Sabrina (1954)

Humphrey Bogart: Linus Larrabee

Photos 

Quotes 

• Sabrina Fairchild : Maybe you should go to Paris, Linus.

  Linus Larrabee : To Paris?

  Sabrina Fairchild : It helped me a lot. Have you ever been there?

  Linus Larrabee : [thinks]  Oh, yes. Yes. Once. I was there for thirty-five minutes.

  Sabrina Fairchild : Thirty-five MINUTES?

  Linus Larrabee : Changing planes. I was on my way to Iraq on an oil deal.

  Sabrina Fairchild : Oh, but Paris isn't for changing planes, it's... it's for changing your outlook, for... for throwing open the windows and letting in... letting in la vie en rose.

  Linus Larrabee : [sadly]  Paris is for lovers. Maybe that's why I stayed only thirty-five minutes.

• Linus Larrabee : Why're you looking at me that way?

  Sabrina Fairchild : All night long I've had the most terrible impulse to do something.

  Linus Larrabee : Oh, never resist an impulse, Sabrina, especially if it's terrible.

  Sabrina Fairchild : I'm gonna do it.

  [reaching out and turning down the brim of Linus' Homburg] 

  Sabrina Fairchild : There!

  Linus Larrabee : What's that for?

  Sabrina Fairchild : We can't have you walking up and down the Champs Elysees looking like a tourist undertaker! Another thing, never a briefcase in Paris and never an umbrella. There's a law.

  Linus Larrabee : How am I ever going to get along in Paris without someone like you? Who'll be there to help me with my French, to turn down the brim of my hat?

  Sabrina Fairchild : Suppose you meet someone on the boat the very first day out? A perfect stranger.

  Linus Larrabee : I have a better suppose, Sabrina. Suppose I were ten years younger. Suppose you weren't in love with David. Suppose I asked you to... I suppose I'm just talking nonsense.

  Sabrina Fairchild : I suppose so.

  Linus Larrabee : Suppose you sing that song again. Slowly.

• David Larrabee : What's so constructive about marrying Elizabeth Tyson?

  Linus Larrabee : [offering a sheet of plastic]  Taste it.

  David Larrabee : [licks it]  It's sweet.

  Linus Larrabee : That's right. It's made of sugar cane.

  David Larrabee : Sugar cane. Wait a minute. This wouldn't have anything to do with the fact that the Tysons own the largest holdings of sugar cane in Puerto Rico, would it?

  Linus Larrabee : Second largest. The largest have no daughter.

  David Larrabee : It's all beginning to make sense. Mr. Tyson owns the sugarcane, you own the formula for the plastics, and I'm supposed to be offered up as a human sacrifice on the altar of the industrial progress. Is that it?

  Linus Larrabee : You make it sound so vulgar, David, as if the son of the hot dog dynasty were being offered in marriage to the daughter of the mustard king. Surely... surely you don't object to Elizabeth Tyson just because her father happens to have twenty million dollars? That's very narrow-minded of you, David.

  David Larrabee : Just one thing you overlooked. I haven't proposed, and she hasn't accepted.

  Linus Larrabee : Oh, don't worry. I proposed and Mr. Tyson accepted.

  David Larrabee : Did you kiss him?

• Linus Larrabee : [slow dancing with Sabrina]  How do you say in French my sister has a yellow pencil?

  Sabrina Fairchild : Ma soeur a un crayon jaune.

  Linus Larrabee : How do you say my brother has a lovely girl?

  Sabrina Fairchild : Mon frère a une gentille petite amie.

  Linus Larrabee : And how do you say I wish I were my brother?

• Linus Larrabee : If you love her, take her. This is the 20th century.

  Oliver Larrabee : The 20th century? I could pick a century out of a hat, blindfolded, and get a better one.

• Linus Larrabee : [into a dictaphone]  Interoffice memo, Linus Larrabee to David Larrabee. Dear David, this is to remind you that you are a junior partner of Larrabee Industries. Our building is located at 30 Broad Street, New York City. Your office is on the 22nd floor. Our normal week is Monday through Friday. Our working day is 9:00 to 5:00. Should you find this inconvenient, you are free to retire under the Larrabee pension plan. Having been with us one year, this will entitle you to sixty-five cents a month for the rest of your life.

• Linus Larrabee : [after Sabrina puts a romantic record on the phonograph]  Sabrina.

  Sabrina Fairchild : Yes?

  Linus Larrabee : Do you mind if we turn this off?

  Sabrina Fairchild : Why?

  Linus Larrabee : [pained]  Because.

  Sabrina Fairchild : Don't you like it?

  Linus Larrabee : I used to like it.

