Cleopatra (1963)
Elizabeth Taylor: Cleopatra
Photos
Quotes
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Cleopatra : How DARE you and the rest of your barbarians set fire to my library! Play conqueror all you want, Mighty Caesar! Rape, murder, pillage thousands, even millions of human beings! But neither you nor any other barbarian has the right to destroy one human thought!
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Cleopatra : You come before me as a suppliant.
Antony : If you choose to regard me as such.
Cleopatra : I do. You will therefore assume the position of a suppliant before this throne. You will kneel.
Antony : I will *what*?
Cleopatra : On-your-knees!
Antony : You dare ask the Proconsul of the Roman Empire?
Cleopatra : I *asked* it of Julius Caesar. I *demand* it of you!
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Cleopatra : [Kicks cushion from throne to Caesar, to get him to kneel] You have such bony knees.
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[Seducing Caesar]
Cleopatra : A woman too must make the barren land fruitful. She must make life grow where there was no life. Just as the Mother Nile feeds and replenishes the Earth, I am the Nile. I will bear many sons. Isis has told me. My breasts are full of love and life. My hips are rounded and well apart. Such women, they say, have sons.
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Apollodorus : I've always loved you.
Cleopatra : And I have always known.
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Antony : What has angered you? That I dealt with Octavian however I could, or that I married his sister to do it? Jealousy or politics, which?
Cleopatra : Both! And damn you for not understanding either!
Antony : It would not occur to me to look to you for instruction.
Cleopatra : Which is why you have come back chained to Octavian like a slave. And with such an exquisite set of chains. So softly spoken, so virtuous! She sleeps, I hear, fully-clothed!
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Cleopatra : I will not be told where I can go and where I cannot go!
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Cleopatra : There are never enough hours in the days of a queen, and her nights have too many.
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Julius Caesar : Ah, yes. I seem to recall some mention of an obsession you have about your divinity... Isis, is it not?
Cleopatra : I shall have to insist that you mind what you say. I AM Isis. I am worshipped by millions who believe it. You are not to confuse what I am with the so-called divine origin which every Roman general seems to acquire together with his shield. It was, uh, Venus you chose to be descended from, wasn't it?
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Julius Caesar : Germanicus! A guard to escort Queen Cleopatra to her apartments.
Germanicus : Guard!
Cleopatra : The corridors are dark gentlemen, but you mustn't be afraid. I am with you.
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Cleopatra : Catullus doesn't approve of you. Why haven't you had him killed?
Julius Caesar : Because *I* approve of *him.*
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[as they begin eating on Cleopatra's barge]
Marc Antony : Fabulous feast.
Cleopatra : One is so limited when one travels by ship.
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Cleopatra : We've gotten off to a bad start. I've done noting but rub you the wrong way.
Julius Caesar : I'm not sure I want to be rubbed by you at all.
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Julius Caesar : Isis herself would surrender her place in heaven to be as beautiful as you.
Cleopatra : You're not supposed to look at me. No one is.
Julius Caesar : Well if they aren't looking, how can they know that I am.
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Cleopatra : [to Mark Antony after protesting her request to kneel] I asked it of Caesar, I demand it of you!
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Cleopatra : You can do what you want with your time.
Julius Caesar : Everything but make it stand still.
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Cleopatra : How strangely awake I feel. As if living had been just a long dream.
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Cleopatra : [to Caesar] Your destiny is no longer just yours. It's mine too.
