Assignment

For this week's assignment I'd like everyone to find a website in English that interests them, and introduce us to the rest of us. I have some English websites listed by the side of the blog, under "Links" but I think you should be able to find others that interest you. Let me introduce the sites that I thought were important enough to link to this blog.

Google News can keep you abreast of the major news stories around the world. I check it first thing almost every morning to keep up with what's happening almost everywhere. You can customize it to report whatever you find interesting.

Japan Today is a news and information website. It's a little bit tabloidy at times, but it does cover the important news about Japan in English. If you're interested in news about Japan in English I would recommend both it and the Japan Times, which is also a newspaper. It's major stories are carried both in the online and print editions.

Brad Blackstone is a friend who used to teach English at Minnesota State University in Akita. Now he teaches at the National University of Singapore. He's much better than I am at both blogging and teaching English, and he uses blogs a lot in his classes. I hope you enjoy his blog.

Another blog for English classes that I happened along one day is the ALEA blog. It calls itself "A meeting point for all the students and staff who are, or have been, studying or teaching English at Yethreb School, Ben Ashur, Tripoli, Libya." It may be interesting for you to read what other students are doing in the way of learning English as a second language.

I also have links to the TOEFL and TOEIC sites for those of you who may be interested in taking either of those tests. TOEIC tests only passive skills, but is used by many businesses in Japan for appointment and promotion purposes. There is a TOEIC preparation class in this school. I also try to prepare my students for TOEFL if I can, and in fact your in-class writing exercises are intended to be preparation for TOEFL's Test of Written English (TWE) section.

Finally, I linked the class blog I created for a more advanced English class. This was originally Level 4, but we keep changing the system. I don't know if we'll be able to continue the advanced, intensive English classes much longer.

my favorite movies

As I explained in class, I didn't want to post to the blog about movies until I knew what kind of films you liked. Now I don't know what to say because you have some very diverse tastes in film. Well, so do I.

My favorite director of all time is definitely Akira Kurosawa, who directed Ran, The Seven Samurai and many other classic films. He was a big influence on such famous Hollywood directors as Steven Spielberg and George Lucas. He and John Ford were also fans of each other. If you haven't seen any of his films I hope you will watch some. It's not widely known, but he was also an editor, and edited his own films. He originally trained to be a painter, and thus his mise en scène is very well composed.

My favorite Hollywood director is (or was until he died recently) Robert Altman. Altman was famous for directing films in which the characters didn't read formal lines, but had to improvise a lot of the dialogue. Many famous actors looked forward to working with him for the freedom his style gave them, and I think it would have been a nightmare to write subtitles for his films because the conversations are always moving in and out of microphone range. His most famous film is probably MASH (which was made into a TV show) but his film 3 Women is ranked higher at the Internet Movie Database. That's kind of a quirky, director's indulgence film, but its being higher rated only highlights his being, like Kurosawa, a film-maker's film-maker.

Altman had a love affair with American music, which I share, and made many films in which great music is important, for example Nashville (country music), Kansas City (Jazz), and A Prairie Home Companion (Folk). In The Long Goodbye the title song, written especially for the film, is played over and over again in a variety of musical genres, from Jazz to Folk to Mexican Mariachi music.

Both those directors are dead, and while I like old movies (if they are good), especially classics like Casablanca and Citizen Kane, I also like more recent films. I enjoy the films of the Coen Brothers, Joel and Ethan, very much, especially O Brother, Where Art Thou? (which also has great music). It's based on Homer's Odyssey, which it sets in Depression Era Mississippi. I also like Roman Polanski's films (no Polanski jokes please - I know he's in the news a lot these days) such as Chinatown, Frantic, and Rosemary's Baby. I think his version of Shakespeare's Macbeth is the best ever filmed.

I do promise we'll watch a film in this class, but I don't know what film it will be. There's no obvious choice that would appeal to everyone in the class together. Do any of you have suggestions?

movie

I really like this movie "COACH CARTER".This movie is based on real story.
This movie is about high school basketball team.At first, this team is very weak,and everyone is so fool that they cann't graduate from high school.
Then Carter is invited only to make this team strong.But Carter also demand players to study.At first ,they don't follow what Carter says,but they gradually trust him and follow.
At last,the team become strong ,and they graduate school .

movie

I like a movie of discrimination against blacks, a regional conflict and a thick love romance.One good work is introduced from the inside.

The title of the movie is hotel Rwanda.

The impressed drama which drew the courage and conscience of the real hotelman who rescued people from a crisis of an enormous volume slaughter by an internal trouble in Rwanda in Africa. A star is a habitue of Stephen and Soderbergh director work and Don Cheadle. "Of father's prayer" etc., Terry George who plays an active part as a playwright deals with a scenario, supervision and making and figures a valiant figure of the man who holds the life of 1200 people heroically. Japanese opening to the public was doubted, the work in topics a campaign to collect signatures on the Internet by young people was effective, and opening to the public achieved.

We live peacefully, but an unrealistic thing has ordinarily occurred at a foreign country. Such actuality, a known work. Please see.

Movies

I like science fiction movies. Especially, I like "Harry Potter".

It is very famous movies, so all of you know this movies probably.

There are seven series from "the Philosopher's Stone" to "the Deathly Hallows", but what I have watched perfectly is "the Philosopher's Stone ", "the Chamber of Secrets " and "the Prisoner of Azkaban ".

My favorite one is "the Prisoner of Azkaban ". This movie has a scene that Harry and Hermione go back into past time and save their friends from death penalty. It's exciting and impressing for me, so I like this scene.

Do you have any scene you can feel excited or impressed in "Harry Potter" ?

My favorite movies

I especially like action movies. For example, 007 series, Jason Bourne series, etc.

First, with regard to 007 series, I like GOLDENEYE and DIE ANOTHER DAY. And I like Pierce Brosnan the best of successive James Bond.

Next, regarding Jason Bourne series, Jason Bourne is a fomer CIA agent and Matt Damon act the part of Jason Bourne. I think that Jason Bourne is very attractive because he is so cool and strong.

Actually, I also like suspense movies. For example, PRIMAL FEAR, HANNIBAL series, etc.

PRIMAL FEAR is a court drama starring Richard Gere. The highlight of the movie is Edward Norton's acting. Edward Norton act the part of a man with a double character and his acting is marvelous anyway. I think that it is worth seeing the film for once.

HNNIBAL series are phychological thriller films based on the novels written by Thomas Harris. Anthony Hopkins gave an excellent performance as Dr. Hannibal Lecter and received Academy Awards in 1991.

Movie

I'm afraid that I don't care too much for the action movie including violent scene.
But I don't hate it. I like SF action movie toward comedy.
For instance, MEN IN BLACK and Back to the future.

The story of the former is that argents are energenic to watch alien. In this movie, many star-studded cast acted. Tommy Lee Jones, Will Smisth, and so on.In the second series,played by Micheal Jackson as Argent M.

In the later movie's main character are an unusual expert and a general high school student. He went to the past and saw his parents were young.


You have may seen either of them,haven't it? You prpbably would enjoy watching these movie.