So – I was travelling in Europe and had to put my quarter-life-crisis-inspired quest to learn another language on hold... or did I?
I might have missed a class (d'esole!), but I decided to make up for it by going to see a French film at an arthouse cinema.
Not so edgy, you might think – I’m the kind of film fan who possesses a pretentious predisposition towards movies in anything but English, and am currently under the spell of a financially crippling addiction to Artificial Eye boxsets.
The difference this time, however, was that I was in Scandinavia – and would be watching a French movie with nothing more than Swedish and Finnish subtitles for help (I barely need to tell you I lack any knowledge of either language).
The bearded hipster on the door – who sold me a ticket in perfect English, of course – seemed suitably amused. After just three classes of beginner’s French, how much was I really going to understand?
I had high hopes. The film was Two Days, One Night, the latest gritty Belgium drama from critical faves the Dardenne Brothers, and a movie I'd been dying to see since interviewing leading man Fabrizio Rongione (Italian, incidentally, how do these Europeans do it?) at the Abu Dhabi Film Festival last year. And I was consoled by the knowledge that even if the dialogue was a blur, there was still Marion Cottilard to watch, in another Oscar-nominated turn.
Thankfully, the plot was a simple one. I knew going in that the film was about a working class mother who, after a period of convalescence from illness, loses her job – but has the chance to save it by convincing the majority of her co-workers to pass over a handsome bonus.
Knowing this gist I was able to fill in many of the the blanks. Much of the film is spent watching Cottilard’s Sandra hike between a series of soul-searching, begging encounters with her co-workers. And from body language and voice tone alone it was always clear who was voting in her favour, and who against. By grasping just 20 percent of dialogue, I could figure out 80 percent of what was going on.
So – films without subtitles – it’s something I’d recommend to any language learner who has already got down some basic conversational skills. But I’ve recently stumbled another trick – sticking French subtitles on while watching an English movie.
Most DVDs come with reams of foreign prose just, waiting to be unlocked, at the click of a button and without leaving your seat. Subliminally scanning the text of a new language for two hours is an effortless way to learn, and you'll find yourself picking up little exclamations and turns of phrase without even realising. C'est vrai!
Rob Garratt is studying beginner's French at Alliance Française Dubai, a non-profit language and cultural institution established in 1982 which teaches French to more than 2,500 students every year. Find out more at www.afdubai.org.