Scripted Dialogue from the Movie Scent of a Women

The text chosen for discourse analysis is a scripted dialogue from the movie Scent of a Woman. This dialogue is dominated by Al Pacino’s character Lieutenant Colonel Frank Slade.

Field

Field refers to the subject matter or the topic of a discourse. It answers the questions as to what is happening, what is the activity and what the text is about (Gee, 2005). The field of this discourse can be broken into parts: it is a criticism on Charlie’s (Chris O'Donnell’s character) school for their unfair treatment of Charlie; and it discusses the qualities a leader should possess. It is very important to notice the register of Slade’s discourse. Being an ex-army officer, his language clearly shows his background as he uses war-related analogies and does not hesitate from using expletives despite being in a school. So much is his language influenced by his background in the army that Trask (James Rebhorn’s Character) has to tell him that he is “in the Baird School not a barracks.”

Tenor

Tenor refers to the roles of participants in a discourse. It tells about the participants and their relative status and power (Gee, 2005). Charlie is being questioned for his involvement in a prank that has been pulled on the school's headmaster, Mr. Trask. Charlie and his colleague, George Willis, Jr., know about the boys who pulled this prank because they see them setting it up on the night before the prank. Mr. Trask knows of this and he offers a bribe to Charlie and George so that they give up the name of the pranksters. The bribe is a letter of recommendation that would virtually guarantee their acceptance in Harvard. Charlie rejects this bribe but George accepts it. Charlie has helped Slade earlier for a few days in return for remuneration. Their company...

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...e is the headmaster of the school and he is standing in front of all the students. This is why he cannot be as rude, impolite and direct as Slade is. He tries to maintain his stout composure and says,

“Are you finished, Mr. Slade?”

This is yet another rhetorical question. This is also a speech act because it also carries the purpose of reiterating Trask’s authority and his power to control the discourse. However, Slade again counters with a direct answer to Trask’s rhetorical question by saying,

“No, I’m just getting warmed up.”

References

Scent of a Woman. Dir. Martin Brest. Perf. Al Pacino, Chris O'Donnell, James Rebhorn, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Gabrielle Anwar. Universal Pictures, 1992.

Jorgensen, Marianne. Discourse Analysis as Theory and Analysis. Sage Publications: London, 2002. Print.

J. P. Gee. An Introduction to Discourse Analysis. Routledge, 2005. Print.