“The Age of Innocence” quotes
(1993)
Martin Scorsese
directed this movie
in 1993
Title The Age of Innocence
Year 1993
Director Martin Scorsese
Genre Drama, Romance
Year 1993
Director Martin Scorsese
Genre Drama, Romance
Plot – Newland Archer is a young lawyer who has never questioned the world he lives in, nor his girlfriend May Welland, until he meets Ellen Olenska, an intelligent and educated countess who inspires a sense of exoticism and spontaneity at the same time. She's a distant relative of May too and has been raised by her mother, aunts and grandmother to become the ideal woman according to the society, which she represents perfectly indeed. Newland becomes first Ellen's defender, as she's considered a questionable woman due to the separation from her husband, then between them arises a strong feeling. While Ellen refuses to be the cause of Newland and May's engagement's break up, the man must choose wether to break the strict social rules to follow his passions or to lose his security and prestige.
All actors – Daniel Day-Lewis, Michelle Pfeiffer, Winona Ryder, Linda Faye Farkas, Michael Rees Davis, Terry Cook, Jon Garrison, Richard E. Grant, Alec McCowen, Geraldine Chaplin, Mary Beth Hurt, Stuart Wilson, Howard Erskine, John McLoughlin, Christopher Nilsson, Miriam Margolyes, Siân Phillips, Carolyn Farina, Michael Gough, Alexis Smith, Kevin Sanders, W.B. Brydon, Tracey Ellis, Cristina Pronzati, Clement Fowler, Norman Lloyd, Cindy Katz, Thomas Gibson, Zoe, Jonathan Pryce, June Squibb, Domenica Cameron-Scorsese, Mac Orange, Brian Davies, Thomas Barbour, Henry Fehren, Patricia Dunnock, Robert Sean Leonard, Joanne Woodward, Claire Bloom, Susan Lynn Bragg, Pasquale Cajano, Tamasin Day-Lewis, Catherine Scorsese, Charles Scorsese, Martin Scorsese, Michael Trout
show all“The Age of Innocence” Quotes 26 quotes
“Your name was Beaufort when he covered you with jewels and it's got to stay Beaufort now that he's covered you with shame.”
“Carriages waited at the curb for the entire performance. It was widely known in New York, but never acknowledged, that Americans want to get away from amusement even more quickly than they want to get to it.”
“They never knew what it meant to be tempted, but you did. You understood. I've never known that before, and it's better than anything I've known.”
“The burden of her flesh had made it long since impossible to go up and down stairs. So, with characteristic independence, she had established herself on the ground floor of her house. From a sitting room, there was an unexpected vista of her bedroom. Her visitors were startled and fascinated by the foreignness of this arrangement, which recalled...” (continue)(continue reading)
“- Newland Archer: You gave me my first glimpse of a real life. Then you asked me to go on with the false one. No one can endure that.
- Ellen Olenska: I'm enduring it.”“Newland. You couldn't be happy if it meant being cruel. If we act any other way I'll be making you act against what I love in you most. And I can't go back to that way of thinking. Don't you see? I can't love you unless I give you up.”
“How can we be happy behind the backs of people who trust us?”
“We should remember, marriage is marriage and Ellen is still a wife.”
“Don't make love to me. Too many people have done that.”
“- Ellen Olenska: I knew you'd come.
- Newland Archer: That shows you wanted me to.”“I can't have my happiness made out of a wrong to someone else.”
“- Ellen Olenska: I think we should look at reality, not dreams.
- Newland Archer: I just want us to be together!
- Ellen Olenska: I can't be your wife, Newland! Is it your idea that I should live with you as your mistress?
- Newland Archer: I want... Somehow, I want to get away with you... and... and find a world where words like that don't exist!”“- Ted Archer: I'll be back on the first, and our wedding's not till the fifth.
- Newland Archer: I'm surprised you even remembered the date.”“- Ellen Olenska: Are you very much in love with her?
- Newland Archer: As much as a man can be.
- Ellen Olenska: Do you think there's a limit?”“Who has the right to make her life over, if she hasn't? Why should we bury a woman alive if her husband prefers to live with whores?”
“Divorce is always unpleasant.”
“Archer enjoyed such challenges to convention. He questioned conformity in private; but, in public, he upheld family and tradition. This was a world balanced so precariously that it's harmony could be shattered by a whisper.”
“The real loneliness is living among all these kind people who only asks you to pretend.”
Highlights
