This is bound to have a mildly disconcerting effect on a grown-up audience, bringing back my baleful memories of when a high school teacher thought it would be a great end of term treat to watch a movie in French… without subtitles. It’s also why those parts of the world acquainted with curry will laugh for both recognition and absurdity when the phrase “Open sesame” is replaced with “Poulet tiki masala!”, a rough approximation of the most popular curry in the UK, chicken tikka masala. “Para ti” is “for you” in Esperanto (itself a mish-mash of other languages), extremely close to the Minionese “para tu”. The Minions’ word for “thank you”, “terimakasi”, is borrowed from Indonesian. “Gelato” from Italian means the same thing, ice cream when said by the Minions. Minionese is in fact a Frankenstein’s monster of a language, stitched together from odd phrases here and there which will be familiar to different people the world over. What’s intriguing is that the creators and voices of the Minions, Pierre Coffin and Chris Renaud, haven’t actually made up a new language at all. In the movie we learn that they have served many masters the world over, so it makes a bit more sense that they couldn’t be held to just one earthly language. Now they have become the stars of their own self-titled, full-length movie, the Minions are more inescapable than ever. Should we fear, or embrace, this new language? The internet is abuzz with Minionese-English dictionaries and this is exactly how it would have started with Klingon, if there were high-speed internet in the 1970s. It is known to a generation as Minionese – the virtually-incoherent language spoken by those googly-eyed yellow chaps, introduced to an unprepared world by the 2010 movie ‘Despicable Me’. I had no occasion of bribing, flattering, or pimping, to procure the favour of any great man, or of his minion I wanted no fence against fraud or oppression: here was neither physician to destroy my body, nor lawyer to ruin my fortune no informer to watch my words and actions, or forge accusations against me for hire: here were no gibers, censurers, backbiters, pickpockets, highwaymen, housebreakers, attorneys, bawds, buffoons, gamesters, politicians, wits, splenetics, tedious talkers, controvertists, ravishers, murderers, robbers, virtuosos no leaders, or followers, of party and faction no encouragers to vice, by seducement or examples no dungeon, axes, gibbets, whipping-posts, or pillories no cheating shopkeepers or mechanics no pride, vanity, or affectation no fops, bullies, drunkards, strolling whores, or poxes no ranting, lewd, expensive wives no stupid, proud pedants no importunate, overbearing, quarrelsome, noisy, roaring, empty, conceited, swearing companions no scoundrels raised from the dust upon the merit of their vices, or nobility thrown into it on account of their virtues no lords, fiddlers, judges, or dancing-masters.Parents still reeling from the decimation of sanity caused by the soundtrack to ‘Frozen’ will be all too aware of a new plague, as the childless amongst us laugh uncomprehendingly at their misfortune. Ferdinando, the ' minion', carries them away, and Hagar puts back the cup which holds the poison meant for Roderigo.
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