如何看电影学英语

How to Learn English from Movies

> By Li Xiaolai · 2010-02-17 · [Original (web archive)](https://web.archive.org/web/20111113132434/http://www.lixiaolai.com/archives/8723.html) (Chinese)
> Our translation from the Chinese original.

"Learning English by watching movies" was once a method I rather looked down on. All along I have had a small prejudice: anything flashy is not to be adopted. In fact, even today I don't think "learning English by watching movies" is any kind of shortcut. However, whether among students or among readers, it seems a lot of people really do want to "learn English by watching movies"—their grounds are nothing more than "you have to be interested"—in fact interest isn't important at all. On this point, I have written many articles explaining it:

> [Is interest really that important?](http://www.lixiaolai.com/archives/160.html)
> [How to identify your true interests?](http://www.lixiaolai.com/archives/7620.html)
> [Don't be interested in English](http://www.lixiaolai.com/archives/257.html)

Nearly two years ago (2008.06), I gave a talk at Tang Zhong (唐中) [Translator's note: 唐中 is the usual short name of a secondary school in Yinchuan, most likely Tanglai Hui Middle School (唐徕回民中学); the original gives only the short name] in Yinchuan. After the talk I chatted with a young girl, who mentioned that her grades in some subjects were quite good because she was interested in them, while in some other subjects they weren't ideal because she wasn't interested. I thought about it and told her, "**Who can't learn and do well at the things they're interested in? What's really badass is 'even though you're not interested, as long as you ought to learn it you can learn it, and then use it well too'……**" [Translator's note: 牛 here, short for 牛逼, rendered "badass."] Times have changed, and that girl should have taken the college entrance exam by now, right? [I wonder whether she really understood at the time](http://www.lixiaolai.com/archives/687.html)?

However, as a teacher, actually there are many times when one shouldn't care too much whether a student's starting point is correct and appropriate; whatever the reason, wanting to learn is in itself already quite commendable. So, cutting the cackle, in any case I ought to give those students who want to "learn English by watching movies" some effective suggestions.

After downloading what you want to watch and like to watch, first go and search on Google for English subtitles. The search keywords can roughly use this format:

> "movie title release-year English subtitle"

For example, if what you want to find is the English subtitles for "[12 Angry Men](http://www.douban.com/subject/1293182/)" (12怒汉), then you search for

> [12 Angry Men 1957 English subtitle](http://is.gd/8zsOS)

As long as the movie isn't too new or too obscure, most of the time you can easily find English subtitles with Google.

Subtitles come in many formats; **I suggest downloading only English subtitles in "srt" format**, because subtitles in this format can be opened directly with the Notepad program (the file itself is a text file).

After opening the subtitle file with Notepad, "Ctrl+A" (select all), then [Translator's note: the original writes 在, literally "at"; 再 ("then") is meant; translated by the intended sense] "Ctrl+C" (copy), copy the subtitle content into a Word document, and then do [intensive reading](http://www.lixiaolai.com/archives/7832.html).

Look up all the words you don't know—and pay attention to identifying phrases too—and then make a word list that is your very own. (Read this article to learn [how to turn MS Word into a powerful learning tool](http://www.lixiaolai.com/archives/7662.html).)

Then start watching the movie. First try whether you can manage with no subtitles at all; only if it's a struggle do you turn on the English subtitles. Note: never watch the Chinese subtitles; if you can't understand the English, go and look it up in the dictionary.

Then find time to review the word list you made before two or three times, and when you have a spare moment watch the movie again.

At this point, some reader will surely say, "Isn't that far too tedious? There's no fun left at all……" Believe me, this is certainly not the first time I've heard this kind of complaint ([people who are afraid of trouble can't do anything well](http://www.lixiaolai.com/archives/7570.html)). But this kind of complaint is short-sighted—no matter who you are, you don't have to be this tedious your whole life. After three to five movies, you'll find you've improved at lightning speed, and you can understand most films more or less entirely.

Generally speaking, the degree to which watching movies improves your English is quite limited. Movies and TV series alike, after all, tell stories more through pictures, and most movies have more action than dialogue. This is even more true for students who like watching action films and shoot-'em-ups; what they mostly hear is nothing more than "phrases" like "Drop it!" or "Go! Go! Go!!!" Even in the dialogue of art-house films, the vocabulary used is quite limited—**in any case it isn't as direct and as effective as "massive reading."**

Series also differ enormously from one another. With series like *24*, *Lost* and *The Sopranos*, a 2000-word vocabulary is basically enough; some historical dramas require a somewhat larger vocabulary, such as *Rome*, *John Adams* and so on. Some other series look as if they are very difficult, but in fact they aren't. The typical one is *House M.D.* When you first watch it, you'll feel it's packed with large numbers of medical terms, but after an episode or two you understand there are only about a hundred-odd words in all, such as MRI, spasm and the like; in the end, it doesn't matter even if you can't understand the medical content, because the exciting parts of the plot have nothing to do with medicine. There are also some series full of slang, such as *Dead Woods* [Translator's note: so written in the original; the series is *Deadwood*], which don't mean much to beginners; even if you learn that kind of slang, there's almost nowhere to use it. *The West Wing* is about [Translator's note: the original writes 将, literally "will, take"; 讲 ("is about, tells of") is meant; translated by the intended sense] how a group of elites run the White House in the United States, so the quality of its lines is high—ornate vocabulary, brilliant sentence patterns, ingenious logic—and its difficulty is considerable. I privately recommended it to some students, and found that only a very few students were interested; most people actually just "watch for fun," and as for "learning," that is nothing more than an excuse for "having fun."

Having said all this, decide for yourselves.

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