Pierrot the Fool (1965)

Jean-Paul Belmondo: Ferdinand Griffon dit Pierrot

Photos 

25 more photos

Quotes 

• Ferdinard , Marianne : Why do you look so sad? Because you speak to me in words and I look at you with feelings.

• Ferdinard , Marianne : I can never have a real conversation with you. You never have ideas, only feelings. That's not true. There are ideas in feelings.

• Marianne : What are you doing?

  Ferdinard : [looking at the mirror]  Looking at myself.

  Marianne : And what do you see?

  Ferdinard : The face of a man who's driving towards a cliff at 100 km/h.

  Marianne : [turns the mirror towards herself]  I see a woman who is in love with the man who's driving towards a cliff at 100 km/h.

  Ferdinard : So let's kiss.

• Ferdinard : We'll just stop anywhere.

  Marianne : And do what all day? No, let's find my brother. He'll give us tons of dough. Then we'll find ourselves a high-class hotel and have some fun!

  Ferdinard : [breaking the fourth wall]  All she thinks about is fun.

  Marianne : Who are you talking to?

  Ferdinard : The audience.

  Marianne : Ah.

• Ferdinard : I think your legs and breasts are very moving.

• [repeated line] 

  Ferdinard : My name's Ferdinand.

• Ferdinard : [quoting what he has written]  "That is the basic problem... you're waiting for me... I'm not there... I arrive... I enter the room... that's when I really start to exist for you... But I existed before that... I had thoughts... I may have been suffering... So the problem is to show you alive, thinking of me,and at the same time, to see me alive by virtue of that very fact." Underlined.

• Ferdinard : I wonder what's keeping the cops. We should be in jail by now.

  Marianne : They're smart... They let people destroy themselves.

• Ferdinard : Ten minutes ago, I saw death everywhere. Now it's just the opposite, look at the sea, the waves, the sky. Life may be sad, but it's always beautiful!

• Ferdinard : It's a good thing I don't like spinach, because if I did, I'd eat it, and I can't stand the stuff. It's the same with you, only the other way around. There is a film like that with Michel Simon. He got taken by this girl.

• Marianne : [repeated exchange]  ... Pierrot.

  Ferdinard : My name's Ferdinand.

• Ferdinard : Poetry is a game of loser-take-all.

• Marianne : Look at the last page, there's a little poem about you. It's by me.

  Ferdinard : Tender... and cruel... real... and surreal... terrifying... and funny nocturnal... and diurnal usual... and unusual handsome as anyone

  Marianne : Pierrot le Fou !

  Ferdinard : My name is Ferdinand. I have told you often enough. Christ almighty ! You bore me to death !

• [repeated line] 

  Ferdinard : Allons-y, Alonzo!

• Ferdinard : A little harbor, as in Conrad.

  Marianne : A sailboat, as in Robert Louis Stevenson.

  Ferdinard : An old brothel, as in Faulkner.

  Marianne : A steward-turned-millionaire, as in Jack London.

  Ferdinard : With you, its always mixed up.

  Marianne : Everything's simple.

  Ferdinard : Too much at once.

  Marianne : No.

  Ferdinard : Two men who beat me up, as in Raymond Chandler.

  Marianne : And you and me and him, see how simple it is?

  Ferdinard : I don't see at all.

• Marianne : Give me the rifle.

  Ferdinard : The same make that killed Kennedy!

  Marianne : Sure, didn't you know it was me?

• Ferdinard : Leave a woman and she'll claim you're off your nut.

  Marianne : Oh, men are the same way.

  Ferdinard : That's true.

• Ferdinard : Off to bed, sleepyheads! Why are they still up?

  La femme de Ferdinand : Because you sent the maid to the movies for the third time this week.

  Ferdinard : Sure, I did. They're showing "Johnny Guitar", good for her education. We see too many squares.

• Ferdinard : You see? I was right

  Marianne : What about?

  Ferdinard : You didn't believe we'd always be in love.

  Marianne : No. I didn't...

  [singing] 

  Marianne : I never told you I'd love you all my life. Oh my love, you never swore to adore me all your life. We never made promises like that, knowing me knowing you. We never thought we ever would be caught by love fickle as we were. And yet, and yet, step by step, without a word between us, bit by bit, feelings slipped between our merry mingle bodies and words of love rose to our naked lips. Bit by bit lots of words of love began to mingle gently with our kisses. How many words of love? I never would have thought I'd always want you. Oh my love, we never would have thought we two could live together and not get bored. Wake up every morning and be just as surprised to be just as happy in the same bed, desire nothing more than that oh so banal pleasure of feeling so good to be together. And yet, and yet, step by step without a word between us, bit by bit our feelings bound us tight in spite of ourselves, bound us tight forever Feelings stronger than any words of love known or unknown. Feelings so wild and so strong. Feelings we never thought were possible before. Don't ever promise to adore me all your life. Let's not make promises like that knowing me knowing you. Let's keep the feeling that this love of ours, this love of ours, will be short and sweet.

  [stops singing] 

  Ferdinard : Anyway, we'll know when we're dead... in 60 years... we'll know if we were always in love.

  Marianne : That's not true, I know I love you, but I'm not sure about you.

  Ferdinard : I do, Marianne, I do.

  Marianne : Well, I'll know soon enough.

• Ferdinard : Aren't you wearing a slip?

  La femme de Ferdinand : No. I'm wearing my new Maidenform girdle, it's invisible.

  Ferdinard : [Reading an advertisement]  "In my new trousers I've got that young look with Maidenform!"

  [Talking to himself] 

  Ferdinard : After Athens, after the Renaissance, we are now entering the civilization of the rump.

• Ferdinard : I'm a huge question mark dangling over the Mediterranean horizon.

• Marianne : What about you? Do you know what you are?

  Ferdinard : I am a sexual being.

• Ferdinard : What I wanted to say... Why? This is silly.