MovieChat Forums > Paulie (1998) Discussion > How many years had passed by?

How many years had passed by?

posted 14 years ago by Hollywood_Square_Contestant
6 replies | jump to latest

I mean, how many years was it when Paulie was giving to Marie as a child from when Paulie gets taken to the pawn shop?

how many years did it take him to reach Los Angeles (a wild guess would do)? and how many years was it when he is first imprisoned by the animal lab institute till he gets rescued by Misha and finally taken back to his original owner? I have always wondered about this and I'm sure I'm not the only one?

I know that the flashbacks begin in the late 60's (obvious by the hairstyles) and the other janitor said something about he forgot or doesn't remember what experiments that the bird was used for?

so it must have been long time, but how long?

[–] dewayne76 14 years ago

Marie appears to be 6-7 years old at the time Paulie was taken away. When they were reunited she appeared to be in her late twenties/early thirties. So give or take it was probably 20-25 years. Of course, my math could be way off. My calculations are based on the ages of the actors at the time of the movies release (1998) and not the character's ages (which are never stated I believe).

[–] Jnbfwc 13 years ago

Really? She didn't look like she was in her late twenties to me. More like early to mid twenties.

[–] kbsrailroad 12 years ago

The beginning I figured to be around 1967 because a radio in the background was playing "The Letter" by The Box Tops which was a hit that year. Ivy's Winnebago was certainly a mid 70's or older model. Later when Benny found Paulie in L.A., the song "Stayin' Alive" by Bee Gees was playing on his car radio so I figured that was to indicate it was 1977. What I'm not sure of was what time frame Paulie was reunited with Marie. The bus he & Misha arrived in looked like an older model. And I didn't note any particularly modern looking equipment around the animal lab, such as computers, etc. I estimated Marie to be 6'ish in the beginning and possibly in her 20's or 30's at the end. Overall it seemed they kept the time passage kind of ambiguous in the film.

[–] 12 years ago

[deleted]

[–] unclemikes-16139 9 years ago

I had been thinking along those lines (Paulie spending at least 15 years in the dungeon) but then I realized that he and Misha found Marie still living at the address the doctor had written down for her soon after acquiring Paulie. Marie could have still been living with her parents but I got the impression that she was living alone. If so, for Marie to still be living at the address that the doctor had for her I assume that she was living there alone as of then, having just moved away from her parents at age 18. Therefore I don't think there would have been more than 7 years between then and his escape (again assuming Marie moved out of her parent's house around age 18). I think it's more likely that he spent at least 13 of those 25 years with Ivy instead of in the dungeon.

[–] straw_hat_boy_luffy 8 years ago

That's a pretty solid guess, I'd say. Although if we go with more 20 years, it could be more like 8-10 with Ivy, 7-8 in the dungeon and the rest split among the other locations.