Moulin Rouge (1952) 79% 7★

Henri: Maman, I am leaving here. I am going to Paris. I shall become a painter. I shall try to make a life for myself.
Countess Adèle de Toulouse-Lautrec: You will… you will be lonely there, Henri!
Henri: I will be lonely anywhere, Maman.

Henri: I am not a moralist, Sergeant. I do not blame people for what they are, only for seeming to be what they are not.

Jane Avril: I know it's all my fault, Henri. I see them as I want them to be, not as they really are. The mists of my dreams around them. They walk in beauty to the music of a Shepard's pipe. Then, the morning wind blows, the mists is swept away.

Lautrec:
A házasság egy hosszú, ízetlen vacsora, mely a desszerttel kezdődik.

Comte Alphonse de Toulouse-Lautrec: You should be horsewhipped for smearing the name of Toulouse-Lautrec over every kiosk in Paris. That revolting poster is a disgrace.
Henri: I am sorry you do not like my work, Father. But I shall continue to sign it as I please, for it is my name and it is my work.
Comte Alphonse de Toulouse-Lautrec: Work? A pretext to hang about cheap dance halls and drink all night. You call that pornographic trash work?
Henri: Yes, I call it work. On this I am more of an authority than you, Father. You've never worked. Our kind never did. We are the grand seigneurs, we are above work. We cloak ourselves in the glory of our name as if it were some remarkable achievement just to be born. The truth is, our world died beside Marie Antoinette. We are the fossils of a bygone age. And I have dared to break the pattern. I work.

Henri: Will you to the opera go with me tomorrow night, mademoiselle? While you make up your mind, let me remind you of the ladies of the Spanish court, who always kept their pet apes by their side so that they themselves would look more beautiful.
Myriamme Hayam: Is your wit always turned against yourself, Monsieur Lautrec?
Henri: This is to assure you in my case there will be no advances to repulse. I will ask for no more than an occasional handful of peanuts.

Henri: Big crowd tonight.
Zidler: Too big, thanks to your poster. Oh, I know I'm making millions, but I liked the Moulin Rouge as she was, lighthearted and hot-blooded, a little strumpet who thought only of tonight. Now she is grown up and knows better. She has money in her stocking, wears corsets, and never drinks a drop too much. Worst of all, she never sees her old friends anymore. She has gone into society. Last night she entertained a cabinet minister and his wife and daughter. It's disgusting!

Prudish woman: Are you Monsieur Joyant?
Maurice Joyant: Yes, madame.
Prudish woman: You should be arrested. To hang such a thing on your wall! Look at this woman. She is undressing, with a man looking on! Disgusting!
Henri: Forgive me, madame, the lady is not undressing, she is dressing. The gentleman happens to be her husband. They are celebrating their twenty-seventh wedding anniversary. They are going to have dinner with their oldest son. He is a taxidermist. I am appalled that you should thus malign these good people. It goes to prove what I have always maintained, that evil exists only in the eye of the beholder. I will thank you to stop looking at my pictures.

Myriamme Hayam: Her eyes told me there were worse things than cold or hunger or even loneliness.

Henri: Her past was too strong for her. The world she lives in is a jungle where people prowl like wild animals. They go without eating when the game is scarce. And when there is a kill, they claw and bite each other over it. It is a world of cruelty and cunning. But, it is free. I put chains on her. They only made her vicious. One night she broke them and escaped into her alleyway.