Watching this fanastic film again yesterday, towards the end of the film I heard Martini, played by Danny De Vito, use the word 'hovno'. I checked it with the subtitles and it definitely was 'hovno'. Hovno is the Czech word for 'shit'. As the director was Milos Forman, I presume that this was his little joke for his fellow countrymen. Any other linguistic 'easter eggs' in films?
1
chriskean1
There are a lot in the 1930s Karloff/Lugosi film "The Black Cat" (nothing to do with Poe). In the movie, Karloff turns out to be head of a Satanic cult, and is seen leading a mass and uttering various phrases in Latin. But the phrases are all gags--"beware of the dog" and so on.
CK
2
anolazima
There are a couple of Yiddish injokes in the Three Stooges. Here is an explanation of the one of the better known ones:
3
vinnyd
When the chorus in Animal Crackers sings "Hurray for Captain Spalding, the African explorer!" Groucho Marx as Spalding asks "Did someone call me schnorrer?" (Schnorrer=beggar in Yiddish.) At about 2:15 here. I don't know how many people at the time could have been expected to know what schnorrer meant.
Not exactly the same kind of thing, but if I recall correctly, the Indians in Blazing Saddles speak Yiddish.
4
nutraxfornerves
Don't forget the Blazing Saddles+ chanteuse, Lili Von Shtupp. As Leo Rosten delicately defines it +shtup can mean "to fornicate" or "the act of copulation" or "a female who fornicates."
Edited by: Mel Kaminsky
5
shilgia
Sasha Baron Cohen speaks Hebrew in the Borat movie, where Borat is supposed to speak Kazakh.
6
stormboy
Sasha Baron Cohen speaks Hebrew in the Borat movie, where Borat is supposed to speak Kazakh.
From what I remember, there's also quite a bit of Polish 'jak się masz?' or Czech 'jak se máš?' ('how are you?') - not sure which it was.
7
igor
One of the most prominent ones is Diva Plavalaguna in the Fifth Element - "Plava laguna" means Blue Lagoon in Serbian/Croatian, as Milla Jovovich played also in the sequel to Brooke Shields' film.
I saw Play It to the Bone with Lolita Davidovich, nothing memorable but I looked up the actress when I heard her speak Serbian - not important to the plot, just a conversation at a party about buying socks for men. There are probably plenty of similar instances.
#6 - It was more like Polish (the middle word is 'she', not 'se'). There's also plenty of Armenian in the movie.
Edited by: igor to add the link
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