- Daniel Michon: You have a father or just a mother?
- Lauren King: No, I have a father. As a matter of fact, I'm on my third.
- Daniel Michon: [surprised] Does your mother divorce them or just kill them?
- Lauren King: [laughs] No, still alive.
- Daniel Michon: What does the latest one do?
- Lauren King: He's in telephones.
- Daniel Michon: Telephones. What does he do exactly?
- Lauren King: Exactly? He's the head of ICT. In Europe.
- Daniel Michon: So. You're a capitalist.
- Lauren King: [shakes her head] My father's a capitalist. My own politics are more... radical than my parents'.
- Daniel Michon: It's easy to be liberal when you're rich. I've seen it in films.
- Lauren King: So what does your father do?
- Daniel Michon: He drives.
- Lauren King: A truck?
- Daniel Michon: No... a taxi.
- Lauren King: You shouldn't be embarrassed, it's honest work.
- Daniel Michon: Not the way he does it.
- Daniel Michon: ...that legend is just another one of your damn lies.
- Julius: You could make it true. What are legends anyway but stories about ordinary people doing extraordinary things? Of course, it takes courage and imagination... not everybody has that. I may be an old fraud Daniel, but I do know this: something that two people who are in love create together against impossible odds, can hold them together... forever.
- Natalie Woodstein, Lauren's dorky friend: Are you in love?
- Lauren King: You don't fall in love with a boy you just met.
- Natalie Woodstein, Lauren's dorky friend: Are you?
- Lauren King: Yeah.
- Lauren King: I used to think, maybe a long time ago, like... like in the time of the pharaohs or Louis the XIIIth that, there was somebody, made just perfect for me. I mean, when you think about it and consider that your feelings of love, begin when you're about ten and if you live to say 70, well that's pretty limiting because, what chance is there that he'll be alive at the same time you are? You know?
- Daniel Michon: I feel the same things. I mean, even if she lived in my lifetime. What if my perfect woman lived in India or California or Brazil? What chance is there that I'd meet her when I live in La Garenne?
- Lauren King: It's incredible isn't it?
- Daniel Michon: Absolutely... incredible.
- [holds her hand]
- Natalie Woodstein, Lauren's dorky friend: [looking at a sculpture of a nude male] Have you ever seen a real one?
- Lauren King: One what?
- [pause]
- Lauren King: Oh. Sure
- Natalie Woodstein, Lauren's dorky friend: Who's? His?
- Lauren King: Who's?
- Natalie Woodstein, Lauren's dorky friend: You know, his... Daniel's.
- Lauren King: Oh, sure.
- Natalie Woodstein, Lauren's dorky friend: Have you ever... you know...
- Lauren King: Done it? All the time, every which way.
- Natalie Woodstein, Lauren's dorky friend: God!
- Lauren King: Well, I would have prefered to have waited, but... well you know the French.
- Natalie Woodstein, Lauren's dorky friend: God!
- [pause]
- Natalie Woodstein, Lauren's dorky friend: Where?
- Lauren King: Where what?
- Natalie Woodstein, Lauren's dorky friend: Did you do it?
- Lauren King: Well, he has this old mattress in his cellar...
- Natalie Woodstein, Lauren's dorky friend: God!
- Daniel Michon: [as Daniel helps Lauren pick up the books she dropped on the ground, he sees one specific book...] Heidegger?
- Lauren King: Ah, it's for school. An assignment.
- Daniel Michon: They assign you Heidegger?
- Lauren King: Sure
- Daniel Michon: They are teaching you existentialism?
- Lauren King: Heidegger isn't really an existentialist.
- Daniel Michon: He claims he isn't. His writing says he is.
- Lauren King: You read Heidegger?
- Daniel Michon: Not anymore. He bores me. Especially his fascination with the tall German poet. What's his name...?
- Lauren King: Hölderlin!
- Daniel Michon: Hölderlin. Did you try to struggle though any of that stuff? Like "The Death of Empedocles."
- Lauren King: "... Empedocles." It's awful. Humph, but the French translation is terrible.
- Daniel Michon: Oh believe me, it's terrible in any language.
- Lauren King: [realizing how smart Daniel really is] I know! That's fantastic!
- Lauren King: [on phone] Natalie? Lauren. What happened in school today?
- Natalie Woodstein, Lauren's dorky friend: We were playing mixed soccer with the boys, Billy and another boy were choosing girls to be on their team. Can you imagine how nervous I was?
- Lauren King: Natalie, he's your cousin!
- Natalie Woodstein, Lauren's dorky friend: Second cousin. The kids don't come out funny or anything, I checked.
