Heck, Viggo should have just stuck with his natural American accent. Aragorn's ancestors did come from a mighty nation across the western sea, after all...
Viggo was fine. His accent was fine, given that he has an unusual way of speaking anyway. I commented on his tendency to speak indistinctly in Eastern Promises and someone who speaks Russian said his accent was authentic. In the same way his English accent was authentic too. The only problem I have is that despite all the hard work done by Americans in the cast to sound as homogeneous as possible, the UK actors were all allowed to use their own accents willy nilly.
Which is not entirely true. Legolas spoke an accent-free Estuary, whereas Orlie doesn't talk like that at all. Basically, no-one does in real life. All the Elves were supposed to speak non-regional received pronunciation, no matter what part of the world the actors came from. As for the Americans opting for the same British English, I think it's hard enough for them to get NRP right, let alone any regional accent. I don't think they are capable of that at all. And Viggo did screw up the accent; throughout the films he pronounced the same words differently, he put "r" where it didn't belong sometimes etc. He was supposed to emulate something English, but it didn't work. I still loved the way he played the character, and it's not a complaint, just an oservation.
I respect your opinion but I disagree. Depending on the voice actor, some folks wouldn't even notice.
No, I did say that, but that was not to say that I think Hurt is ideal for the role simply because he has played a dragon. I suggested it because he is good at that kind of character - namely voicing an evil, gravelly, wicked, old beast. Otherwise I'd have just said he's played a dragon, and not indicated at all whether he's any good at it.
Had he not played Elrond, Hugo Weaving would have been perfect... This is going to sound wacky and out of left field, but: Tony Blair.
I've got that. My point is and was that I'd like to see the role played by someone who hasn't done such a similar role before. Whether or not he was good at it was irrelevant - I just want The Hobbit's dragon to be an all new one, not to be one where people go 'Oh, he sounds like the dragon in Merlin/ Dragonheart/ whatever.' I just thought that the smiley you posted before was a little uncalled for given that.
Who's Paul Lynne? Or do you mean Paul Lynde from Hollywood Squares fame? (he's deceased, by the way, and has been for about thirty years)