I watched Fargo last night. What a cool movie!
I asked my husband “why do they speak like that?”, he said “because they are Minnesotans”.
Hmmm… now that I think of it I have never, ever met a Minnesotan (that I know).
Do they really speak like that and pepper their conversations with “jas”? And why would they speak with an accent that sounds more German than Scandinavian?
I have no idea why they speak like that, but a lot of people in northern Michigan (particularly UPers) speak like that.
I found the accents in Fargo to be accurate but a tad exaggerated for comic affect. For a more serious example of a Minnesota accent, check out Kurt Russel’s performance as Minnesotan hockey coach Herb Brooks in Miracle.
Most Minnesotans are of German and/or Norwegian ancestry – the accent definitely includes a lot of characteristics of both those languages.
It’s a little exaggarated in the movie, but yah, sure, you betcha, they talk like that. It’s thicker in some regions than others but the lilt is pretty much ubiquitous.
Hokey smokes! That movie never worked!
One of my wife’s best friends is from Western Minnesota and has no noticeable accent herself. After she had seen Fargo (the movie), she was angry at the Coen Bros. for lampooning Minnesotans and their accent. “Nobody there talks like that!” she’d hiss. A few months later, her sister brought her family to visit and we all went out for dinner. Every time the sister would talk, my wife and I would bite our cheeks and squirm to keep from laughing out loud. She had the exact same accent that you hear in the movie.
And Swedish (though we don’t say “ja” as they do in Fargo).
Heck, when I had to call people in Milwaukee for Miller back in the day, the systems support people all talk like that. Not as severe, but pretty close.
The Coen Brothers are from Minneapolis. There was a mediocre film called Feeling Minnesota that came out about the same time as Fargo. It starred Keanu Reaves and Cameron Diaz. Also set in or near Minneapolis, but there were no accents whatsoever. Could have taken place just about anywhere. Very lame compared with Fargo, and it made the film even more tepid than it already was, due to the obvious comparison with the better film. I almost think of the accents in *Fargo * as a whole other character.
In the Special Features in the Fargo DVD, there’s an interview with William H. Macy where he claims that people are always coming up to him and saying, “I really didn’t like the accents in Faahr-go - that’s not the way we actually talk, ya know?”
from my time in Minnesota and Canada I’d like to say that it seems like your face just gets used to being frozen for months at a time and the way that limits your movement becomes an accent. Now the phrases and slang are just another regional flavor, but the accent is the sound of 20 below zero
Umm…am I really the first person to point out that Fargo is actually in North Dakota?
(Same region, I know…)
Title is “Fargo” but almost all action is set in MN, Brainerd in particular. One of my great great grandfathers 1st farm after immigrating was near there.
And yes, some of my older Scandinavian relatives did talk that way.
I was JUST coming in here to post that. Wikipedia: Fargo. Moorhead, Minnesota, is across the Red River. According to Wiki, 39% of Minnesota’s residents are of German ancestry, with another 26%+ from Scandanavia.
So that’s why they sound German! There’s no hint of Scandinavian in their accent as far as my non-Scandinavian ears can ascertain.
Siam Sam is right. The accent is another character in the movie. I am afraid if I ever hear anyone speaking like that I will have to laugh. It ranks second to Argentinian Spanish in my list of funny accents. 
An a little OT: My 2 yo daughter has the funniest accent. She sounds nothing like us (we speak three languages at home, one being Danish). After I watched Fargo it dawned on me that she sounds exactly like the characters in the movie, down to “you betcha” (which she did not learn from us). It is entirely coincidental, but very funny.
I work with people from Minnesota. We have a Minneapolis office that is closely tied with ours in Virginia. They DO speak like this, although (and as expected) some have thicker accents than others. A couple of things that are funny:
“Ooh, I dunnnoo” for “Oh, I don’t know.” And they pronounce the word “root” like “foot.”
The main thing is their Os. They make Spanish Os sound like diphthongs.
It’s not as strong in the Twin Cities, but you do hear that elongated “O” (“Minnesooota”).
I associate the accent with rural (not necessarily northern) Minnesota and older people. However, I had a co-worker who was in her 20’s who had a pretty strong “Fargo” accent. Everyone assumed she was from “Up Nort’”, but she was really from St. Paul.
I learned that idea of the Minnesota accent caused by influence from German and Scandinavian (particularly Norwegian) from listening to lots of tapes of Prairie Home Companion on family trips.