I was terribly chuffed by how many Brits were in the movie, actually. And not just as villains! Such a delicious novelty. Go Team!

Well, Chris Nolan is half-British, so it's not terribly surprising.

think the tradition of Brit villains dates to Die Hard and how AWESOME Alan Rickman was in it, so you can blame him.

But he was playing a German! Badly, mind you (accent-wise), but still!

But Rickman played the "nondescript, unspecified generic European," in Die Hard, not an Englishman. I'd say Brit villainy dates rather to the early Bond films. Blofeld and Dr. No and Goldfinger and the like.

Yes, but he was awfully good at it.

Those Fanta chicks bellow their theme song so loudly I can't possibly talk during the ad. I could scream, but I think nobody would hear by desperate cry for help.

I hate the Fanta girls. I definitenly do NOT wanna Fanta.

A Brit friend has complained bitterly to me about how the English are always bad guys in American movies. I keep trying to convince him that it's compliment, but I don't think he's buying it.

This is so totally true. All the bloody time. 'We need somebody villainous - quick, let's get a Brit. Or, or at least let's get someone to do an English accent. Yeah. That'll sound evil. And it'll be so satisfying when we kick their ass!'

It's like the US movie industry is constantly replaying the whole bloody War of Independence in some kind of pathetic Oedipal thing again and again and again - watch us defeat those nasty Brits, they think they're better than us with their superior cut-glass accents but we're going to kick their pansy asses into the middle of next week.

Eddie Izzard has a great riff on that, including how French actors are always cast as the seductive, sexy ones.

Yeah. We play bad guys in Hollywood movies because of the Revolutionary War. Yeah, yes, no two ways about it. And the French, who were on your side in the Revolutionary war, they play more esoteric characters. They have characters who turn up and go, "My name is Pierre! I come from Paris. I come to have sex with your family." "Help yourself…because of the debt of honor to General Lafayette!"

YES.

What Eddie said. That.

Sigh.

Also, generally English men are depicted as gay and/or spineless, whereas English women are depicted as ice maidens secretly burning for a jolly good hard shag from a manly American.

English women are depicted as ice maidens secretly burning for a jolly good hard shag from a manly American.

That certainly describes all the English women I've come across, which is zero, which is why I am NGA.

English women are depicted as ice maidens secretly burning for a jolly good hard shag from a manly American.

::starts packing for England::

Wait, you said depicted....

It's like the US movie industry is constantly replaying the whole bloody War of Independence in some kind of pathetic Oedipal thing again and again and again

Tee hee. Fay, that actually was one of my explanations. "Culturally, you're our parents. And we're basically an adolescent country, so..."

The complimentary (ish?) version is basically what tommyrot said. We tend to associate a British accent with a higher IQ. I blame PBS for that. So you're the villains because your higher intelligence makes you a a more formidable adversary. Hey, it could be worse: An accent from the southern U.S. is usually shorthand for "inbred and dangerously violent."

Lemme see if I can dig up his rant about it, because it was amusing.

Aha. This followed extensive venting about Titanic and Braveheart and several other movies, which I would quote except he does run on. Anyway:

I must just mention 'Pitch Black' at this point though, because I saw it in New York and when - surprise surprise - the 'stupid selfish Englishman' crawls away from the others and knackers their light defence against the beasties, I turned to the people next to me and grunted "A Brit? Being a git in a film? What a shock, eh..?" Unfortunately, however, I am 6' 4", was built like a brick shit-house at the time, had a skinhead (almost), and was wearing a big black leather 'lock-stock' coat. As a consequence, said couple almost crapped themselves. I thought New Yorkers were supposed to be hard? Tsh.

And part of my response:

I will attempt to explain (though not defend) using Brits as baddies: we've got an inferiority complex. It's the same reason teenagers like seeing adults made to look stupid. "Ooo, we're the United States, we're rich and powerful!" "Ah. Yes. We did that. Was fun. Have at it." "No! We're RULING THE WORLD! FEAR US!" "Yes, quite. Have fun, give us a ring on Sunday, we're just keeping Western Culture respectable over here, cheers." "ARGH!"

You'd be toast if we didn't adore your accents so much. (And I *think* that the Evil Bastard English always have upper-class, veddy proper accents. If it's Cockney-esque, you can be the good guy.) We love the Irish because they're the drunken brother who's still living at home. "Oo, he's so rebellious and punk and surly!" The Scots and Welsh haven't proved interesting enough to have strong feelings about. Poor middle children.

Patrick Stewart.