2007-08-26 22:33:11 · 6 answers · asked by D.B.O. 4 in Society & Culture ➔ Languages
Ignore any comment suggesting one phrase is more grammatically correct than the other. 'I have seen the movie' is a statement of fact that the movie has been viewed by you. Once you elaborate and put in some temporal clause or adverb, you cannot use the 'I have ...' construction; but must use the simple past - 'I saw the movie on Tuesday / yesterday / already, etc.
US English often uses the simple past where British English uses the present perfect 'I have seen.' Question - 'Shall we go and see Movie X tonight?' Answer - 'I've already seen it' (Brit.) / 'I already saw it' (US possible.)
2007-08-26 23:20:55 · answer #1 · answered by JJ 7 · 2⤊ 0⤋
"I have seen what you saw." Yikes. You want "I saw the movie".
The verb "to see" is an irregular verb.
The past simple form of the verb is saw (used when we want to talk about something that started in the past and also finished in the past.) For example:
"I saw a movie yesterday", or, "Yesterday, I saw a movie". (Ask the question when did you see the movie?) Answer yesterday + ask the question can you see the movie now? Answer NO, therefore we use the past simple tense.
The past participle of the verb "to see" is seen. We use this form when we use the perfect tense.
We would usually use "seen" when we want to talk about something that we saw in the past without mentioning WHEN we saw it.)
For example: "I have seen a movie. Ask the question "When did you see the movie?" Answer we don't know, but SOMETIME before now so it is the perfect tense.
Not all English speakers are this pedantic, just folks like The Answer and myself.
2007-08-27 05:42:12 · answer #2 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Simple Past tense has a descriptive effect. "I saw the movie" means you want to the describe what you did. Whereas Present Perfect tense "I have seen the movie" simply mean "been there,done that" without any descriptive component.
Above is the academic explanation from textbook. In real life, nobody cares about the difference and you probably have no idea what I have been babbling about.
2007-08-27 05:40:23 · answer #3 · answered by The Answer 3 · 3⤊ 0⤋
"I saw the movie."
"No you haven't!"
"I have seen the movie."
Another way of convincing someone, by repeating it using more astute linguistics or formal verbosity.
Keep the ticket, and you won't have this problem ever again, unless you go blind.
2007-08-27 05:36:14 · answer #4 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 1⤋
ummm... i have seen the movie is the proper grammatical context you want to use.... is that what you mean?
2007-08-27 05:40:26 · answer #5 · answered by coltfan70 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
it means the same thing ,, but the tense is kind of different
2007-08-27 05:37:41 · answer #6 · answered by Amit M 2 · 0⤊ 1⤋