46 ways to avoid using the word “very”

I am a big movie fan, collecting a sheer volume of Blu-ray movies in my removable disk, both Hollywood and other countries’ production, say Britain. Recently I found that the line in American movies are full of simple, direct words, whereas the British ones are sometimes filled with sophisticated words such as Bill Nighy in “Page Eight” saying the word chauffeur instead of driver. Why don’t they use simple words? Maybe intentionally, the British films intend to say the opulent words to distinguish themselves from their straightforward counterparts, or just because the advanced words are only available in these well-educated British gentlemen.

More importantly, I collected more of these substitutions below in the form, and I advise that these advanced vocabulary is far more important in the IELTS writing and speaking test you should know.

Avoid saying:	Rather saying:	Avoid saying:	Rather saying:
afraid	terrified	neat	immaculate
angry	furious	old	ancient
bad	atrocious	poor	destitute
beautiful	exquisite	pretty	beautiful
big	immense	quiet	silent
bright	dazzling	risky	perious
capable	accomplished	roomy	spacious
clean	spotless	rude	vulgar
cold	freezing	serious	solemn
conventional	conservative	small	tiny
dirty	squalid	strong	unyielding
dry	parched	stupid	idiotic
eager	keen	sad	morose
fast	quick	tasty	delicious
fierce	ferocious	thin	gaunt
good	superb	tired	exhausted
happy	jubilant	ugly	hideous
hot	scalding	valuable	precious
hungry	ravenous	weak	feeble
large	colossal	wet	soaked
lively	vivacous	wicked	villainous
loved	adored	wise	sagacious
clever	brilliant	worried	anxious

The list is endless as you know. You can collect your own to make your English more high-level. I am afraid that I really need several days to digest these new words.