It holds with me

[gamboler]

What does this expression mean in this context:

Matt: I'm so crazy about you I don't know what I'm doing.
Billie: Oh, it holds with me, Matt

(Taken from an old movie of the fifties, it's a scene with two lovers huggging each other)

Does it mean something similar to "the same goes for me" or "for me it's the same"?

 

[emsr2d2]

It's not a familiar phrase to me. Without further context I would probably reach the same conclusion as you did. I'm not able to play the mp3 file so I am assuming that you heard it correctly.

 

[GoesStation]

Unless Billie has a foreign accent, I'm pretty sure she isn't saying "it holds with me." I've listened repeatedly and have not been able to figure it out.

 

[gamboler]

As far as I know, the actress doesn't have a foreign accent. She was born and raised in New York City. The rest of her dialogues is clear, in spite of her husky voice.

 

[teechar]

What's the name of the movie?

 

[GoesStation]

As far as I know, the actress doesn't have a foreign accent. She was born and raised in New York City. The rest of her dialogues is clear, in spite of her husky voice.

I was thinking of the character, not the actress. But if the character is American, I'm at a loss to understand the clip. Can you put up a somewhat longer clip to establish the context a bit?

 

[emsr2d2]

I've managed to listen to it several times now. I'm afraid I cannot make out what she's saying at all. What's the title of the film?

 

[gamboler]

You won't find the script on the Internet. Moreover, the film doesn't have subtitles in any language and it hasn't been released on DVD or BluRay, it's just a TV broadcast. I searched all of that before posting my question. All the context I can give you is that after this short dialogue, she kisses him passionately and the scene ends. The character is supposedly from Chicago, no foreign accents involved. Could it be what she says "Oh, that thought's with me, Matt"? ("that thought is with me" meaning "I think the same about you"). Would it be good grammar?

 

[GoesStation]

"Oh, that thought's with me" doesn't make sense.

I hear "Oh, the tote's with me, Matt." Since that makes no sense, she must be saying something else that I can't guess. If you put up a longer clip that begins a minute or so before this bit, maybe the context will clarify the line.

Does the film establish the character's ethnicity? In films of the forties and fifties, Japanese-American, Irish-American and Jewish-American characters, for example, were sometimes played with somewhat different accents.

 

[gamboler]

Thanks, GoesStation. I don't know why you said that the expression "that thought is with me" doesn't make sense. I googled it and I obtained 522,000 results. You can easily check it. "It holds with me" on its own has 76,400 results. Notwithstanding, as you asked me to add some more of the previous dialogue between Billie and Matt, here it is. They are the lines they say before the ones quoted in my question. As I told you, the scene ends after the kiss. None of the characters are Japanese-American, Irish-American, etc. All of them are 100% American.

 

[teechar]

None of the characters are Japanese-American, Irish-American, etc.

So are these < 100% American?

 

[GoesStation]

I'm an American Anglophone. Google is a giant network of computers. When Google returns half a million hits on a string of words, it does not follow that that string would be a natural utterance in a certain spot in an American English dialog.

I'm afraid listening to the earlier dialog has shed no light on what Billie says at the end. It definitely doesn't sound like "that holds with me"; what I hear is "the tote's with me". Neither makes any sense.

 

[teechar]

I suspect she is saying "it hurts with me, Matt."
There's an "it" and the associated third person singular "s" in there.

 

[gamboler]

Yes, teechar, they are 100%.

 

[GoesStation]

In any case, Gamboler, you may find it reassuring to know that a bunch of Anglophones have had no better luck than you had at understanding the line.

 

[andrewg927]

Whatever she is saying doesn't sound like English. It's very possible, given this clip is from 1950's, that the character just utters something foreign.

 

[teechar]

It's very possible, given this clip is from 1950's, that the character just utters something foreign.

I don't see the connection.

 

[andrewg927]

I don't see the connection.

It is quite common, I think, in the old days for movie studios to hire Americans to speak a foreign language or just inject certain foreign phrases (in French or Italian) so they sound hip. I'm not an expert on this but I have seen a few old movies do this.

 

[gamboler]

It's not the case, andrewg927. Furthermore, as I am Spanish and I speak French and Italian too, I can assure you that she is not speaking in any of those languages. I told you that the actress was born in New York City and her character is supossed to be born in Chicago. I asked a friend who is from California and she's almost sure that Billie says "Oh, that's how it's with me, Matt.", meaning, of course, "I feel the same".

 

[andrewg927]

It's not the case, andrewg927. Furthermore, as I am Spanish and I speak French and Italian too, I can assure you that she is not speaking in any of those languages. I told you that the actress was born in New York City and her character is supossed to be born in Chicago. I asked a friend who is from California and she's almost sure that Billie says "Oh, that's how it's with me, Matt.", meaning, of course, "I feel the same".

It has nothing to do with where she is from or where her character is from. I would not be surprised if she dropped in a foreign phrase (in whatever language) during that short dialogue for whatever reason (since I know nothing of the bigger picture here). I find it amusing that you seem very certain that what she said was in American English even though your friend from California was only "almost sure" that what it was and other American English speakers here can't even be sure.