When they give a toast they say kampai, 'cheers' in Japanese. When the Queen presents a minion with her crown, he says terima kasih, 'thank you' in Indonesian. Speakers “hear” their languages in it because the phrases often work with what they see. Kalmyk speakers would not recognize any connection with what they were hearing and the action on the screen. Actors simply listened to random recordings of the language, and imitated what they heard. Ewokese was apparently based on the general sound of a Central Asian language called Kalmyk (and a few other languages), but without any regard for meaning. Minionese is not in any way a fully-fledged, worked out language like Klingon or Dothraki, but it is more interesting than Ewokese, the babbling of the Star Wars Ewoks, another language engineered for cuteness. What’s more, it will be accessible to English speakers too, because the “verb” has been changed to due, which sounds like “do it.” This babyish “feel” to the phrase, and the meaning of it, will be accessible to speakers of all those languages. That “me” toddler sense also works for the Spanish ( yo lo haces) and the French ( je le fais). In this scene, where the minions are hitchhiking, one says “ Me le due, spetta.” This is almost Italian for “I’ll do it, wait” ( io lo faccio, spetta) but since it uses the “me” form instead of the “I” form, gives the sense of “Me do it,” which is how a toddler might say it.

And sometimes in ways that subtly reinforce the cute baby talk element. However, whether he intended it or not, meaning usually does come into play. “I just pick one that doesn’t express something by the meaning but rather the melody of the words.” So I have all these sources of inspiration for their words,” he says. I also know a little bit of Spanish, Italian, Indonesian, and Japanese. Director Pierre Coffin, who voiced the minions, says he basically made it up as he went along. Phrases from various languages get into the mix. Minionese is not just a babified version of English, though. Bee doo, translated on the list as 'fire,' uses the age-old strategy of baby onomatopoeia ( woof woof for dog, choo choo for train). In this Minionese vocabulary list you can see this tendency in bello (hello), poopaye (goodbye), baboi (toy), and bable (apple). The pitch is shifted upwards, it uses simple consonant-vowel syllables (ba-na-na being the archetype Minionese word), and it has an affinity for b and p sounds, some of the first consonants babies acquire.

One of the ways it does this is by imitating features of baby talk.

The minions get back to those cute roots, but especially so in their language. Mignon has connotations of delicate, tiny, charming, and adorable (think filet mignon), but in English this came to be associated with a lover or a favorite, then particularly a king or other powerful person’s favorite, and then with all the associations that go with that (brown-nosing, servility, groveling dependency). It comes from mignon, the French for “cute.” But, although they probably weren’t aware of it, when the directors of Despicable Me and subsequent “minion” films designed the now ubiquitous yellow creatures, they tapped into the deep etymological source of the word. A minion is by definition a particular type of subordinate henchman. Evil’s Mini-Me, underlings who are prepared to fawn over evil geniuses and do their every bidding are a staple of the genre. Because the 2010 film Despicable Me was about an evil genius, it was only natural that it should also feature minions.

Minion language