The Age of Innocence (1934)

Irene Dunne: Ellen

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Quotes 

• Julius Beaufort : After all your exquisite associations over there, how do you think you're going to like it here?

  Ellen : I think it quite like heaven.

  Julius Beaufort : Yes, I have that feeling too sometimes. You mean, just some place to go after you're dead?

• Mrs. Welland : Where is this place?

  Ellen : West 23rd Street.

  Mrs. Welland : West 23rd Street! Where all those dreadful people live.

  Ellen : Dreadful people?

  [to Beaufort] 

  Ellen : You told me it was respectable?

  Julius Beaufort : Well, in my experience, I've always found it very respectable.

  Mrs. Welland : You know perfectly well, the sort of persons who live there. All kinds of odds and ends. Bird-stuffers. Dreadful people who write. Dressmakers. Musicians. Painters.

  Ellen : Musicians, painters. I've always liked Bohemians. My husband's house was always full of them.

  Mrs. Welland : In deed.

• Ellen : I want my freedom, Newland. I can't - pretend.

  Newland Archer : Pretend?

  Ellen : Yes. That I'm like the other women over here. They never seem to feel any - need.

  Newland Archer : Need?

  Ellen : Yes, don't you see? I'm not mincing words. You mustn't expect me to. I'm one of those women - who must have love. Who must be loved. You don't think I'm horrible to say these things, do you?

  Newland Archer : No. I think you're the only honest woman I've ever known.

• Ellen : Why is it all your fashionable houses have to be the same color? Like, cold chocolate sauce?

• Ellen : You've showed me that it's worthwhile to miss things, if by doing so, others can be saved from disillusionment and misery.

• Newland Archer : Ellen, we'll go away. Away from everything. To some place where people can be free.

  Ellen : Where is that place? Has anyone ever been there? Because, I know so many who have tried to find it. And, believe me, they all got out by mistake, at some wayside station, like, Dieppe or Pisa or Monte Carlo. It wasn't at all different from the old world they'd left. Only, smaller and dingier and more promiscuous. You see, over there we think it's over here. And over here we think it's over there. But, now I know, it isn't anywhere. My eyes are open. I think they'll always be open now. Isn't there some sort of Chinese torture like that? Where they fasten your eyelids back so your never again in blessed darkness?

  Newland Archer : But, don't you see we can't go on like this? Together, not together. In reach, out of reach.

• Ellen : You can't refuse this time, can you?

  Newland Archer : I shall say not!

• Ellen : I never drink between meals - that is, tea.

• Ellen : What difference does it make where one lives?

  Mrs. Welland : That's just it, my dear. It makes all the difference!

• Ellen : I'm asking him to get me a divorce.

  Mr. Welland : Ellen! El-Ellen!

  May Welland : Father, you better take one of your powders.

  Mr. Welland : Yes, dear. Yes. dear.

• Newland Archer : You are beginning to open my eyes to a lot of things. Things I've looked at so long, I've never even seen. Ellen...

  Ellen : Sit here.

  Newland Archer : I've come to tell you I've changed my mind. You've made me see things differently. I think you've a right to your freedom and I want to help you to get it.

  Ellen : But, all the things you said about - not hurting the family?

  Newland Archer : It's your life, your happiness. You've a right to decide these things for yourself. Bravely, honestly.

  Ellen : Have I?

  Newland Archer : Yes. Over here, we're afraid to face fights. When we say dignity, we mean fear of what others will say. When we say good taste, we mean glossing over their truth. When we say decency, we mean hypocrisy.

• Newland Archer : Why are you crying?

  Ellen : Don't you remember a moment ago, in the conservatory, when our hands touched a little plant?

  Newland Archer : There never was a moment ago.

  Ellen : It seemed to - wither. Oh, darling, don't you see, sometimes life can touch us and we die.

  Newland Archer : But, this is the first moment we've ever lived!

• Newland Archer : Ellen, can't we sit here just for a few minutes longer. It's been a hundred years since we talked together.

  Ellen : Granny had a letter from May in Paris. I pictured you there with the chestnuts all in bloom along the avenue, the roll of the river, under the beautiful bridges. Life is very rich there, isn't it? And didn't you find that there's nothing like a good glimpse of other roofs and other streets.

  Newland Archer : I was thinking only of your roof. The little house on 23rd Street. Imagining you there.