Teacher: Colleen

Hello everyone! Welcome to today’s Summer Movie Talk. Today’s talk starts out with a discussion of movies vs. books. Next, we’ll introduce some movies featuring robots, and some summer 2014 blockbuster movies. Speaking of summer and action movies, we will also learn an interesting fact about them!

First up: Books versus movies! Books and films have been considered humans’ greatest inventions, and they are entertaining and educational. What would be preferable between these two? I would choose movies. Films’ plots are easier to understand than books, and remembering the characters is easier. It is much better to look at the readily visualized story rather than to read words and try to imagine all the details. Plus, watching movies with friends and family allows you to spend time together and, therefore, build good relationships.

Speaking of entertaining films, I would like to introduce some movies with robots. The first motion picture is “Maze Runner.” Thomas’s memory is wiped, and he is placed in a maze with a group of boys. Only by piecing together fragments of his past with the clues he discovers in the maze, Thomas can hope to uncover his true purpose and a way to escape. There are monsters called ‘Grievers’ in the maze. These Grievers are robots that become the clues. The second movie is “The X-Men: Days of Future Past.” The X-Men send Wolverine to the past in an effort to change history and prevent a war. In this war, humans develop a robot; it is a deadly weapon that tracks and kills countless mutants, which leads to the X-Men changing the past. These two films have enjoyable plots with interesting characters. However, “The Maze Runner” is better because it is thrilling and gives you many things to think about. “X-Men: Days of the Future Past” is in second place, because it is fairly enjoyable but only full of action scenes and meaningless plots; it is not touching at all.

These two motion pictures were released in summer, but it turns out that there are many thrilling films in this particular season. “Divergent,” “Dawn of the Planet of the Apes,” “The Amazing Spider-Man 2,” “Pirates: The Bandits Go Aboard” (Korean movie), and several more films were also released in summer. They all have one thing in common: they are action movies. According to a study, most summer films are targeted to thrill and entertain the audience with countless action scenes while most winter movies are touching and warm. These winter films win most of the awards. This is the secret about the weather and movies.

I hope you enjoyed today’s "Summer Movie Talk!" I hope to see you next time!

Discussion questions

This is a story about movies. Summarize this report.

1. Why does the writer prefer movies to books?

2. What do 'Maze Runner' and 'X-Men: Days of the Future Past' have in common?

3. What is typical of summer movies?

4. Do you prefer action movies or touching movies? Why?

5. What would you talk about, if you were a reporter on TV?