English, baby!

8mm

Date: Jul 20 2000

Intro

1. Learn Vocabulary - Learn some new vocabulary before you start the lesson.

2. Read and Prepare - Read the introduction and prepare to hear the audio.

Plot: A private investigator is hired after an 8mm film is found showing a woman getting killed. His job is to find out whether the tape was a fake, and if the woman is really still alive.
Clip: In this scene, Tom (Nicholas Cage) is talking to Max (Joaquin Phoenix), who works in a sex store, about the sex industry in America.

Dialog

1. Study - Read the dialog again to see how the vocab words are used.

Tom

Max

Tom looks up at a poster on the wall and reads it.

Tom: ‘Hard Spank, Max California’.

Max: That’s my old band. We broke up.

Tom: When?

Max: Maybe about a year ago.

Tom: I don’t mean any offense but, what are you doing mixed up in all this?

Max: I’m not mixed up in anything, pops.

Tom: You just strike me as being smart enough to do something else.

Max: Thanks. I wish you owned a record label. Look, it beats pumping gas. I don’t buy it, don’t endorse it, I just point the way.

Tom: You say it gets to you.

Max: Well, hell yeah! The parade of losers I see everyday, what choices have I got? The music industry is not exactly beating down my door. What about you, Tom Welles? You got a ring on your finger. You got kids?

Tom: A daughter. *

Max: So you got a wife and a daughter, and a nice little yellow house with a dog named Chet. What the hell are you doing here?

Tom: Good question. *

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Discussion

One of these men is from the upper-class, and the other is from the lower-class. Can you tell which one? Some hints are given in their speech styles and what they say. This was a really eye-opening movie. There is a lot that goes on behind closed doors in the sex industry that most people don’t know about. Some of these things are displayed and explained in this movie, and they could make you uncomfortable. If you’re interested in this type of thing, then this is a good movie. I give it a 7 out of 10, for it’s originality. Have you seen this movie and you want to share your opinion? Or maybe you have seen another movie recently you want to talk about? Well, come to the “Movie Madness” message board and tell us about it! From the front row, John