#431 - How I Started to Understand Movies in English WITHOUT Subtitles — My 5 Secrets
21:52 Share

Aww yeah, RealLifers, Global Citizens, this is Izzy from RealLife English, where it is our mission to guide you beyond the classroom to speak English confidently and naturally, to connect to the world, and to actually use your English as a doorway to the life of your dreams.

So if you watch this lesson until the end, you're going to learn exactly what I did to start understanding natives when you speak fast in movies and TV series without subtitles. Now, as you know, I'm not a native English speaker. I've been through this process just like you.

And today we're going to get really practical, we're going to get really hands-on with some of the material that I brought. Hands-on is like exactly that, right? Practical, not theoretical, with active participation. So I'm going to invite you guys to join me in analyzing some of my favorite movies and series from the past. And I'm going to be learning some connected speech with it, some vocabulary, but most importantly, what happens in my mind, the mind of a person who...

is understanding everything or almost everything they are hearing. So there are five secrets that I'll reveal to you about these things that happen in my mind. They're not really secrets, but just because they're hidden in here, I could consider them secrets. Now I'm going to be using some more advanced expressions today because this is a solo lesson I'm here by myself, so I'm feeling more loose, you know, so some more advanced words may come up that I may not explain.

I just explained expression hands on to you, but I may not do that every time. And in order for you not to miss any of these words and for you to actually learn them and integrate them in your active vocabulary, download the RealLife app. You can get this lesson right now and you can actually continue watching it over there and get vocabulary flashcards of all these expressions so you can practice them. I'm going to leave the link in the description below so you can click there and go straight to this lesson. You can unlock it for free if it's your first one. And I'll see you over there.

And let's start already with the first secret. That is that connected speech, I see connected speech everywhere. When I'm listening to English, when I'm hearing English, I'm hearing not just like some instances, some examples of connected speech. I'm seeing it everywhere. And when I'm teaching, I may not highlight every single example, like the lessons with movies and series that you watch on our app. But that doesn't mean they're not there.

So let me show you just one example here with a movie that I personally love that is Bruce Almighty with Jim Carrey and Morgan Freeman. And Morgan Freeman, he uses a lot of connected speech in his sentences. Now in this movie, Jim's character, he gets angry at God and then God gives him his powers to see if he can do a better job than him. It's not a religious movie, but I find it really interesting. And one thing that Morgan Freeman's character said there that

which is a very good example of connected speech was some of the happiest people in the world go home smelling to high heaven at the end of the day. Some of the happiest people in the world go home smelling to high heaven at the end of the day. Some of the, some of the happiest people. And if you notice, it's like, it's all connected, even though some words like happiest people. So happiest ends in a T people starts with a P it's all consonants, happiest people.

Technically, there's no connected speech there, but it kind of does, right? It kind of does. Like happiest people. Happiest people. In Portuguese, we don't do that. We separate words more clearly. And there's other phrases here that they're literally connected. Connected speech, by the way, if you guys don't know what that is, it's when natives, they link, they morph words together, and they cut different letters, and everything gets kind of like mashed up together. So he said, some of the...

There was no sound there at the end of of some of the or when you finish the sentence at the end of the day. That's very connected at the end of the day. At the end of the day. As I said, connected speech is everywhere. Have that in mind every time you listen to something in English. Try to pay attention to the flow of the sentences there. OK, now let's move on to the second secret. It's something that I learned.

more than 10 years ago that it's actually possible even if you're at an intermediate level to watch a movie without subtitles today wherever you are like at whatever level you are it is possible if you do it part by part

through scenes. There's a reason why we do our lessons with scenes, you know, in little chunks, because it's easier to actually learn that way. And it is what I did. Now, the method you can apply is the same method that we use when you teach. First, you watch it with subtitles. Then you investigate all the advanced words, all the different sounds there.

