Cast Away (2000) Best Quotes – ‘We live or we die by the clock.

Starring: Tom Hanks, Helen Hunt, Lari White, Chris Noth, Nick Searcy, Dennis Letts, Paul Sanchez, Jenifer Lewis

OUR RATING: ★★★★★

Story:

Survival drama directed by Robert Zemeckis. Cast Away (2000) follows FedEx executive Chuck Noland (Tom Hanks), who whilst en-route to an assignment his plane crashes over the Pacific Ocean during a storm. The sole survivor of the flight, Chuck washes ashore on a deserted island. When his efforts to sail away and contact help fail, Chuck is tested mentally, physically, and emotionally in order to survive on the island, where he remains for years, accompanied by only his handmade volleyball friend, Wilson.

Our Favorite Quotes:

'I know what I have to do now. I got to keep breathing. Because tomorrow the sun will rise. Who knows what the tide could bring?' - Chuck Noland (Cast Away) Click To Tweet

Best Quotes

Ramon: [notices the FedEx package with a Butterfly logo on it] Where’s she headed?
Bettina Peterson: Ah, she’s snow bound Ramon.
Ramon: I see you went with the pink.
Bettina Peterson: Yeah. Yeah. It’s kind of a pink day today.

Chuck Noland: Time rules over us without mercy. Not caring if we’re healthy or ill. Hungry or drunk. Russian, American, beings from Mars. It’s like a fire. It could either destroy us, or it could keep us warm. That’s why every FedEx office has a clock. Because we live or we die by the clock. We never turn our back on it. And we never, ever allow ourselves the sin of losing track of time.

Chuck Noland: [referring to what he FedEx’d to himself] It is a clock, which I started at absolute zero, and it’s now at eighty seven hours, twenty-two minutes and seventeen seconds. From Memphis, America to Nikolia in Russia, eighty-seven hours. Eight seven hours is a shameful outrage. This is just an egg timer! What if it had been something else, like your paycheck? Or fresh boysenberries? Or adoption papers? Eighty-seven hours is an eternity. The cosmos was created in less time. Wars have been fought and nations toppled at eighty-seven hours! Fortune made and squandered.

Chuck Noland: [leaving a message for Kelly] I miss you. I really want to kiss you. I’m out of here in about two minutes and I’m picking up the sweep through Paris, so I should be back in Memphis in about eighteen hours or so. That’s the good news. The bad news is, I got to go to the dentist this week. I got something in there and it’s hurting. I love you, and I’m going to see you soon, and you know what that means.

Chuck Noland: Nikolai. Tick-tock. Tick-tock. Tick-tock. Tick-tock!

Chuck Noland: I absolutely, positively have to get to Memphis tonight.
Pilot Jack: Can’t help you. Try UPS.

Chuck Noland: Relentless is our goal. Relentless!
Stan: What do you expect from the guy who stole a crippled kid’s bicycle when his truck broke down?
Chuck Noland: I borrowed it. I borrowed it. But I love that the kid’s now crippled.

Chuck Noland: [to Stan] It’s about the trucks. Today’s truck was two minutes late. Tomorrow’s will be four minutes late, and then six minutes late, and then eight minutes late. And the next thing you know, we’re the U.S. mail.

Kelly Frears: You’re home
Chuck Noland: Home indeed.
Kelly Frears: I love that you’re home.

'The most beautiful thing in the world is, of course, the world itself.' - Chuck Noland (Cast Away) Click To Tweet

Dennis Larson: [at the family Christmas meal] Speaking of marriage, Chuck, when are you going to make an honest woman out of Kelly?
Chuck Noland: Here it is! Let’s look at the clock.
Kelly Frears: How long?
Chuck Noland: Alright. By my time, it took fourteen minutes into the meal. So I win.
Kelly Frears: Okay. You won. I owe you five dollars.
Chuck Noland: Way before the pie
Kelly Frears: I told him on the way over here. Right about the pie came out, the marriage…

Kelly Frears: [looking at their diaries] Okay, I’ll cancel Saturday.
Chuck Noland: No, don’t. If I’m not here, I’m not. But if I am, well, then I am.
Kelly Frears: Chuck, it’s canceled. But you got to be here New Year’s eve.
Chuck Noland: Malaysia can’t be that bad. I’ll be here New Year’s eve.

