Carnal Knowledge (1971)

Jack Nicholson: Jonathan

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Quotes 

• Bobbie : The reason I sleep all day is because I can't stand my life!

  Jonathan : What life?

  Bobbie : Sleeping all day!

• Jonathan : Look, sister, I'm out there in the jungle - eight hours a day!

  Bobbie : You wouldn't even let me canvas for Kennedy.

  Jonathan : You want a job? I got a job for you. Fix up this pigsty! You get a pretty Goddammed good salary for testing out this bed all day! You want an extra fifty dollars a week, try vacuuming! You want an extra hundred, make this Goddammed bed! Try opening some Goddammed windows! That's why you can't stand up in here, the Goddammed place smells like a coffin!

• [first lines] 

  Jonathan : If you had a choice...

  Sandy : Yeah?

  Jonathan : Would you rather love a girl, or have her love you?

  Sandy : I want it mutual.

  Jonathan : I mean if you couldn't have it mutual.

  Sandy : You mean would I rather be the one who loves, or is loved?

  Jonathan : Yeah.

  Sandy : It's not that easy a question. But, I think I'd rather be in love.

  Jonathan : Me too. I wouldn't want to get hurt, though.

• Jonathan : Alright, where the fuck is my shoehorn? This place is a mess! There's not any food in the house, half the time you look like you fell out of bed! You spend more time in bed than any other human being past the age of 6 months than I ever heard of!

• Jonathan : Do you always answer a question with a question?

  Susan : Do you always date your best friend's girlfriend?

• Bobbie : I need a life.

  Jonathan : Get a job!

  Bobbie : I don't want a job! I want you.

  Jonathan : I'm taken, by me! Get out of the house! Do something useful, goddammit.

• Jonathan : What are you crying for? It wasn't a Lassie story.

• Jonathan : Talk about the pot and the kettle. When I caught wind of your checkered past, I felt like a celibate.

  Bobbie : You made me tell you.

  Jonathan : Sure. I twisted your arm.

  Bobbie : It got you hot!

  Jonathan : Something has to.

• Jonathan : Oh, Bobbie. You don't need me. Why do you let yourself in for this kind of abuse? Walk out. Leave me. Please leave me. God's sake, I'd almost marry you if you'd leave me.

  Bobbie : You call that abuse? You don't know what I'm used to. With all your carrying on, to me you're a gift.

• Jonathan : She's a real ball-buster, that one. I've been through the mill with her kind.

  Sandy : Yeah?

  Jonathan : You think a girl goes for you, and you find out she's after your money or your balls - or your money *and* your balls. Women today are better-hung than the men.

• [last lines] 

  Jonathan : I'm not kind.

  Louise : I don't mean "weak" kind the way so many men are. I mean the kindness that comes from enormous strength, from an inner power so strong that every act, no matter what, is more proof of that power. That's what all women resent. That's why they try to cut you down, because your knowledge of yourself and them is so right, so true, that it exposes the lies by which they, every scheming one of them, live by. It takes a true woman to understand that the purest form of love is of a man who denies himself to her, of a man who inspires worship, because he has no need for any woman. Because he has himself, and who is better, more beautiful, more powerful, more perfect... you're getting hard... more strong, more masculine, more extraordinary, more... bust. It's rising, it's rising... more virile, domineering. More irresistible. It's up, it's in the air...

• Jonathan : At one time, it was great what we had... the kidding around. It can't have a natural time span. Affairs can't dissolve in a good way. There's always got to be poison. I don't see why, I really don't see why!

• Jonathan : The first time I do it, I want it beautiful. I don't want to waste it on some beast.

  Sandy : I feel the same way about getting laid as I feel about going to college. I'm being pressured into it.

• Jonathan : Is this an ultimatum? Answer me, you ball-busting, castrating, son of a cunt bitch! Is this an ultimatum or not?

• Jonathan : We'd be good together.

  Susan : I'm dating your best friend.

  Jonathan : He won't mind.

  Susan : How do you know?

  Jonathan : I won't tell him.

• Cindy : Sandy and I have a party to go to.

  Jonathan : Sandy's busy.

  Cindy : You wanna come around sometime by yourself, that's one thing. I've been expecting that. But you tell Sandy that if he lays one hand on that tub of lard in there, not to come home. So you call me.

