On the Beach (1959) - Quotes

Essential Viewing: On the Beach

Taglines: IF YOU Never See Another Motion Picture In Your Life You Must See ON THE BEACH

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The Greatest Tale of Our Era

Taglines: The Biggest Story Of our Time!

Quotes sourced from Wikiquote (© Wikiquote contributors), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Modified for formatting/length.

Moment of Reflection in Crisis

Peter Holmes: Darling.

Mary Holmes: God, God forgive us. Peter, I think I'll have that cup of tea, now.

Quotes sourced from Wikiquote (© Wikiquote contributors), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Modified for formatting/length.

Reflection on a Past Relationship

Peter Holmes: You remember when we first met? It was on the beach. I thought you were everything I'd always wanted.

Mary Holmes: I thought you were underfed.

Mary Holmes: It's all over now isn't it?

Peter Holmes: Yes. It's all over.

Quotes sourced from Wikiquote (© Wikiquote contributors), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Modified for formatting/length.

Perceptions of Americans in Uncertain Times

Dwight Towers: Well... how'd you recognise me?

Moira Davidson: I love Americans. They're so naïve.

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Hope Amidst Despair

Julian Osborn: We're all doomed, you know. The whole, silly, drunken, pathetic lot of us. Doomed by the air we're about to breathe. We haven't got a chance!

Mary Holmes: Stop it! I won't have it, Julian. I won't! There is hope. There has to be hope. There's always hope. We just can't go on like this. We can't. We - we...

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The Illusion of Cure in Despair

Peter Holmes: Now, this is a special kind of — sleeping pill. I had a devil of a time getting em. But, I wanted you to have them on hand and to make sure you knew how to use em. What happens with the radiation is that you get — you get ill — and you start feeling sick and then you are sick and you go on being sick. You can't keep anything down. You may feel better for awhile; but, but it always comes back. You get weaker.

Mary Holmes: And this cures it.

Peter Holmes: Darling, you know nothing cures it. This ends it.

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Questioning Responsibility in a Crisis

Moira Davidson: All I want to know is: if everybody was so smart, why didn't they know what would happen?

Dwight Towers: They did.

Moira Davidson: Well, I, I can't take it. I, oh, yes, I can take it! But, it's unfair. It's unfair because I didn't do anything. And nobody I know did anything.

Quotes sourced from Wikiquote (© Wikiquote contributors), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Modified for formatting/length.

Defiance in the Face of Adversity

Morgan: They pushed us too far! They didn't think we'd fight, no matter what they did!

Julian Osborn: And they were wrong. We fought. We expunged them. And we didn't do such a bad job on ourselves.

Quotes sourced from Wikiquote (© Wikiquote contributors), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Modified for formatting/length.

The Dilemma of Hope and Reality

Julian Osborn: There was a choice. It was build the bombs, and use them — or risk the United States, the Soviet Union, and the rest of us, would find some way... to go on living

Morgan: [scoffs] That's wishful thinking if ever I heard it.

Julian Osborn: [softly] I'm not against wishful thinking. Not now.

Struggling with Self-Identity and Acceptance

Moira Davidson: I wouldn't really mind... if you could forget entirely who I am... I don't like myself very much anyway.

The Weight of Time and Memory

Moira Davidson: There isn't time. No time to love... nothing to remember... nothing worth remembering.

The Fragility of Civilization and Technology

Julian Osborn: In the end, somehow granted the time for examination, we shall find that our so called civilization was gloriously destroyed by a handful of vacuum tubes and transistors. Probably faulty.

Human folly in self-destruction

Julian Osborn: Who would ever have believed that human beings would be stupid enough to blow themselves off the face of the Earth?

Reflections on Drinking and Insight

Julian Osborn: I shouldn't drink, you know. I inevitably say something brilliant.

The Complexity of War and Responsibility

Julian Osborn: The trouble with you is you want a simple answer. There isn't any. The war started when people accepted the idiotic principle that peace could be maintained — by arranging to defend themselves with weapons they couldn't possibly use — without committing suicide. Everybody had an atomic bomb, and counter-bombs, and counter-counter bombs. The devices outgrew us; we couldn't control them. I know, I helped build them. God, help me. Somewhere, some poor bloke probably looked at a radar screen and thought he saw something. He knew that if he hesitated one-thousands of a second — his own country would be wiped off the map. So, So, he pushed a button - and the world went — crazy. And, and...