Kelly Frears: [as Chuck opens her Christmas present, an antique watch] My grandaddy used it on the Southern Pacific.
Chuck Noland: [opens the watch and sees a picture of Kelly inside] Hey, I took this. This is my favorite picture of you. You know what I’m going to do? I’m always going to keep this on Memphis time. Kelly time!

Chuck Noland: [referring to his Christmas present for her] Sorry about the hand towels
Kelly Frears: No, no. I love them.
Chuck Noland: You’re hard to shop for.
Kelly Frears: Every time I wash my hands, I will think of you.

Chuck Noland: [as he walks back to Kelly to give her the car keys] You know, that reminds me. I almost forgot I had one more present for you. Only this isn’t an “open in the car” kind of present. Like, say, hand towels, which were a joke, by the way.
Kelly Frears: [referring to the small ring box he’s given her] I’m terrified.
Chuck Noland: Just take it and hold onto it, and you can open it on New Year’s eve. And I love you.
Chuck Noland: [kisses Kelly and turns to walk towards the airplane] I’ll be right back.

Chuck Noland: [to the pilots] Hey, is all this turbulence from Santa and those eight tiny reindeer?

Chuck Noland: [after the plane has crashed and ending up on a deserted island] Hello! Anybody?! Anybody?! Help! Help!

Chuck Noland: [after he keeps hearing a thumping noise he shouts] What is that?! Hey! Hey! Anybody?

Chuck Noland: [after burying and standing over the grave of a crew member] So, that’s it.

Chuck Noland: [after noticing a ship, turns on and off the flash light] Help me! Help! Right here! Right here! Help! Look here! Look, look, look! S.O.S. Please! Help! Come on! Help!

'We live and die by time, and we must not commit the sin of turning our back on time.' - Chuck Noland (Cast Away) Click To Tweet

Chuck Noland: [finds a birthday card from one of the FedEx boxes he’s opened] “Happy Birthday. The most beautiful thing in the world is, of course, the world itself. Johnny, have the happiest birthday ever! Score! Your Grandpa.”
[takes out a volleyball from the box, which has the brand name of WILSON]

Chuck Noland: [as he’s trying to light a fire, looks over at the volleyball, Wilson] You wouldn’t have a match, by any chance, would you?

Chuck Noland: [celebrating, after successfully lighting up a fire] Look what I have created. I have made fire. I have made fire!

Chuck Noland: [to Wilson] You got to love crab. In the nick of time too. I couldn’t take much more of those coconuts. Coconut milk is a natural laxative. Things that Gilligan never told us.

Chuck Noland: [to Wilson, drawing on the cave walls] We were in route from Memphis for eleven and a half hours, for about four hundred and seventy miles an hour. So they think that we were right here. But we went out of radio contact and flew around that storm for about an hour. So that’s a distance of what, four hundred miles? Four hundred miles squared, that’s a hundred and sixty thousand times Pi.
Chuck Noland: [starts doing the calculations] That’s a search area of five hundred thousand square miles. That’s twice the size of Texas. They may never find us.

Chuck Noland: This tooth is just killing me. It started out just hurting when I bit down, but now, now it just hurts all the time. All the time. It’s a good thing there’s not much to eat around here, because I don’t think I could chew it. Just have to keep sucking on all that coconut and all that crab. And just think, I used to avoid going to the dentist! Like the plague. I’d avoid it every single chance I got. But now, oh, what I wouldn’t give to have a dentist right here in this cave. In fact, I wish you were dentist. Yeah. Doctor Wilson. You want to hear something funny? Back home in Memphis, my dentist’s name is Doctor James Spaulding.
Chuck Noland: [looks at his drawing of Kelly] She’s much prettier in real life.

Chuck Noland: [reading the label on a the port-a-potty that has washed ashore] Bakersfield? Bakersfield!

Chuck Noland: [figuring out that he can use the port-a-potty to sail in the water] This could work. This could work!

Chuck Noland: [referring to the amount of wood he’s brought to make his boat] Twenty-two. Forty-four lashings? Forty-four lashings. We have to make rope again. Wilson, we’re going to have to make a hell of a lot of rope.

Chuck Noland: [to Wilson, points at the calendar line he’s drawn on the cave wall] Here we are today. That give us another month and a half, until we’re into March and April, which is our best chances for the high tides and the offshore breezes. We need nearly four hundred and twenty-four feet of good rope, plus another fifty feet, say, for miscellaneous. That rounds that off to four hundred and seventy-five feet of good rope. Now, if we average, fifteen feet a day. Plus, we have to build it, we have to stock it, we have to launch it. That’s going to be tight. That is not much time. But we live and die by time, and we must not commit the sin of turning our back on time.
Chuck Noland: [laughs bitterly] I know. I know.

