“Barcelona” quotes

(1994)
Movie Barcelona
Title Barcelona
Year 1994
Director Whit Stillman
Genre Drama, Comedy, Romance
Interpreted by
Plot – Barcelona, 1980. Ted Boynton's life is suddenly messed up by the arrival of his cousin Fred Boynton. Ted dates ugly girls while Fred is disgusted by anti-American graffiti on the walls. At a party they meet Aurora Boval, an ugly but kind girl who invites Ted to a jazz concert. That evening he's joined indeed by the blonde and beautiful Montserrat and they start a relationship, even if she's engaged to Ramon. When Fred and Ramon argue, Ted expels his cousin and Montserrat disappears. When Fred is injured by a terrorist and goes into a coma, Ted visits him and meets Greta, then he decides to marry her.
All actors – Taylor Nichols, Chris Eigeman, Tushka Bergen, Mira Sorvino, Pep Munné, Hellena Taylor, Núria Badia, Thomas Gibson, Jack Gilpin, Pere Ponce, Laura López, Francis Creighton
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  • “- Marta: You seem very intelligent for an American.
    - Fred: Well, I'm not.”

    Mira Sorvino - Marta Ferrer
    Chris Eigeman - Fred Boynton
  • “I think it's well-known that anti-Americanism has its roots in sexualimpotence, at least in Europe.”
    Chris Eigeman - Fred Boynton
    [Tag:america, motive, sex]
  • “- Ted: Here in Barcelona, everything was swept aside. The world was turned upside down and stayed there.
    - Fred: Has it ever occurred to you that maybe the world was upside down before, and now it's right side up?”

    Taylor Nichols - Ted Boynton
    Chris Eigeman - Fred Boynton
    [Tag:perception]
  • - Ted: Spanish girls tend to be really promiscuous.
    - Fred: You're such a prig.
    - Ted: No, I wasn't using "promiscuous" pejoratively. It's just a fact. They have completely different attitudes toward sex.
    - Fred: Well, I wasn't using "prig" pejoratively.

    Taylor Nichols - Ted Boynton
    Chris Eigeman - Fred Boynton
    [Tag:sex, stereotype, women]
  • “He might seem like a typical American, like a big unsophisticated child, but he's far more complex than that. Have you ever heard of the Marquis de Sade? Ted's a great admirer of de Sade. And a follower of Dr. Johnson. He's a complex - and in some ways dangerous - man. He has a serious romantic illusion problem. Women find him fascinating. His...” (continue)(continue reading)

    Chris Eigeman - Fred Boynton
    [Tag:charm, mystery, sex]
  • “- Ted: You're very perceptive.
    - Montserrat: What?
    - Ted: You are very perceptive.
    - Montserrat: Oh. Thank you.
    - Ted: I don't really like perceptive. It's not that kind.”

    Taylor Nichols - Ted Boynton
    Tushka Bergen - Montserrat Raventos
  • “You are far weirder than someone merely into S&M. At least they have a tradition. We have some idea what S&M is about. There's movies and books about it. But so far as I know, there is nothing to explain the way you are.”

    Chris Eigeman - Fred Boynton
    [Tag:knowledge, sex]
  • “That's one of the great things about getting involved with someone from another country. You can't take it personally. What's really terrific is that when we act in ways which might objectively seem asshole-ish or, or, incredibly annoying, they don't get upset at all. They don't take it personally. They just assume it's some national...” (continue)(continue reading)
    Taylor Nichols - Ted Boynton
  • - Fred: One of the things that keeps popping up is this about "subtext". Plays, novels, songs - they all have a "subtext". Which I take to mean a hidden message or import of some kind. So subtext we know. But what do you call the message or meaning that's right there on the surface, completely open and obvious? They never talk about that. What... (continue)(continue reading)
    Chris Eigeman - Fred Boynton
    Taylor Nichols - Ted Boynton
    [Tag:meaning, writing]
  • “- Marta: I think there is something fascist about a boy who immediately talks of marrying a woman he likes.
    - Fred: I don't think Ted is a fascist of the marrying kind.”

