Spartacus (1960)
Charles Laughton: Gracchus
Photos
Quotes
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Gracchus : You and I have a tendency towards corpulence. Corpulence makes a man reasonable, pleasant and phlegmatic. Have you noticed the nastiest of tyrants are invariably thin?
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Julius Caesar : I thought you had reservations about the gods.
Gracchus : Privately I believe in none of them - neither do you. Publicly, I believe in them all.
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Gracchus : This Republic of ours is something like a rich widow. Most Romans love her as their mother, but Crassus dreams of marrying the old girl, to put it politely.
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[deleted scene]
[last words]
Gracchus : [to his maid Julia] The new master of Rome will be calling on me tomorrow, he wants me to make a speech. Take him to wherever I am and show me to him. And Julia, when I meet you in paradise, describe to me the expression on his face when he saw me dead. Now go away. Go away!
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Batiatus : There I was, better than a millionaire in the morning and a penniless refugee by nightfall with nothing but these rags and my poor flesh to call of my own. All because Crassus decides to break his journey at Capua with a couple of capricious, over-painted nymphs! These two daughters of Venus had to taunt the gladiators, force them to fight to the death and before I knew what had happened, revolution on my hands!
Gracchus : What revenge have you in mind?
Batiatus : I sold Crassus this woman, Varinia. May the gods give her wings. There was no contract, but she was clearly his slave as soon as the deal was made. Now she's off with Spartacus killing people in their beds. And Crassus, no mention of money, no!
Gracchus : You never offered me this woman. Why not?
Batiatus : Well, she's not remotely your type, Gracchus. She is very thin and...
Gracchus : Look around you. You'll see women of all sizes. 500 sesterces deposit on Varinia. Since he hasn't paid for her, this gives me first call over Crassus when she's caught and auctioned..
Batiatus : May the Gods adore you! Why would you buy a woman that you have never even seen?
Gracchus : To annoy Crassus, of course, and to help you.
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Crassus : Did you truly believe 500 years of Rome could so easily be delivered to the clutches of a mob? Already the bodies of 6000 crucified slaves line along the Appian Way. Tomorrow the last of their companions will fight to their death in the temple of my fathers as a sacrifice to them. As those slaves have died, so will your rabble... if they falter one instant in loyalty to the new order of affairs. Arrests are in progress. The prisons began to fill. In every city and province, lists of the disloyal have been compiled. Tomorrow, they will learn the cost of their terrible folly... their treason.
Gracchus : Where does my name appear on the list of the disloyal enemies of the state?
Crassus : First. Yet, I have no desire of vengeance upon you. Your property shall not be touched. You will retain the rank and title of a Roman Senator. A house... a farmhouse in Picenum has been provided for your exile. You may take your women with you.
Gracchus : Why am I to be left so conspicuously alive?
Crassus : Your followers are deluded enough to trust you. I intend that you shall speak to them tomorrow for their own good, their peaceful and profitable future. From time to time thereafter, I may find it useful to bring you back to Rome to continue your duty to her, to calm the envious spirit and the troubled mind. You will persuade them to accept destiny and order and trust the gods!
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Gracchus : Let's add courage to your new found virtues. Would half a million sesterces make you brave?
Batiatus : Half a million? Mmm-hmm, well, Crassus does seem to dwindle in the mind, but...
Gracchus : Let's reduce him further. A round million!
Batiatus : A million. For such a sum I could bribe Jupiter himself!
Gracchus : With a lesser sum I have.
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Julius Caesar : So now we deal with pirates. We bargain with criminals.
Gracchus : Now, don't be so stiff-necked about it! Politics is a *practical* profession. If a criminal has what you want, you do business with him.
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Gracchus : Julia, I don't like the sound of weeping. This is a happy house, please stop.
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Crassus : Have you thought how costly my services might be?
Gracchus : We buy everything else these days. No reason why we shouldn't be charged for patriotism. What's your fee?
Crassus : My election as First Consul, command of all the legions of Italy, and the abolition of senatorial authority over the courts.
Gracchus : Dictatorship.
Crassus : Order.
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Gracchus : Dignity and honesty in one afternoon. I hardly recognize you.
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Gracchus : Don't make a fool of yourself. Why call back the legions when the garrison of Rome has nothing to do but to defend us from sausage makers?
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Gracchus : You and I have a tendency towards corpulence. Corpulence makes a man reasonable, pleasant, and phlegmatic. Have you noticed the nastiest of tyrants are invariably thin?
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Batiatus : In spite of your vices, you are the most generous Roman of our time.
Gracchus : Vices?
Batiatus : Ladies.
Gracchus : Ladies? Since when are they a vice?
Batiatus : Perhaps I used the wrong word. An eccentricity, a foible. I hope I pronounced that word. It's well-known that even your groom and butler are women.
Gracchus : I'm the most virtuous man in Rome. I keep these women out of my respect for Roman morality. That morality which has made Rome strong enough to steal two-thirds of the world from its rightful owners, founded on the sanctity of Roman marriage and Roman family. I happen to like women. I have a promiscuous nature and unlike these aristocrats, I will not take a marriage vow which my nature will prevent me from keeping it..
Batiatus : You have too great a respect for the purity of womankind.
Gracchus : Exactly.
Batiatus : It must be tantalizing to be surrounded by so much purity.
Gracchus : [chuckles] It is.
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Gracchus : Crassus is the only man in Rome who hasn't yielded to republican corruption and never will! I'll take a little republican corruption along with a little republican freedom but I won't take the dictatorship of Crassus and no freedom at all!
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Batiatus : I've more stripes on my back than a zebra. Every time I touch my wounds, they sing like larks. But in spite of that, I think I've found something that I never had before, with all my wealth.
Gracchus : What is that?
Batiatus : Don't laugh at me, but I believe it to be dignity.
Gracchus : In Rome, dignity shortens life even more surely than disease. The gods must be saving you for some great enterprise.
Batiatus : You think so? Anyone who believes I'll turn informer for nothing is a fool. I bore the whip without complaint.
Gracchus : Yes, indeed. That sounds like a *bad* attack of dignity.
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Julius Caesar : What I do, I do not for myself; but, for Rome.
Gracchus : Rome? Poor, helpless Rome.
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Gracchus : It would take a great woman to make Crassus fall out of love with himself.
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Gracchus : Julia, I don't like the sound of weeping. This is a happy house. Please stop it.