And then you try and watch it without subtitles. If it's still difficult, you go back, watch the subtitles again and keep doing that until you have acquired that capacity to really understand what you're seeing without any subtitles, because the sounds, they just make sense to you. Now, I mentioned vocabulary. This is another very important aspect of understanding natives when they speak fast, because if you're not aware of the vocabulary they're using, things are not going to make sense to you. Right. Just like connected speech is important.

Learn vocabulary as well. When you watch any movie, any series, any scene, you do like we show you. You stop and you get curious. You know, cultivate that sense of wonder. It's like, huh, what is that word? I don't know why they're saying that. Like, again, Morgan Freeman's character here said, some of the happiest people in the world go home smelling to high heaven.

What is that? Smelling to high heaven? Do you guys know? I have a few producers here in the studio with me here today. Fabia, Thiago, Mate. Do you know what that is?

Yeah, that's a collocation. Like, ah, it stinks. It smells to high heaven. It's just a collocation. It's just an expression, a native expression that doesn't have a literal meaning, obviously. It's just like it smells really bad. It's funny because, you know, this character represents like it's God. So when you say it's smelling to high heaven, it's kind of funny. But anyway, if you don't know that, if you haven't heard that, even if you understand all the words, high heaven, you'd be like,

But that doesn't make any sense. So then maybe you'd freeze, you know, maybe you'd get lost in the next sentences you would not follow because it just got stuck in that one part. So pause, feel free to pause, look it up in the dictionary. Maybe if it's something cultural, you're not going to find it in a dictionary, right? If he's mentioning a name of a place, a person, you're going to want to know what that is to really get all the context. And then you hit play again and it'll all make sense.

All right, let's now go to secret number three. That is be an actor. Pretend that you're an actor. Do the voice, you know, get into it because I find it very difficult to master any language, the spoken form of the language. If you don't lean into acting to lean into something is like to really get obsessed over it, to not hold, hold back, to hold yourself from doing it.

Like I mentioned, like it's important that you get curious about vocabulary connected speech. So if you lean into it, you're literally speaking like lean into something that can move your body closer, right? To maybe read something. That's what it literally means. And the thing is that it's not really acting. When I say acting, it's just so you can have that idea of what an actor does.

So for you, it'll seem like acting, but for a native speaker, that's how they speak. It's like, imagine your native language when you've seen foreigners trying to speak your native language, probably, right? So when they do, you'll find that there's something off about the musicality, about the way they speak in their voice. Maybe even the tone of their voice is not the same. I find that Americans, when they speak English,

It's just too low. Like usually when English has this raspy low tone, like, oh, right. When they say the thing is, it's not acting. You sense that raspiness. But when I'm speaking Portuguese, it's not like that. It's more nasal. There's no raspiness, right? But I'm going to speak English automatically. You can hear that.

Now, am I faking it? What am I doing here? It's just me. It's just part of my personality when I speak English because I've acquired that. So you've got to do the same. One of our producers, Fabia, here is asking what is the meaning of raspiness. Raspy is... Imagine somebody singing and they sing with a clean voice like... But then they sing like... You know, that's a raspy voice. Nigga!

It's the best way that I can describe it. Now, one way that you can do that is just by getting to the fourth secret and kind of mix it with the third one here. So being an actor, in order to really do a good job being an actor is you've got to love what you're watching and find characters that you're also liking.

really into. To be into something is like to like it, to love it. I'm into a movie. I like this movie. So I can give you one example here with a TV series that I'd watch a lot. I think in 2010, 2011. This is called Psych and it's a really hilarious clip. Check it out. I saw the shooting on television. I've been trying to call your cell phone. It's been going to voicemail.

See, this guy, Sean Spencer, the protagonist there, the younger guy,

He was one of my English parents. It's a concept that is like when you're learning your native language, you may have somebody who raised you, like a parent or somebody else who raised you, and that person was a big influence on you, on how you speak, right? So when you're learning another language, a second language, you may need, you know, quote-unquote parents in that language too. So this guy was sort of like an English parent for me. The way he said...

Because his father was concerned with him, right? And then he got upset with him because he ate a banana instead of calling him to say that he was okay after a shooting event. And then he said, you ate a banana? And Sean responded, I sure did. You know why? Because it makes me think of you because you're my big old papa monkey.