    Mira Sorvino - Marta Ferrer
    Chris Eigeman - Fred Boynton
    [Tag:fascism, marriage]
  • “Positive thinking is fine in theory. But whenever I try it on a systematic basis... I end up really depressed.”
    Taylor Nichols - Ted Boynton
  • “- Fred: I could have shaved the wrong way all my life and never have known it. And then I could have taught my son to shave the wrong way without him ever knowing it either.
    - Marta: You have a son?
    - Fred: No... But I might someday. And then maybe I'll teach him to shave the wrong way.”

    Chris Eigeman - Fred Boynton
    Mira Sorvino - Marta Ferrer
    [Tag:mistake, son, teaching]
  • “You should get down on your knees and thank God that you have a cousin who makes up interesting stories about you. I'm the best P.R. guy you're ever going to have. Do you think any even mildly cool trade fair girl would give you the time of day if she knew the pathetic Bible-dancing goody-goody you really are?”

    Chris Eigeman - Fred Boynton
  • - Fred: "Yankee" and "gringo" are obviously pejorative, but it's the standard dictionary term that's the most insulting of all. "Estadunidense". Dense. D-E-N-S-E. It's the same spelling. Dense: thick, stupid. Every time you hear it. Estadunidense-dense-dense. It's like a direct slap in the face. It's incredible.
    - Montserrat: I think you are too... (continue)
    (continue reading)
    Chris Eigeman - Fred Boynton
    Tushka Bergen - Montserrat Raventos
  • “- Woman (Shootings in America): All those people killed in shootings in America?
    - Fred: Oh, shootings, yes. But that doesn't mean Americans are more violent than other people. We're just better shots.”

    Diana Sassen - Woman - 'Shootings in America'
    Chris Eigeman - Fred Boynton
  • “- Ted: There's a lot of anti-NATO feeling here.
    - Fred: Anti what?
    - Ted: Anti-NATO.
    - Fred: Anti-NATO?
    - Ted: Yeah. Well, actually here it's OTAN.
    - Fred: They're against OTAN? What are they for? Soviet troops racing across Europe, eating all the croissants?”

    Taylor Nichols - Ted Boynton
    Chris Eigeman - Fred Boynton
  • “My jazz rule is: If you can't dance to it, you don't want to know about it.”
    Chris Eigeman - Fred Boynton
    [Tag:dancing]
  • “- Ted: Take these ants. In the U.S. view, a small group, or cadre, of fierce red ants have taken power and are oppressing the black ant majority. Now the stated U.S. policy is to aid those black ants opposing the red ants in hopes of restoring democracy, and to impede the red ants from assisting their red ant comrades in neighboring ant...” (continue)(continue reading)
    Taylor Nichols - Ted Boynton
    Pep Munné - Ramone
    [Tag:america, politics]
  • Katharine Ross has just married this really cool guy - tall, blond, incredibly popular, the make-out king of his fraternity in Berkeley - when this obnoxious Dustin Hoffman character shows up at the back of the church, acting like a total asshole. "Elaine! Elaine!". Does Katharine Ross tell Dustin Hoffman, "Get lost, creep. I'm a married woman"?... (continue)(continue reading)

    Chris Eigeman - Fred Boynton
  • “Ramone is very persuasive, and he painted a terrible picture of what it would be like for her to live the rest of her life in America, with all of its crime, consumerism, and vulgarity. All those loud, badly dressed, fat people watching their eighty channels of television and visiting shopping malls. The plastic throw-everything-away society...” (continue)(continue reading)
    Mira Sorvino - Marta Ferrer
  • “I don't go to bed with just anyone anymore. I have to be attracted to them sexually.”
    Mira Sorvino - Marta Ferrer
    [Tag:seduction, sex]
  • “When we were kids I borrowed some things. It was never ever theft! In each case I either told you... or was about to.”

    Chris Eigeman - Fred Boynton
    [Tag:childhood, theft]
Highlights