• Jonathan : What would you do?

  Sandy : If she looks anything like she looks on television...

  Jonathan : Size 38 with a D cup.

  Sandy : But, looks aren't everything.

  Jonathan : Believe me, looks are everything.

• Jonathan : Sandy, do you wanna get laid?

  Sandy : Please.

• Bobbie : Marry me, Jonathan! Please, please!

  Jonathan : You're trying to kill me.

• Jonathan : [Yelling]  Very slick! Very clever! But it's not going to work, Bobbie!

• Sandy : You were in love with Gloria.

  Jonathan : I was starting to be in love with her, then she let me feel her up on the first date. Turned me right off.

  Sandy : You kept going with her, though.

  Jonathan : Well, she let me feel her up.

• Sandy : She was the best-looking girl at the whole mixer. I'll say that for her. Wasn't she?

  Jonathan : Her tits were too small.

  Sandy : Yeah, I was thinking that. The hell with her.

  Jonathan : But her legs were great.

  Sandy : You think so? Standing so close, I really couldn't tell about her legs.

  Jonathan : I wouldn't kick her out of bed.

  Sandy : She's got some funny ideas.

  Jonathan : I wouldn't kick her out of bed.

• Sandy : She kissed me five times.

  Jonathan : Now, that's when you should've put your hand on her tit.

  Sandy : Come on, when this girl's nice enough to kiss me, I should do that to her?

  Jonathan : You act as if she's doing you a favor.

  Sandy : Well, it is sort of a favor, isn't it? I mean, when a girl lets you kiss her and, you know, go on from there. Feel her up and, you know, the rest of it. Go all the way and the rest of it. I mean, isn't it a favor? What's in it for her? I mean, if she's not getting paid or anything.

• Jonathan : What did you say exactly?

  Sandy : I don't remember exactly. That she was the first girl I ever tried to feel up.

  Jonathan : You told her that?

  Sandy : Was it a mistake?

  Jonathan : I wouldn't.

  Sandy : Then she got nicer to me.

  Jonathan : What do you mean nicer?

  Sandy : She put my hand on her breast.

  Jonathan : You mean you put it on; she left it there.

  Sandy : No, she picked it up and put it on.

  Jonathan : She took your hand like this? And put it on like this?

  Sandy : That's right. So, I didn't know what to think.

  Jonathan : You didn't, huh?

  Sandy : For just wanting to be friends, she's suddenly getting pretty aggressive.

  Jonathan : Yeah, then what?

  Sandy : I asked her if she was a virgin.

  Jonathan : You're kidding.

  Sandy : Was that a mistake? Anyhow, she is.

  Jonathan : *She* says. So now you got, what, one hand or two hands on her tits?

  Sandy : By this time, she's put the other hand on the other one.

  Jonathan : She put both hands on? Two hands?

  Sandy : So I said, "What are you gonna do with your hands?"

  Jonathan : You didn't say that.

  Sandy : It just came out.

  Jonathan : Yeah, then what?

  Sandy : Let me see if I got this. She unzipped my fly.

  Jonathan : Bullshit artist! Then what? Then what?

  Sandy : Then she did it!

  Jonathan : Did what? Bullshit artist! She really did that to you?

  Sandy : Yeah.

  Jonathan : She did *that*?

  Sandy : Yeah.

• Sandy : I'm reading "The Fountainhead."

  Jonathan : "The Fountainhead." What's that?

  Sandy : It's her favorite book. You ever hear of "Jean-Christophe"?

  Jonathan : What's that?

  Sandy : It's a classic, you moron. Gonna read it after "The Fountainhead."

  Jonathan : Yeah, you ever read "Guadalcanal Diary" by Richard Tregaskis?

  Sandy : No.

  Jonathan : That was a best seller and I read it. Ever read "Gentleman's Agreement" by Laura Z. Hobson? You ever read "A Bell For Adano" by John Hersey?

  Sandy : I'm gonna read everything from now on.

• Susan : Were you very poor?

  Jonathan : My father couldn't hold on to a job. He kept giving me advice. The more he failed, the more advice I got. He's a Communist, my father.

  Susan : We're Republicans.

• Jonathan : Let me see your hand. Ahh... mmm...

  Bobbie : Well?

