Word.ws English Dictionary

punch dialogue

Syllables: punch di·a·logue/ˌpʌn(t)ʃ ˈdaɪəlɒɡ/US/ˌpʌn(t)ʃ ˈdaɪəˌlɔɡ/

punch dialogue noun: chiefly in a film: a retort or a witty line, commonly written to be spoken by the protagonist to excite fans of the actor delivering them.

Noun

punch dialogue (plural punch dialogues)

  1. (India, South) Chiefly in a film: a retort or a witty line, commonly written to be spoken by the protagonist to excite fans of the actor delivering them.
    • ‘Meen aviyal enthayo entho’ – the comic number by Sreenivasan in the movie, ‘Akkare Akkare Akkare’, ‘Thomas Kutty Vittoda’ by Mukesh in ‘Harihar Nagar’ series, ‘Gafoor Ka Dosth’ are other punch dialogues that are printed on the T-shirts, […]2011 October 18, “Malayalam punch dialogues now on t-shirts”, in The New Indian Express, Chennai, Tamil Nadu: Express Publications, →OCLC, archived from the original on 25 Apr 2023
    • Apart from intense fight sequences and glamourous^([sic]) songs, one of the most important ingredients of a masala enetertainer^([sic]) in Tollywood – is its punch dialogues. For instance, a Nandamuri Balakrishna film is incomplete without punch dialogues – those with attitude, catchy slogans...2016 March 2, Suhas Yellapantula, “Punch patakas for men only”, in The New Indian Express, Chennai, Tamil Nadu: Express Publications, →OCLC, archived from the original on 16 Sep 2022

Examples of punch dialogue in a sentence

  • Apart from intense fight sequences and glamourous^([sic]) songs, one of the most important ingredients of a masala enetertainer^([sic]) in Tollywood – is its punch dialogues.2016 March 2, Suhas Yellapantula, “Punch patakas for men only”, in The New Indian Express, Chennai, Tamil Nadu: Express Publications...
  • Rajinikanth didn't invent the punch dialogue, but it is safe to say that nobody has popularised the delivery of sharply written lines aimed for maximum effect better than the Tamil screen icon.2016 July 17, Nandhu Sundaram, “Where there is Rajinikanth, there is Punch Dialogue”, in Scroll.in, archived from the original on 14 Feb...
  • The poster is coupled with a punch dialogue which has given a fillip to his [Puneeth Rajkumar's] appearance in the movie and given fans a high.2020 August 1, Manjula, “Puneeth Rajkumar’s punch dialogue in Yuvarathnaa motion poster”, in The Hans India, Hyderabad, Telegana: Hyderabad...
  • He then delivers one of Iḷaiya Taḷapati (Young General) Vijay’s punch dialogues from the action film Pokkiri (2007, dir.2022, Constantine V. Nakassis, “Chapter Three: The Politics of Parody”, in Onscreen/Offscreen, University of Toronto Press, →ISBN, page 118:

Forms of punch dialogue

pluralpunch dialogues

Origin of punch dialogue

From punch + dialogue, with dialogue used loosely to mean a spoken line. The term possibly compares the force of the line to a punch (similar to punch line), or because many of these lines are delivered immediately preceding a fight scene (compare fighting words).

Questions about punch dialogue

What does punch dialogue mean?
Punch dialogue means chiefly in a film: a retort or a witty line, commonly written to be spoken by the protagonist to excite fans of the actor delivering them.
How do you use punch dialogue in a sentence?
Apart from intense fight sequences and glamourous^([sic]) songs, one of the most important ingredients of a masala enetertainer^([sic]) in Tollywood – is its punch dialogues.
What part of speech is punch dialogue?
Punch dialogue is a noun.
How do you pronounce punch dialogue?
Punch dialogue is pronounced /ˌpʌn(t)ʃ ˈdaɪəlɒɡ/ (UK).
What is the plural of punch dialogue?
The plural of punch dialogue is punch dialogues.

Words near punch dialogue in the dictionary

  1. punch cards
  2. punch clock
  3. punch clocks
  4. punch dagger
  5. punch daggers
  6. punch dialogue
  7. punch dialogues
  8. punch down
  9. punch drunk
  10. punch drunk syndrome
  11. punch drunk syndromes

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: punch dialogue (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-punch dialogue.wav.

Cite this entry: “punch dialogue.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/punch_dialogue. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.