一篇关于近日在美国上映影片《The Nun》的影评中有这样一段话：
For while The Nun takes place in a crumbling Romanian castle surrounded by thickets of crosses, soupy fog, and a murder of crows, its script utilizes the kitchen-sink approach common to contemporary Hollywood blockbusters—and the film is worse off for it.
《华尔街日报》近日发表的文章《The 5G Race: China and U.S. Battle to Control World’s Fastest Wireless Internet》中，也出现了kitchen sink这个让人困惑的表达：
“5G is such an important strategic project in China--kitchen sink, all the resources,” said Edison Lee, a telecom analyst at investment bank Jefferies in Hong Kong.
Kitchen sink即厨房里的洗碗池，和电影剧本和5G网络有什么关系呢？无论是kitchen-sink approach还是《华尔街日报》中的kitchen sink，其实都来自于习语everything but/except the kitchen sink。
从字面上看，everything but/except the kitchen sink就是除了厨房洗碗池以外的所有东西。根据《剑桥词典》，这一表达的意思为：a much larger number of things than is necessary，即远远超过必要的东西。词典特别标注这是一个带有幽默色彩的表达。词典给出例句为：We're only going on vacation for a week, but John will insist on taking everything but the kitchen sink，字面意思是把除了很难移动的厨房洗碗池以外的所有东西都带上去度假，实际就是带的东西太多，远超必要。
Kitchen-sink approach是everything but/except the kitchen sink的简略表达，可理解为追求宁滥勿缺、把能用上的元素都用上的方法：
The expression everything but the kitchen sink has been used so often that the term kitchen sink itself has become a related idiom, used as an adjective. For example, when a cell phone has everything but the kitchen sink it has almost every feature possible, even if some of those features are completely unneeded or impractical. The company that makes this phone, then, has used a kitchen sink approach to its design, meaning that they have “thrown in every feature possible.” When such a company encounters a problem they might “throw the kitchen sink” at it, meaning they utilize all their resources to solve the problem. However it is used, the idiom tends to be hyperbolic and slightly humorous.
因此，采取kitchen-sink approach的剧本包括了该类型影片所有的元素，“kitchen sink, all the resources”说的是中国不遗余力、投入大量资源开发5G通讯技术。
小品《今天的幸福2》中，马丽扮演的角色和她的前夫有句对白：“你走的时候，家里只剩我和承重墙了。”如果要翻译这句话，就可以考虑用You took away everything but the kitchen sink。
需要注意的是，kitchen sink不一定带有贬义，比如《华尔街日报》的那段话并不是暗示中国的5G投入大到不合理的地步。到底是不是超过必要，还要根据上下文判断。
（中国翻译研究院）