So this silly way of speaking, I think I've adopted that myself to my own way of speaking because I kind of speak like that in Portuguese. So I needed to find that kind of influence in English as well. But again, it's not faking, it's not acting. It's just like you finding real people, even though this is a series.

But it's so well done. And I know that the people, the casting, the actors in this series, they love it. They love this show. They love this character so much. And I can really sense that myself. And I just connect with it. Connecting with what you're watching, connecting with the language that you're consuming is fundamental. We say that that's one of the superpowers of the best learners.

right? It's when you're able to connect with what you're seeing. There's that sense of identity. That is what allows you to keep going, right? To make English really a part of who you are. And if you paid attention to this clip, there's also a lot of connected speech there. So I'd like to challenge you guys to go back there. And if you didn't pay attention and see if you can spot anything, I can give you one

Example here of something they said is like, "He ate a banana." - He ate a banana. - Gus, the other guy, Sean's friend, when his father asked like, what did he do? The first thing that he did is like, "He ate a banana." He ate, he ate a, he ate a banana. Not he ate a banana. As I said, connected speech everywhere. - He ate a banana. - Okay, now let's move on to the final secret, the fifth secret that you will need to start understanding natives when they speak fast.

in movies and TV series without subtitles. This will only start happening for you when you take the leap. To take the leap is to just challenge yourself and dive in, you know, face your fears. So I'm saying this now, but back when I was learning, I didn't do this on purpose. I did not simply take the leap because I thought that was a good idea, but more because, um,

I was kind of forced to. I had this MP4 player, this device to listen to music and watch videos in a very, very small screen. You guys have no idea how small that was. If you measure things in centimeters in your country, imagine like three centimeters, like three fingers. That was the size of the screen, like really small. And I'll take that to school and I'd watch this series, for example, there.

Now, it didn't allow me to turn on subtitles. Actually, I would just download the files of the episodes and watch them the way they came. So it was my only option. So that's when I realized like, wait, I can understand some things. You know, it's not like I'm not getting anything. What that allowed me to notice is that the fact that you can understand some things is already all you need to start to understand more things. It's not going to magically be like a,

You're not watching anything without subtitles. And then suddenly one day you decide to and now you get 100% of what you're watching. You got to start somewhere. Why not start now? Why not start today? It's not going to hurt you, right? Like, what's the worst thing that could happen? So I want to challenge you guys with a relatively easier scene to understand here from Gladiator. This is when...

The protagonist reveals himself. And I think it's so powerful. It's one of the most powerful scenes in cinema, at least in my opinion. All right. So just in case you haven't watched this movie or if it's been a while, let me give you some context.

So the protagonist, Maximus, he is a gladiator, but he was not always gladiator. He originally was the general of the Roman army, but he was betrayed. The emperor tried to kill him because of something that happened in the movie. And this happened early in the movie. It's not a spoiler. So he eventually came back to Rome disguised as a gladiator, right? So this is when they meet for the first time, the emperor and him.

And it's just so awesome because he's amazing as a fighter. A gladiator is, if you don't know, it's what we call those fighters that would fight in the arena, in those areas where all the Romans would go and watch them fight lions and stuff or other people. And he's just fantastic as a fighter.

because of his experience, right? As a soldier, as a general. And everybody gets impressed and the Emperor decides to meet him and ask him, "Who are you? What's your name?" Check it out. "My name is Maximus Decimus Meridius, commander of the armies of the North, general of the Felix Legions. Loyal servant to the true Emperor Marcus Aurelius, father to a murdered son, husband to a murdered wife, and I will have my vengeance in this life or the next."

Oh man, you know what's a fun thing to do also? To memorize some lines that you feel are really great. You know, if you're just impressed by anything you watch, like why not memorize it? I memorized this. I remember I was like, my name is Maximus Decimus Meridius, commander of the armies of the north, you know, with that British accent. And did you understand it? Because we played here without subtitles. What were the biggest challenges for you?

