[HDCriticalFan]

An excellent BBC Natural History programme. An interesting story and beautiful HD pictures.

But the story of these three troupes of monkeys was quite enough to make a show. Did we really need the "human interest" element of the (admittedly hugely photogenic) Japanese primatologist to tell us her personal thoughts ?

And why couldn't we listen to this Japanese scientist (with subtitles) instead of having her faded down and voiced-over in English ?

Other shows (Around the World in 80 Faiths) seem to be able to deal more sensitively/respectfully with foreign language speakers even when they are apparently filmed in a real-time conversation.

And was that really the normal speaking voice of voice-over artist Liz Sutherland ? Does she have a (comedy) Japanese accent in "real life" ? I don't think so. I think she was either told (or decided) to put on this accent to match the nationality of the scientist.

Presumably we are to believe that, if this scientist could speak English, then this is how she would do it. What an assumption! There is no reason to believe that she could not speak English much more fluently.

Leaving aside the Political Incorrectness of this, I felt it spoiled the show for me as I strained to pick out errors in her fake accent. To be fair to Liz, I really didn't spot any. I was almost prepared to believe that a Japanese person had done the voice-over ... until I saw Liz Sutherland in the credits. Now I suppose she might have Japanese ancestry, but what are the odds !




Regards