'Time rules over us without mercy. Not caring if we're healthy or ill. Hungry or drunk. Russian, American, beings from Mars. It's like a fire. It could either destroy us, or it could keep us warm.' - Chuck Noland (Cast Away) Click To Tweet

Chuck Noland: [to Wilson] Yeah, I know. I know where there’s thirty feet of extra rope! But I’m not going back up there.

Chuck Noland: [referring to the last bit of rope he’s brought from the top of the cliff] There. You happy? Do you have to keep bringing that up? Can’t you just forget it? Huh? You were right. You were right. It was a good thing that we did a test, because it wasn’t going to be just a quick little But it was the only option I had at the time though, okay? It was what, a year ago? So let’s just forget it.

Chuck Noland: [to Wilson] And what is your point? Well, we might just make it. Did that thought ever cross your brain? Well, regardless, I would rather take my chance out there on the ocean, than to stay here and die on this s**thole island, spending the rest of my life talking to a goddamn volleyball!
[kicks Wilson out of the cave]

Chuck Noland: [after he’s found Wilson] Oh! Never again! Never again. Never again. You okay? You okay? Yeah?

Chuck Noland: [putting fresh paint onto Wilson’s face on the volleyball] Yeah, I know you. I know you! I know you! So, we okay? Okay.

Chuck Noland: [to Wilson] You still awake? Me too. You scared? Me too.

See more Cast Away Quotes

Chuck Noland: [getting ready to launch his make-shift boat] Okay. Here we go, Wilson. You don’t have to worry about anything. I’ll do all the paddling. You just hang on.

Chuck Noland: [after he’s successfully let the boat sail through the wave] I think we did it! I think we did it! Wilson, I think we did it!
[looks over at the island and start to cry as he paddles further away from the island]

Chuck Noland: [as he sees Wilson floating away in the sea] Wilson, I’m coming. Wilson!

Chuck Noland: [as he realizes he can’t rescue Wilson] Wislon! I’m sorry! I’m sorry, Wilson. Wilson, I’m sorry! I’m sorry! Wilson! I can’t! Wilson! Wilson!

Stan: [after Chuck’s been rescued, on the plane back to Memphis] Well, here’s the drill. Plane pulls in, we get off, and there’s a little ceremony right there in the hanger. Fred Smith will say a few words. All you have to is smile and say “thank you”. Then we’ll take you over to see Kelly.
Chuck Noland: She’s actually going to to be there?
Stan: Well, that’s what we have arranged. I mean, if you’re sure you want to do this.
Chuck Noland: Oh, yeah! Yeah! Yes. I don’t know what I’m going to say to her. What in the world am I going to say to her?

Stan: Chuck, Kelly had to let you go. You know? She thought you were dead. We buried you. We had a funeral, a coffin, a gravestone, the whole thing.
Chuck Noland: You had a coffin? Well, what was in it?
Stan: Well everybody put something in. You know, just a cell phone, a beeper, some pictures. I put in some Elvis CDs.
Chuck Noland: So you had my funeral, and then you had Mary’s funeral. Stan, I’m so sorry I wasn’t around when Mary died. I should have been there for you, and I wasn’t. I’m so sorry.

Chuck Noland: [waiting for Kelly, instead Lovett shows up] I’m sorry. I must be in the wrong place.
Jerry Lovett: No, you’re in the right place. You probably don’t remember me. I actually did root canal on you about five years ago. Jim Spaulding referred you.
Chuck Noland: Oh, yeah. Yeah.
Jerry Lovett: I’m Kelly’s husband. Jerry Lovett. Kelly wanted to be here. Look, this is very hard for everyone. I can’t even imagine how hard this is for you. Kelly, she’s had it rough. First when she thought she lost you, and now dealing with all this. It’s confusing. It’s very emotional for her. She’s sort of lost. Maybe you could just give her a little more time. Anyway, I’m sorry.

Stan: [to Chuck] We got another big day tomorrow. It takes a lot of paper work to bring back a man. Bring you back to life, man.

Stan: [to Chuck] Tomorrow. Tomorrow we’re going to you bring you back to life!

