up sounding far more British than the main guys that were playing the British characters. I mentioned the other roles/actors just to emphasize how jarring it can be. I think pertains to the initial question.

>As you say (unless you can explain why their nationalities
>don't factor, not just state it) Jeremy Irons and Gabriel
>Byrne are British so it's likely that will be the accent they
>use. Malkovich almost always speaks NE patrician American,
>similar and often confused, but if it's British in that film
>then so be it. As the setting is French, these native
>English-speaking actors making a film for a primarily
>English-speaking audience are not likely going to adopt fake
>French accents. There's no need for it and it would be
>distracting. Nothing new there. Leo's accent was regular
>American, which is a big part of why the film was weird for
>people. But I don't think it was done for any other affect
>than for them not to take on French accents, they spoke in
>their natural dialects and let the story be central to the
>film.
>
Of course that's why they did it. But it's not good. It's quite bad actually. And anyone that really pay attention will probably think it's laughably bad. And more so when some of the characters actually do assume the proper accent, and others don't.

>Yes, they can. But in this case, the films mentioned are
>fantasy. I could probably move off of Troy with some
>convincing, but not 300.
>
Calling it fantasy and not a period piece is mostly you're own opinion, though, right? I mean, I'm with you, I don't want to set 300 right up there next to the Age of Innocence, but there isn't exactly any set standard to qualify your statement. There aren't any strict borders to it (well, you could probably say that LOTR is fantasy and not a period piece, since it isn't set in this world). Once you try to set those borders suddenly you get tons of movies that don't fit on either side.