Reader Derek (dlipkin) sent me some gems from the movies. While most people watch that movie trivia, yelling out answers, Derek took pictures of the ones with grammatical errors for the blog.
You never told me which movie you saw! I saw Superbad last night — it was great.
The pictures are kind of dark, so click on them to see the full details.
Add a few commas!
It is whose, not who’s, and for the love of God, get rid of those quotation marks!
The question marks are a bit under control.
Apparently when “the Spider-Man” was filmed, most of the filming took place inside an oversized fruit.
That colon is highly unnecessary.
“The group finds themselves?” That hurts.
Danny Devito-their is, of course, one of the great actors of our time.
I have never seen a movie theater with slides quite like these. This chain must be California-based, or maybe I just don’t go to a theater who has them.
Come on, though. Get an editor!
These are great. Thanks, Derek.
dlipkin is always on the watch.
Our slides is cinemas are just as woeful. Ho hum.
“. . . maybe I just don’t go to a theater who has them.”
In the UK we use “who” about people and “which” about things. Your above clause would be incorrect since it should say, “. . . maybe I just don’t go to a theater which has them.”
Was this a rare slip up on your part, or is it acceptable American idiom?
A company called Cinemark recently took over Century theaters, and these horrible slides were one of the results of that. I’ve started to go to a local independently owned theater chain just to get away from the horrible grammatical mistakes.
Incidentally, I would use “that” instead of “who” in the sentence the shrink mentions, not “which,” which I only use in non-restrictive clauses such as this one. Some might say this is too fussy, though.
I have read that “whose” is acceptable to use with objects, however, though I don’t know about “who.”
More on which/that: http://www.worldwidewords.org/articles/which.htm
And on “whose”:
http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-who3.htm
(I’m not affiliated with that website at all. I just find it a good resource.)
Most of those made me cringe, but I have to give them props for correctly writing “two months’ worth”.
I actually saw Superbad that night as well! I thought it was hilarious.
Also, shouldn’t “terminally ill” be hyphenated, in the slide call “The Plot Thickens?”
Also, did I position the question mark correct in the previous sentence?
I just saw all of those when I went to see Harry Potter V two weeks ago in Braintree.