Movie: Lost in Translation - Quotes

[Comesweetdeath]

Charlotte: So, what are you doing here?Bob: Uh, a couple of things. Taking a break from my wife, forgetting my son's birthday. And, uh, getting paid two million dollars to endorse a whiskey when I could be doing a play somewhere.Charlotte: Oh.Bob: But the good news is, the whiskey works. [Charlotte laughs] What are you doing?

Is Bob's expression of "the whiskey works" implying that the whiskey helps him to forget?


Q2:
(bob and Charlotte are talking about marriage)
Charlotte: Twenty-five years. That's, uh, well it's impressive.Bob: Well you figure, you sleep one-third of your life, that knocks out eight years of marriage right there. So you're, y'know, down to sixteen and change. You know you're just a teenager, at marriage; you can drive it but there's still the occasional accident.

What does "down to sixteen and change" mean? Why not "up to sixteen"?

Thank you very much

 

[emsr2d2]

Charlotte: So, what are you doing here?Bob: Uh, a couple of things. Taking a break from my wife, forgetting my son's birthday. And, uh, getting paid two million dollars to endorse a whiskey when I could be doing a play somewhere.Charlotte: Oh.Bob: But the good news is, the whiskey works. [Charlotte laughs] What are you doing?

Is Bob's expression of "the whiskey works" implying that the whiskey helps him to forget?


Q2:
(bob and Charlotte are talking about marriage)
Charlotte: Twenty-five years. That's, uh, well it's impressive.Bob: Well you figure, you sleep one-third of your life, that knocks out eight years of marriage right there. So you're, y'know, down to sixteen and change. You know you're just a teenager, at marriage; you can drive it but there's still the occasional accident.

What does "down to sixteen and change" mean? Why not "up to sixteen"?

Thank you very much

Welcome to the forum.

I'm honestly not sure about the first. He's there to endorse a whiskey so it would be odd for him to say that it is successfully helping him to forget, unless that's what the makers of the whiskey want it to do. However, I also think it's the most likely meaning.

"Down to sixteen and change" - they started off talking about being married for 25 years. Then Bob points out that you sleep for one-third of your life, so for 8 years of those 25 years, you're asleep. That leaves just over 16 years to account for (actually, it leaves 17 years to account for but I guess some poetic licence was used). When we calculate a subtraction, we use "down to". 25 years minus 8 years means you're down to 17 years. Take away another 7 years and you're down to 10 years.

 

[Rover_KE]

Welcome to the forum, Comesweetdeath.:-D (I couldn't find a 'shudder' emoticon.)

I think you are right with your interpretation of Q1.

In future, please ask unrelated questions in separate threads.

Rover

 

[Comesweetdeath]

Thanks guys, got it!