Spartacus (1960)

Kirk Douglas: Spartacus

Photos 

38 more photos

Quotes 

• Tigranes Levantus : If you looked into a magic crystal, you saw your army destroyed and yourself dead. If you saw that in the future, as I'm sure you're seeing it now, would you continue to fight?

  Spartacus : Yes.

  Tigranes Levantus : Knowing that you must lose?

  Spartacus : Knowing we can. All men lose when they die and all men die. But a slave and a free man lose different things.

  Tigranes Levantus : They both lose life.

  Spartacus : When a free man dies, he loses the pleasure of life. A slave loses his pain. Death is the only freedom a slave knows. That's why he's not afraid of it. That's why we'll win.

• Antoninus : Are you afraid to die, Spartacus?

  Spartacus : No more than I was to be born.

• Varinia : You like him, don't you.

  Spartacus : Who wants to fight? An animal can learn to fight. But to say beautiful things, and to make people believe them...

• Spartacus : Maybe there's no peace in this world, for us or for anyone else. I don't know. But I do know that as long as we live, we must stay true to ourselves. I do know that we're brothers. And I know that we're free. We march tonight!

• Spartacus : I'm not an animal! I'm not an animal.

  Varinia : Neither am I.

• Spartacus : What's your name?

  Draba : You don't want to know my name. I don't want to know your name.

  Spartacus : Just a friendly question.

  Draba : Gladiators don't make friends. If we're ever matched in the arena together, I have to kill you.

• Varinia : What are you thinking about?

  Spartacus : I'm free. And what do I know? I don't even know how to read.

  Varinia : You know things that can't be taught.

  Spartacus : I know nothing. Nothing. And I wanna know. I want to... I wanna know.

  Varinia : Know what?

  Spartacus : Everything! Why a star falls and a bird doesn't, where the sun goes at night, why the moon changes shape. I wanna know where the wind comes from.

  Varinia : The wind begins in a cave: far to the north, a young god sleeps in that cave. He dreams of a girl and he sighs, and the night wind stirs with his breath.

  [laughs] 

  Spartacus : I wanna know all about you. Every line, every curve. I wanna know every part of you. Every beat of your heart.

• Spartacus : [to Crassus, about the slain Antoninus]  Here's your victory. He'll come back. He'll come back, and he'll be millions!

• [being forced to fight] 

  Spartacus : Don't give them the pleasure of a contest. Lower your guard, I'll kill you on the first rush.

  Antoninus : I won't let them crucify you!

  Spartacus : It's my last order, obey it!

• [fighting] 

  Spartacus : Do you realize how long it takes to die on a cross?

  Antoninus : I don't care!

• Spartacus : Crixus always wanted to march on Rome. Now he doesn't have to. Rome's come to us.

• Spartacus : I'd rather be here, a free man among brothers, facing a long march and a hard fight, than to be the richest citizen of Rome, fat with food he didn't work for, and surrounded by slaves.

• Spartacus : I've never had a woman.

  [Varinia disrobes] 

  Batiatus : [laughs as he observes through a barred hole in ceiling]  You have one now, Spartacus. You must take her.

  Spartacus : Go away.

  Batiatus : What will she think of you? Indeed, what will I think of you?

  Spartacus : Go away.

  Batiatus : Come, come. Be generous. We must learn to share our pleasures.

• Marcellus : I like you. I want you to be my friend. I want to be your friend. All I ask is that you get along with me. What's your name, slave?

  Spartacus : Spartacus.

  Marcellus : I feel you don't like me.

• Crixus : What if they matched you and me?

  Spartacus : They won't.

  Crixus : What if they did? Would you fight?

  Spartacus : I'd have to. So would you.

  Crixus : Would you try to kill me?

  Spartacus : Yes, I'd kill. I'd try to stay. I'd try to stay alive and so would you.

• Spartacus : What are we, Crixus? What are we becoming? Romans? Have we learned nothing? What's happening to us?

• Spartacus : Gladiators. An army of gladiators. There's never been an army like that. One gladiator's worth any two Roman soldiers that ever lived.

  Crixus : We beat the Roman guards here but a Roman army is a different thing. They fight different than we do too.

  Spartacus : We can beat anything they send against us if we really want to.

• Varinia : Forbid me ever to leave you.

  Spartacus : I do forbid you. I forbid you. I forbid you. I forbid you.

• Spartacus : I thought you were in Rome. How'd you escape?

  Varinia : I - I jumped out of the cart and Batiatus was so fat...

  [Spartacus burst out laughing] 

  Varinia : I flew out of the cart and Batiatus was so fat that he couldn't catch me. He couldn't catch up with me.

• Spartacus : Nobody can ever sell you again?

  Varinia : Nobody can sell *you*.

  Spartacus : Or give you away.

  Varinia : Or give you away.

  Spartacus : Nobody can ever make you stay with anyone.

  Varinia : Nobody can make you stay with anybody.

• Spartacus : Hey Poet, I haven't had an egg in days.

• Antoninus : I came here to fight.

  Spartacus : Anyone can learn to fight.

  Antoninus : I joined to fight.

  Spartacus : What's your name?

  Antoninus : Antoninus.

  Spartacus : There's a time for fighting and there's is a time for singing. Now you teach us to sing. Sing, Antoninus.

• Spartacus : What did you do?

  Antoninus : Singer of songs.

  Spartacus : Singer of songs? But what work did you do?

  Antoninus : That's my work. I also juggle.

  Spartacus : Juggle. What else do you do?

  Antoninus : I can do feats of magic.

  Spartacus : Magic? Maybe he can make the Romans disappear.

• Spartacus : How you disappoint me, Marcus Glabrus. Playing dead. You afraid to die? It's easy to die. Haven't you seen enough gladiators in the arena to see how easy it is to die? Of course you have.

• Spartacus : We want nothing from Rome. Nothing, except our freedom!

• Spartacus : Who are Isis and Serapis?

  Antoninus : Gods of the East.

  Spartacus : Why should they want us to win?

  Tigranes Levantus : Because they favor Cilicia and Cilicia, like you, fights against the Romans.

• Spartacus : You're all wrong! The best wine comes from home, wherever it is.

• Spartacus : I'm gonna have a son.

  Varinia : It might be a daughter.

• Varinia : Spartacus, I've been trying to remember the song that Antoninus sang. Is it blue shadows and purple woods, or is it purple woods and blue shadows or what is it? Can you remember me?

  Spartacus : I want to make love to my wife!

  Varinia : Spartacus, put me down! Oh! You got - you got - you - you have to be gentle with me.

• Varinia : I can't live without you, Spartacus.

  Spartacus : Varinia. Varinia. Varinia. Varinia, for you and me there can be no farewells. As long as one of us lives, we all live.

• Spartacus : Oh, Varinia. Don't make me weak.

  Varinia : You're strong enough to be weak.

• Spartacus : Sometimes, even with you here sleeping beside me I feel so alone. I imagine a god for slaves and I pray.

  Varinia : What do you pray for?

  Spartacus : I pray for a son who'll be born free.

  Varinia : I pray for the same thing.

• Antoninus : Could we have won, Spartacus? Could we ever have won?

  Spartacus : Just by fighting them, we won something. When just one man says "No, I won't," Rome begins to fear. We were tens of thousands who said no. That was the wonder of it. To have seen slaves lift their heads from the dust, to see them rise from their knees, stand tall with a song on their lips, to hear them storm through the mountains shouting, to hear them sing along the plains.