Movie Talk

I recently saw Genius.  Generally, you don't make movies about writers, since watching them do their thing is the cinematic equivalent of paint drying; Genius is about a book editor, and that makes writing seem like the Indianapolis 500.

But that's not what I want to talk about.  I want to discuss the cast.  It features Colin Firth as Maxwell Perkins, Jude Law as Thomas Wolfe, Nicole Kidman as Wolfe's lover Aline Bernstein, Guy Pearce as F. Scott Fitzgerald and Dominic West as Ernest Hemingway.

Colin Firth is British, Jude Law is British, Nicole Kidman is Australian, Guy Pearce is Australian, Dominic West is British.  Yet here they are in a movie set in America, about Americans, trying out their American accents.

I have no objection to hiring the best actors available, but it's strange when so many are hired to speak so differently.  If it weren't for Laura Linney as Perkins' wife, the Yanks would have no say at all.