- Kay King: She spent the whole time reading a book. Well, don't you think a child her age would be more interested in watching a movie being made?
- Richard King: It depends on the book.
- Natalie Woodstein, Lauren's dorky friend: You don't know what love is like until you've fallen for your cousin.
- Julius: There was no Emilia. She was a fantasy.
- Daniel Michon: She was a lie!
- Julius: She was an attempt to bring - a little romance - into my life.
- Daniel Michon: That's pretty sad!
- Julius: Any sadder than sitting in a darkened theater, pretending you are Robert Redford, performing heroic deeds?
- Daniel Michon: Lauren? Lauren? Call me Bogie.
- Lauren King: Why?
- Daniel Michon: Because they belong together. Lauren and Bogie. Lauren Bacall, Humphrey Bogart.
- Lauren King: Heidegger isn't all that hard. I mean, his stuff is mostly etymological. you know, like, why is there something rather than nothing at all.
- Londet: Great boobs!
- Daniel Michon: All this... and you look at that?
- Londet: You look at what you like. I'll look at what I like.
- Richard King: Lauren was beginning to think you weren't going to come. I'm Richard King, Lauren's father.
- Daniel Michon: Good to meet you sir. Lauren speaks very highly of you.
- Kay King: Well, I'm delighted you boys could come.
- Londet: Thank you for exciting me.
- Kay King: Lauren, you are never to see that boy again. Ever! Or, at least until school is over. Then it won't matter anyway because we're leaving for the States.
- Lauren King: The States?
- Kay King: Your father has taken a job in god damn Houston. We'll be leaving at the end of the month. You better get used to the idea.
- Lauren King: That's why I wanted to go to Venice. Not just to run away. But so we could kiss under the Bridge of Sighs - at sunset - when the bells tolled. The way the Brownings did. And then we could love each other for ever.
- Julius: There is a legend which says that if two lovers - kiss - in a gondola, under the Bridge of Sighs, at sunset, when the bells of the Campanile toll - they will love each other - forever.
- Daniel Michon: This is your room? It doesn't look like you.
- Lauren King: I know. My mother decorated it. The only thing in here that's me, is me.
- Londet: [In French] You have this all to yourself?
- Lauren King: Oui.
- Natalie Woodstein, Lauren's dorky friend: [Londet says something in French] What'd he say?
- Daniel Michon: He said he sleeps in the same bed with his sister.
- Daniel Michon: God, how awful!
- Londet: [In French] It's not so bad. She's 17. She's great looking and has huge boobs.
- Natalie Woodstein, Lauren's dorky friend: What'd he say?
- Lauren King: Ha! He said - he has a - great amount of affection for her.
- Daniel Michon: [Daniel and Lauren have snuck into the projection room of an adult movie theater] I just noted there aren't any subtitles.
- Lauren King: You sorta get the gist of it, anyway.
- [Watches screen]
- Lauren King: She's so pretty. Why would she...?
- [Something unseen happens on screen and Lauren, horrified, runs off]
- Daniel Michon: [Daniel, watching the movie:] what is he making her do?
- Daniel Michon: [chasing after Lauren outside the adult theater] I've never seen one of them before either, I wouldn't have taken you. It isn't like that. That's something else. It isn't love.
- Michel Michon: I took some Americans from the station to the Hotel George V. I said my meter was broke. Special rate: 100 francs.
- Daniel Michon: That's a 20 franc ride, tops.
- Michel Michon: They looked as if they'd stiff me on the tip.
- Daniel Michon: They won't like the French.
- Michel Michon: I don't like Americans. We're even.
- Lauren King: Have you ever seen one of those kinds of movies before?
- Daniel Michon: Sure, Londet's father owns this porno house. We go all the time.
- Kay King: Oh, Brod, I'm so flattered that you could come! George told me not even to bother inviting you because you never show up at these affairs.
- Broderick 'Brod' Crawford: I figured, what the hell, the booze is free and maybe I'll get laid.
- Kay King: [to George] Ha! He is such a delight.
- Kay King: What is going on! Jesus Christ, Richard, get in here! They've been having an orgy!
- Richard King: Don't be ridiculous! What were you doing?
- Lauren King: We had some champagne and I opened my gifts. That's all!
- Natalie Woodstein, Lauren's dorky friend: you don't know what love is like until you've fallen for your cousin
- Londet: [Enters and finds Daniel talking to Lauren] What are your doing? They're looking for you. I said you were taking a leak.
- Daniel Michon: [to Lauren] I have to go.
- Londet: [Looking at Lauren and saying in French] Nice boobs!