I was looking forward to the new BBC series with Kenneth Branagh playing a detective, Wallander. The trailers seemed good, so I made sure to plonk myself in front of the TV last night at precisely 9pm. The information button said that it was about a Swedish detective, so I assumed it was set in England with Branagh playing a Swedish person living in England. Swedish people generally have fantastic American and British accents (it seems they can choose which type they study at school), so the absence of a Swedish accent from Branagh didn’t strike me as odd. I did start to get really confused when after Branagh’s character was speaking about his father, some Swedish person died (a flag and a TV programme were the clues he was Swedish), so I assumed it was his father who died. It eventually dawned on me when the “Polis” showed up, that this was another horrible example of a show set in a foreign country where everyone speaks English!
My message to the BBC: If you are going to make a show set in Sweden, cast Swedish people and subtitle it!!!! It is just too fake and unwatchable otherwise. I turned off the TV and decided to do some internet banking instead. I’ve just checked online and it seems the show was based on a book by a Swedish author, so it is understandable that they wanted to keep it set in Sweden, but really, change the setting to the UK or find some Swedish actors – I’m sure there are plenty!
1 December 2008 12:55