映画をたくさん見た / eiga o takusan mita

[damkay]

this phrase bothers me because the translation is:

I saw a lot of movies.

but i understand something like:

i saw many times a movie.

WHY is that たくさん is before the verb 見た and not 映画 so i can tell for sure that the movies are then ones witch are a lot???

[Shiroisan]

Because 映画　always means movie(s). The (s) is optional depending on the context. If you were talking about a specific movie that you've seen lots of times, you'd say この映画 or その映画... Or something more specific like that.

[SomeCallMeChris]

You can say たくさん映画を見た and still be correct I think, or if it's not correct by classroom standards it's at least reasonably normal.

(Although the rules as I know them would seem to require it to be たくさんな映画を見た, I don't think anyone would ever do that ... when たくさん is used in that position it either drops the な entirely - which seems a little slangy - or uses the 'alternate' adjectival form たくさんの映画 ... even though it's technically a な adjective , I don't think I've -ever- seen it used with な. That's all rather beside the point though.)

I do feel like 映画をたくさん見た is more normal though, and it's a common example in dictionaries and textbooks.

Anyway, I -believe- the reason is because it's acting as a number, if an abstract one.
日曜日、映画を2つ見た ... 'I saw two movies on Sunday.'
(りんごを3つ食べた、and so on, as well. It's a common way to express counting if a little odd with movies.)
You're putting たくさん in there not as an adjective, but as a noun meaning 'many' in the place that a count can go. You can do the same thing with 少し( but not 少ない).

よく can appear in the same position, but that's different because it's an adverb and has every right to be there, but there are probably other abstract noun counters that aren't coming to me right now that can also be used (I feel quite sure there are words in my passive vocabulary that mean things like 'a moderate number', or 'a substantial number' that are inbetween すこし and たくさん, but I can't dredge them up just now.)

If my analysis is correct, then たくさん（の）映画を見た would literally mean 'Many movies I saw' (which is perfectly correct English if you're living in Elizabethan times... but might want rephrasing in modern English, unless you're a poet.) 映画をたくさん見た would literally mean 'I saw many movies.'

Probably they both would be reasonably understood in most contexts as 'I have seen many movies'. I think I would say 今まで、映画をたくさん見た if I wanted to ensure the right interpretation.

(Also, to say 'I've seen -that- movie -many times-' would be その映画を何回も見たことがある　
... たくさん means 'many (of a thing)' not 'many times'... and it can't directly modify 見た because it's not an adverb)

[furrykef]

Counter words frequently appear before the verb:

本を２冊買った。
コーヒーを１杯飲んだ。
りんごを３個食べた。
犬が１匹います。

Since たくさん also specifies number, if not an exact one, it makes sense that it follows the same rule. You'll get used to it before you know it.

(EDIT: Oop, if I'd read SomeCallMeChris's post more thoroughly, I'd see he already addressed this point. Ah well.)

[damkay]

ARigatoo guys, i understand now, that explanations were very useful.