Kelly Frears: [opens the door as Chuck is about to ring the doorbell] I’m awake. I saw your taxi drive up. Get in her out of the rain.
Chuck Noland: I saw you down at the hub today, so I know you were down there.
[Kelly hugs him]

Chuck Noland: It’s a nice house.
Kelly Frears: Yeah, we got a nice mortgage too.

Chuck Noland: So, let me get one thing straight here. We have a pro football team now, but they’re in Nashville?
Kelly Frears: Yeah. Oh, my God. Okay, they used to be in Houston. First they were the Oilers, now they’re the Titans.
Chuck Noland: The Houston Oilers are the Tennessee Titans?
Kelly Frears: Yeah. That’s not all. They went to the Super Bowl last year.
Chuck Noland: And I missed that.
Kelly Frears: You would’ve died. It was so exciting. They almost won by one yard. One lousy yard right at the end.

Chuck Noland: What happened to you becoming a professor? You’re not Doctor Kelly Frears-Lovett?
Kelly Frears: When your plane went down, everything just sort of got put on hold. I think about taking it up again though.

Chuck Noland: [referring to the watch Kelly gave him] I came out here to give you this.
Kelly Frears: Oh, my God.
Chuck Noland: I’m sorry it doesn’t work. I kept the picture. It’s all faded anyway.
Kelly Frears: I want you to have it. I gave it to you.
Chuck Noland: It’s a family heirloom, and it should stay in your family.

Kelly Frears: They said they never figured out what caused the crashed. Probably some mislabeled hazardous material caught fire.
Kelly Frears: [pointing to the map] So here’s where that ship found you. And you drifted about five hundred miles. This is where your island was, about six hundred miles south of the Cook Islands. And these are the search grids. Ships went back and forth for weeks looking for you.
Chuck Noland: I never should’ve gotten on that plane. I never should’ve gotten out of the car.

Chuck Noland: You kept our car. Alright, now, this is weird. It’s a good car. Had a lot of memories in this car.
Kelly Frears: Two very nice memories.

Kelly Frears: So, what now?
Chuck Noland: I don’t know. I really don’t know.
Kelly Frears: [as Chuck gets into the car] You said you’d be right back.
Chuck Noland: I’m so sorry.
Kelly Frears: Me too.
[leans in through the car window and kisses him]

Kelly Frears: [after she kisses him passionately] I always knew you were alive. I knew it. But everybody said that I had to stop saying that, that I had to let you go. I love you. You’re the love of my life.
Chuck Noland: I love you too, Kelly. More than you’ll ever know.
Kelly Frears: [gets into the car, as he goes to start the car] Chuck?
Chuck Noland: You have to go home.
[Kelly nods her head]

Chuck Noland: [to Stan] We both had done the math, and Kelly added it all up. She knew she had to let me go. I added it up, knew that I’d lost her. Because I was never going to get off that island. I was going to die there, totally alone. I mean, I was going to get sick, or I was going to get injured, or something. The only choice I had, the only thing I could control, was when, and how, and where that was going to happen. So, I made a rope, and I went up to the summit to hang myself. I had to test it, you know? Of course. You know me. And the weight of the log snapped the limb of the tree. So I couldn’t even kill myself the way I wanted to. I had power over nothing. And that’s when this feeling came over me like a warm blanket. I knew, somehow, that I had to stay alive. Somehow. I had to keep breathing. Even though there was no reason to hope. And all my logic said that I would never see this place again. So that’s what I did. I stayed alive. I kept breathing. And then one day that logic was proven all wrong, because the tide came in, gave me a sail. And now, here I am. I’m back, in Memphis, talking to you. I have ice in my glass. And I’ve lost her all over again. I’m so sad that I don’t have Kelly. But I’m so grateful that she was with me on that island. And I know what I have to do now. I got to keep breathing. Because tomorrow the sun will rise. Who knows what the tide could bring?

Bettina Peterson: You look lost.
Chuck Noland: I do?
Bettina Peterson: Where you headed?
Chuck Noland: Well, I was just about to figure that out.
Bettina Peterson: Well, that’s 83 South. And this road here will hook you up with I-40 East. If you turn right, that’ll take you to Amarillo, Flagstaff, California. And if you head back that direction, you’ll find a whole lot of nothing all the way to Canada.
Chuck Noland: I got it.
Bettina Peterson: Alright then. Good luck, cowboy.
Chuck Noland: Thank You.
[as she drives away, Chuck notices the butterfly logo on the back of her truck is the same as on the FedEx package he found on the island he never opened]

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