but in my opinion, this was just the Spanish producers attempting to emphasize Spain and its culture.
Yeah, if that were the case I don't think they'd make the only Spanish character a drug-smuggling rapist.

roy was much worse.
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You thought he was annoying..because he had an accent?
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He annoyed me too, but not because he put a couple of spanish words into the conversation, but because of his accent.. And the way he was trying to be such a "bad boy"

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The only time I found Noriega endurable is when he wore that mask on Abre los ojos (Open Your Eyes). But I agree he was particularly unconvincing in this film.

Mr. Noriega tried to flesh out a very one-dimensional character with few lines of interest by inserting phrases of Spanish into the dialogue which is supposed to make him more intriguing. His character ate, drank and had a bag of Chinese dolls. He hints that he's a bad boy and as soon as they are alone, tries to get into Jessie's pants in a church in the wilderness, although he knows she's married. That's all we really know until after
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he is killed. Only after Noriega's Carlos is out of the movie is it revealed to the audience he was a drug
smuggler and killer.

To me it wasn't his Spanish that sounded annoying, but his English. He sounded really retarded while trying to speak English.
And I really respect Noriega. But he should stick to Spanish, English reduces his acting skills and his hotness.
Everything is a version of something else.

he did when insulting the Polish people at one point

I totally didn't even notice that he was using that much Spanish. But I did find him annoying for other reasons.

Gee, theholeintheworld, I didn't even notice that some of the dialog is in Spanish. I guess that means I'm a cosmopolitan, eh?
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I don't remember now what Carlos said, but it didn't seem forced to me. I read in an interview that the American director was the one who asked Noriega to put some Spanish in the dialogue, not the Spanish producers. It wasn't about emphasizing Spain per se, but the article doesn't seem to be online anymore so I can't give direct quotes about why. I think the character was just supposed to seem a bit more exotic to Jessie than her small-town Iowa husband was.
As for your last question, "Would you really keep talking to a guy that is constantly inserting phrases into the conversation in a language that you don't understand?" Yes. Makes things interesting. He just used a few simple words and phrases that a lot of people already understand anyway, either from school Spanish or from context.

To me he was annoying because he's just not the type who would roam Russia/Siberia like that, and yet he acted and was portrayed as such a bad-ass.
In reality he would get f%cked up pretty soon, I don't think he even knows Russian in the movie. Guy like him just wouldn't make it in the real world (real Russia), with the climate and Russian culture (that he knows jack beep about) and all that.
They should've cast a tougher looking guy.