  Sabrina Fairchild : [taking the record off]  Certain songs bring back certain memories to me, too. Did you love her?

  Linus Larrabee : I'd rather not talk about it.

  Sabrina Fairchild : I'm sorry.

  Linus Larrabee : That's all right.

  Sabrina Fairchild : It's so strange to think of you being touched by a woman. I always thought you walked alone.

  Linus Larrabee : No man walks alone from choice.

  Sabrina Fairchild : As a child I used to watch you, from the window over the garage. Coming and going, always wearing your black homburg and carrying a briefcase and umbrella. I thought you could never belong to anyone. Never care for anyone.

  Linus Larrabee : Oh, yes, the cold businessman behind his marble desk, way up in his executive suite. No emotions, just ice water in his veins and ticker tape coming from his heart. And yet... one day that same cold businessman, high up in a skyscraper, opens a window, steps out on a ledge... stands there for three hours wondering... if he should jump.

  Sabrina Fairchild : Because of her?

• Linus Larrabee : A new product has been found, something of use to the world, so a new industry moves into an undeveloped area. Factories go up, machines are brought in, a harbor is dug, and you're in business. It's purely coincidental of course that people who never saw a dime before suddenly have a dollar, and barefooted kids wear shoes and have their teeth fixed and their faces washed. What's wrong with the kind of an urge that gives people libraries, hospitals, baseball diamonds and, uh, movies on a Saturday night? Miss McCardle, will you send in the secretaries?

  Miss McCardle : Yes, Mr. Larrabee.

  David Larrabee : Now you make me feel like a heel. If I don't marry Elizabeth, some kid is going to be running around Puerto Rico barefoot with cavities in his teeth.

• Oliver Larrabee : I can never remember that garage girl's name.

  Linus Larrabee : Sabrina.

  Oliver Larrabee : Sabrina! What right has a chauffeur got to call his daughter Sabrina?

  Linus Larrabee : What would you suggest... Ethel?

• Linus Larrabee : I always make it a point to have controls.

  Mr. Tyson : Yes, it's your good luck the kids are so fond of each other.

  Linus Larrabee : I always make it a point to be lucky, too.

• Thomas Fairchild : I like to think of life as a limousine. Though we are all riding together, we must remember our places. There's a front seat and a back seat and a window in between.

  Linus Larrabee : Fairchild, I never realized it before, but you're a terrible snob.

  Thomas Fairchild : Yes, sir.

• Linus Larrabee : Look at me. Joe College with a touch of arthritis.

• David Larrabee : What makes you so sure Sabrina still wants me?

  Linus Larrabee : Of course she wants you. She's wanted you all her life.

  David Larrabee : Until you came along in that silly homburg.

  Linus Larrabee : Well, suppose you straighten that silly straw hat and on your way. You'll miss the boat.

  David Larrabee : Don't worry. I won't miss the boat. I'm going.

  [starts walking towards the door] 

  David Larrabee : Funniest thing. Linus Larrabee, the man who doesn't burn, doesn't scorch, doesn't melt... suddenly throws a twenty million dollar deal out the window.

  [stops at the door] 

  David Larrabee : Are you sure *you* don't want to go with her?

  Linus Larrabee : Why should I want to go with her?

  David Larrabee : Because you're in love with her.

• Linus Larrabee : She doesn't want money; she wants love.

  Oliver Larrabee : I thought they discontinued that model.

• Thomas Fairchild : May I ask, sir, what exactly are your intentions?

  Linus Larrabee : My intentions? Unethical, reprehensible but very practical.

  Thomas Fairchild : I beg your pardon?

• David Larrabee : Morning, Linus. Where're you off to?

  Linus Larrabee : The office. Where do you think?

  David Larrabee : The office? On Sunday?

  Linus Larrabee : Today is Wednesday.

  David Larrabee : Wednesday?

• David Larrabee : I've been trying to write a poem to her but I... I can't seem to finish it. What rhymes with "glass"?

  Linus Larrabee : Glass... Glass... Uh...

  [snaps fingers] 

  Linus Larrabee : "Alas"!

• Linus Larrabee : I wish I were dead with my back broken.

• Oliver Larrabee : Seems to me there ought to be a less extravagant way of getting a chauffeur's daughter out of one's hair.

  Linus Larrabee : How would you do it? You can't even get a little olive out of a jar!

• Linus Larrabee : [Linus has decided to cancel the wedding]  When's your mother's birthday?

  Miss McCardle : Why?

• Linus Larrabee : No self-respecting prime minister would offer kronen.

  Sabrina Fairchild : No self-respecting waitress would take dollars.