Wednesday, April 02, 2008

Action, Not Words

One of my Chinese has gotten into the habit of coming into work every day with a little list of slang phrases which he then asks me to explain.  They come from a show on local TV called “Action English.” It takes lines and phrases from movies and translates them into English.  (I’m quite sure that the show got clearances to use those clips from their respective copyright holders.) At any rate, today one of the phrases he asked me was “a walking felony.” I said I’d never heard this phrase used before.  He was dumbstruck; after all, it had been on the show. 

I told him that I’d make a guess, that it was similar to the term “jailbait,” a word who’s meaning I then went on to explain.  A few minutes later I got online and Googled the phrase.  Though there are virtually no instances of it being used, I actually found one solid reference to it, ironically enough this short 2005 article in the NYT about the show “Action English.” Here’s the salient section.

Still, not everything seems to translate. Episode 61, for instance, wrestled with the term “walking felony,” excavated from the comedy “Legally Blonde.” In the movie, Elle Woods (Reese Witherspoon), wearing a pink bunny outfit, sashays up to her ex-boyfriend at a party. On seeing her, he exclaims, “Wow, you look like a walking felony!”

The show rendered the phrase literally as “someone that is dangerous.” “Thank you,” she responds. “You’re so sweet.” Here’s hoping military negotiators weren’t watching.

So I wasn’t all that far off with my guess of “jailbait,” but that’s not really a phrase anyone uses.  Apparently the show is only about 10 minutes long, but they have four presenters, one of whom is an American living in America.  You’d almost think that with the number of slang phrases and words that are out there today they could pick one that people actually use.