  Jonathan : You are built.

  Bobbie : You see that in my hand?

  Jonathan : Even your hand is built.

  Bobbie : I think you're a dirty old man.

  Jonathan : I'm a dirty young man.

• Jonathan : You won't take pity on me?

  Bobbie : Only if you say you're sorry.

  Jonathan : I'm sorry.

  Bobbie : And you'll never do it again.

  Jonathan : I'll never do it again.

  Bobbie : And you'll always be a good boy.

  Jonathan : Yes, Mama.

  Bobbie : You like to be mothered?

  Jonathan : I'd like to be smothered by you.

  Bobbie : What else would you like me to do to you?

• Jonathan : How do you like it?

  Bobbie : How do I like what?

  Jonathan : My, uh, you know.

  Bobbie : What do I know?

  Jonathan : You know everything.

  Bobbie : I know you.

  Jonathan : And I know you.

• Bobbie : Most guys I know are pricks. I don't know anymore what they want.

  Jonathan : I'll be happy to tell you. They want

  [slaps Bobbie's behind] 

  Jonathan : the boodle. But they ain't gonna get the boodle.

  Bobbie : Goddamn right.

  Jonathan : Because this kid here has got the boodle.

  Bobbie : You're pretty sure of yourself, aren't you?

• Jonathan : Our eyes should be open. If we should go into this, we should know exactly what we're getting into.

  Bobbie : It's just a shack-up. I'm not asking for your hand in marriage.

  Jonathan : Well, as long as we both understand that.

  Bobbie : We do.

• Jonathan : Boy, is she competitive.

  Sandy : She is very competitive, but I find that attractive.

  Jonathan : You know her problem? She wants balls.

• Sandy : I wish she were more feminine.

  Jonathan : She is a little masculine.

  Sandy : I just wish she wouldn't always demand her own way.

  Jonathan : She's got a great body on her.

  Sandy : I have to treat her like a child, give her everything she wants.

  Jonathan : I wouldn't mind giving her something.

• Jonathan : [slide show narration]  Mildred, I think, this one's name was. She followed me around at school. The fellas kidded me about her. I warned her if she didn't stop, I'd beat her up. She picked up her skirt, dropped her drawers and shoved her ass at me. So I got my first sight of ass at 12.

• Jonathan : [slide show narration]  Here's Charlotte. Not much on looks, but great tits for 15.

• Jonathan : [slide show narration]  Here's a real cunt. I forget her name. A Nazi. I banged her in Berlin.

• Sandy : What about Gwen?

  Jonathan : Her I could talk to.

  Sandy : I've never been able to talk to any girl.

  Jonathan : I was really getting crazy about her. She's stuck up. Wouldn't let me lay a hand on her. So I went back to Gloria.

• Sandy : You want perfection.

  Jonathan : What do you want, wise guy?

  Sandy : She just has to be nice, that's all.

  Jonathan : You wouldn't want her beautiful?

  Sandy : She doesn't have to be beautiful. I would like her built, though.

• Jonathan : I want mine sexy-looking.

  Sandy : I wouldn't want her to look like a tramp.

  Jonathan : Sexy doesn't mean she has to look like a tramp.

• Jonathan : She should be very understanding. Start the same sentences together.

  Sandy : Yeah, I'd like that.

  Jonathan : *Big* tits.

  Sandy : Yeah, but still a virgin.

  Jonathan : I don't care about that.

  Sandy : Come on.

  Jonathan : I wouldn't mind if she was a little ahead of me, with those big tits, and knew hundreds of different ways.

• Jonathan : There's a way to talk to girls, you know? Tell her a joke.

  Sandy : What joke?

  Jonathan : Tell her about your unhappy childhood.

  Sandy : That's not bad.

  Jonathan : But don't make it like an act.

  Sandy : No.

  Jonathan : Go ahead. Go ahead, schmuck. If you don't, I will.

• Jonathan : Did you feel her up yet?

  Sandy : Come on, I like this girl. I don't want to ruin things.

• Jonathan : Some people you can tell about right away. Most girls I talk to it's like we're spies from foreign countries and we're speaking in code. Everything means something else. Like, I say, "Would you like to take a walk?" And it means something else. And she says, "I can't. I've got a French test tomorrow." And it means something else.