Pay attention to the things that are particularly difficult for you because those are the things that you should start working on. I wanted to do this here because it's one thing that you realize when you take the leap and watch things without subtitles is it's easier for you to spot your weaknesses. So do that today. Pick a movie, pick something.

whatever you're watching right now and turn it off, turn off the subtitles. All right. And to close, I'm going to give you guys a next action, something for you to do to restart practicing already immediately. And this will be for you to practice all these five things that I shared with you, all these five secrets. So before anything, pick a movie or series that you really love. That is very, very important. And then remember,

Let's recap the five secrets so you can start applying all of that. First thing is you're going to start seeing connected speech everywhere. That is very, very important that you see it everywhere. Just like the example I gave of how the word of can become a

a simple "ah" sound like at the end of the day some of the instead of some of the. Then secret number two, you're going to start watching it part by part. Don't try and watch the whole thing at once because that's not going to give you the chance to obsess over scenes and to really make sure that you are covering each scene. And as you move on, you have already mastered the previous scene. So by the end, you're doing all of this. You're going to be able to watch that entire movie all without subtitles.

Secret number three is be an actor. Remember that it's not just important for you to make the sounds right, like the pronunciation of the words or that you learn all the vocabulary. Vocabulary is really important, by the way. But it's not just that. You've got to master the intonation and the character within you. The person within you who is speaking from a place of...

identity, right? So if you identify with certain characters, that's going to be really magical for you. And I believe it's the only way really to master spoken English. Now, one way to make this easier for you to be like an actor or actress is if you really love what you're watching. I already said this. If you made sure to pick a movie or series that you're really into,

It's going to be a lot easier for you to identify with the characters that you're seeing. If you don't identify with anyone, if you don't look up to, if you don't feel like, oh no, I wish I could be like that person in some way, don't use that for learning, at least for this particular exercise. And finally, it's important that you take the leap and just watch it without subtitles and challenge yourself ultimately. Because if you feel like you're afraid of doing it, if you don't feel confident,

You know what? That doesn't matter because confidence will only come when you have enough experience. That is a thing that I think most learners, they fail to pay attention to is that they want to feel confident immediately or they wait until they're confident to start practicing. There's a problem there, right? It's a puzzle. Like how do you get confident if you're not practicing?

So you got to start practicing. So what you need instead is courage. So when you challenge yourself to do it, then you have, you have it all. And this is literally what I did. It took me two years, I believe. Yeah. Like from 2010 to 2012, you know, in 2010, I was still watching with subtitles in Portuguese, you know, it could have been faster if I knew this, if somebody told me these things, I could have accelerated my learning process, but it took my, but it took me a while to figure out like, wow, I can turn these off, you know, but, uh,

This learning process of discovering things on my own, I think, gave me a lot of confidence to be saying these things today. So give it a try. And I think you'll see a lot of progress for yourself. And this was my first solo lesson here on this podcast all by myself. And I really appreciate you being here and all of our producers here in the studio as well who helped me out today.

And for all of you guys watching us on YouTube, if you like our content, if you want to support us, give this video a like and subscribe and hit the bell down below because that helps you get more content from us. And it also lets YouTube know that this is valuable and other learners will find us more easily. Now, if you are listening to us on Spotify or Apple Podcasts or any stream platforms, do the same. Follow us over there because it shows those platforms.

that you're enjoying our content and other learners will find this more easily. And if you're not getting these lessons on the real life app, what are you waiting for? It's really the best way to consume these lessons because on the app we give you, for example, vocabulary flashcards so you can practice the most advanced expressions that we use here in these lessons, in all of our lessons with movies,

podcasts, TV series, and that's the best way for you to learn and never forget these expressions so you can use them in conversations later. So the link is in the description or you can simply search for RealLife English on Google Play or the App Store and start practicing all the vocabulary now. So thank you again for joining me in this lesson. And as we always say on this podcast, no matter what divides us, that which unites us is far greater. One, two, three. Ah, yeah.

you