  Susan : And you say, "I'll come over and help you study." And it means something else.

  Jonathan : You're very sharp, I like that.

  Susan : And that means something else.

  Jonathan : You're too sharp.

  Susan : Does that bother you?

  Jonathan : It interests me.

  Susan : Is that more code?

• Sandy : She thinks I'm sensitive.

  Jonathan : Sensitive? Sensitive? Oh, boy! Whoa-ho! What do you talk to her about, flowers?

  Sandy : Books.

  Jonathan : Books? You phony, I read more books than you do.

  Sandy : Yeah, well, I'm gonna start.

• Jonathan : It's as if you're the first guy in history who ever got laid.

  Sandy : I'm the first guy in my history who ever got laid.

  Jonathan : I like it too, but you don't hear me crowing about it. There's such a thing as good taste, you know?

  Sandy : What's the matter with you?

  Jonathan : Jeez!

  Sandy : After you started scoring, what did I get out of you? "We did it standing, sitting, in the car, under the car."

• Jonathan : Boy, you're really something.

  Susan : I don't feel like something. I feel like nothing.

• Jonathan : So?

  Susan : So? Jonathan - I'll always be your friend.

  Jonathan : Jesus, Susan, I hope not.

• Jonathan : You want her?

  Sandy : I wouldn't kick her out of bed.

  Jonathan : Will you look at the pair on her?

  Sandy : Get a look at that schmuck trying to keep up with her.

  Jonathan : They're always with guys like that.

• Jonathan : I'd get married in a minute if I could find the right girl.

  Sandy : Bullshit artist. You and your actress friends.

  Jonathan : Are you kidding, Doctor? You're the one that's got the deal. I mean, what can I say? "Take your clothes off, baby, I wanna check your capital gains."

  Sandy : I just look.

  Jonathan : Sure, you do.

• Jonathan : It's not as easy getting laid as it used to be. I don't think I fuck more than a dozen new girls a year now. Maybe I'm too much of a perfectionist. This last one came so close to being what I wanted. Good pair of tits on her - not a great pair. Almost no ass at all and that bothered me. Sensational legs. I would have settled for the legs, if she had just two more inches here

  [gestures to his chest] 

  Jonathan : and three more here.

  [gestures to his behind] 

• Jonathan : What will you do?

  Bobbie : What would you like me to do?

  Jonathan : What would you like to do?

• Jonathan : This is just between the two of us, but for the last year or so, I've been having - I don't know, a little trouble. I wasn't worried, but still and all a little trouble with - well, myself. You know, getting hard. It took a long time, and you know how girls are today, they judge you. They judge you very quickly. So, uh, I had a real rough time a couple of times. Some very nasty innuendos. And, as I say, I wasn't too worried; but, I won't lie to you, I was a little worried. Then along comes this Bobbie. I get one look at the size of the pair on her and I never had a doubt I'd ever be anything but okay again, and I was. I was.

• Jonathan : A second ago you had me screwing Cindy. Who am I screwing now, Sandy?

  Bobbie : You're going too fast for me.

  Jonathan : I'm going too fast for you? Your little mind operates like an IBM, like a pinball machine. First Cindy. Oh, no, not Cindy? How about Sandy? How about Cindy and Sandy?

• Bobbie : You have such contempt for me.

  Jonathan : Kid, you worked hard for it. It's yours.

  Bobbie : The way you paw me at parties.

  Jonathan : Now affection is contempt. Upside down. Everything upside down.

  Bobbie : Feeling me up in public is not affection.

• Bobbie : I know I sleep all day. I know I'm doing a terrible job, but you're not helping me any.

  Jonathan : And who helps me?

  Bobbie : I help you.

  Jonathan : Your kind of help I can do without.

• Bobbie : Jonathan, do you want it over between us?

  Jonathan : Why does it have to be one way or the other?

  Bobbie : You don't want me to leave?

  Jonathan : I want you right here where you belong!

  Bobbie : And what about you?

  Jonathan : When I'm here, I'm here. When I'm not here, I'm there.

  Bobbie : Where?

  Jonathan : Wherever!

• Sandy : You got Bobbie. I should only have it that good.

  Jonathan : Ohh - Bobbie.

  Sandy : Bobbie, are you kidding? I've never seen a body like that.

  Jonathan : She could do with a little more of what Cindy's got. She's so goddamn passive.

  Sandy : Yeah, I wouldn't mind Cindy just lying still once. She's so busy handing out instructions in bed. It's like close-order drill.

  Jonathan : Yeah? I wouldn't mind a little of that, as long as she doesn't forget who's boss.

• Jonathan : [slide show narration]  That's Bonnie, my first love. She lived upstairs from us. We started exposing ourselves to each other at 10. We got caught on the roof one day by my mother who washed my mouth out with soap. I never got the connection.

• Jonathan : [slide show narration]  Marcia, 13 1/2 or thereabouts, I kissed her one night at a spin-the-bottle party.

• Jonathan : [slide show narration]  This one's Rosalie. Rosalie looked just like Elizabeth Taylor in "National Velvet." I had a crush on Rosalie from 14 to 15 and I never went near her. In those days, we had illusions.

• Jonathan : [slide show narration]  Here's Gloria, the best-built girl at Evander Childs. I took her to the Bronx Zoo once and on the bus, copped a cheap feel.

• Jonathan : [slide show narration]  Here's Gwen. I went with her for a year trying to get her to put out, but she thought I was too nice and was saving me for marriage. Every guy at Evander must have gotten into her pants except me.

• Jonathan : [slide show narration]  Here's my first - no, that one was a mistake. Here's Eileen, my very first fuck. She was a modern dancer at Swarthmore. Great body on her. What a waste - frigid.

• Jonathan : [slide show narration]  Here's Bobbie! My wife. The fastest tits in the West and king of the ball-busters. She conned me into marrying her and now she's killing me with alimony.

• Jonathan : [slide show narration]  This slob I went with for a year until I got so sick of her ball-busting, I couldn't get it up anymore. I can't remember her name.

• Jonathan : [slide narration]  This was my Jap in the sack. I heard that Oriental girls were different. Not in America, they're not.

• Jonathan : I thought she was your daughter when you first came in.

  Sandy : In a lot of ways, she's older than I am.

  Jonathan : Yeah.

  Sandy : She knows worlds I can't even begin to touch yet.

  Jonathan : Sandy, please.

  Sandy : I found out who I am.

  Jonathan : You're in big trouble.

  Sandy : Same old Jonathan.

  Jonathan : Indubitably.

• Jonathan : Sandy, you found a good piece of ass. God bless you. You're my friend, I'm happy for you. As long as it lasts, I'm happy for you. You deserve to be happy. I mean it.

• Sandy : You don't need those games, Jonathan. I know. I've played more games than anyone. The obedient son game. The bright student game. The cocksman's game.

  Jonathan : Some cocksman.

  Sandy : The respectable husband game. The good father game.

  Jonathan : Good father?

  Sandy : The specialist game. Games don't impress Jennifer. Just life, just love.

• Sandy : Jennifer knows more at 18 than Susan knows to this day.

  Jonathan : You found yourself a real jewel, okay?

  Sandy : She's my love teacher.

  Jonathan : Finally got it up, huh?

• Sandy : You give off such bad vibrations.

  Jonathan : Bad vibrations? Sandy, I love you, but you're a schmuck. You were always young, Sandy, open. You were schmucky a lot of the time, but maybe schmuckiness is what you need to stay young and open.

• Jonathan : Women...

  Louise : All ball-busters, right?

  Jonathan : You know it. When you think of some of the things he has to dip into, any guy with a conscience has a right to turn soft. Am I right, Louise?

  Louise : You're always right, lover.

• [repeated line] 

  Jonathan : Bullshit artist!

• Jonathan : [looking at a bill]  You and Lord & Taylor's are gonna have to work out a trial separation.

  Bobbie : I had the water running. What did you say?

  Jonathan : You and Lord & Taylor's are going to have to work out a trial separation.

• Jonathan : Hey, you wouldn't want to swap sometime, would you?

  Sandy : Are you serious?

  Jonathan : What do you say? Might liven things up a bit. She can miss one party. Leave her to me.

  Sandy : What about Bobbie?

  Jonathan : She's so mad at me, she'll jump all over you just for revenge. Hey, you like that, huh?

  Sandy : Seriously?

  Jonathan : She's in the bedroom. If you're quiet, you can do it and she won't even know.