Sherman's March (1985)

Charleen Swansea: Self

Quotes 

• [Ross and Charleen walk through overgrown ruins] 

  Ross McElwee : The place is like a tomb.

  Charleen : No, it's not. It's like pubic hair. Part, part the bushes. Go into the place. Go with it, Ross. It's not like a tomb. That's the trouble with you. You don't know the difference between sex and death.

  Ross McElwee : Sex and death?

  Charleen : Sex and death! This is life! This is, man, you can't even tell it when it sits on your face, you can't tell which it is.

• [commenting on graffiti] 

  Charleen : This is the way women - want to hear men talk to them. Now, see, Becky knows how to talk. "I love you and I can't help it and I don't care who knows it." What is she saying? "I give you my life and heart." This is the way I want you to talk to Dee Dee. This is what... This is the language women can understand. That's what they believe. They experience it in their own lives.

  Ross McElwee : Well, not all women, I mean...

  Charleen : Well, the only women I know believe that. That's the only way I can... could... understand you...

  Ross McElwee : But, I felt that way about a couple of people. It doesn't solve everything. That's the point. It doesn't guarantee...

  Charleen : You never solve everything, Ross. You never solve everything. The only thing you've got is a chance for a few passionate hits. You see how foolish it all is. You see what the army comes to. The bunkers, the island, the burned-out house. Hell, it's all a tragedy. It's just a matter of how you get through it. And the most interesting way to get through it is to say, "I can't help it. I'm full of passion and I'm gonna die this moment." It's the only way to pretend you're alive. It's the only way to - not be alone and depressed. You've got to kid yourself and you've got to kid her and then you'll both believe it.

• [Complaining about Ross filming] 

  Charleen : Could you turn it off? This is important. This is not art, this is life!

• Charleen : The only way to get you coupled and for it to be a permanent thing, is to find you a woman who thinks that you're god. It's gonna take a very special kind of woman to think that you're a god, too.

• Charleen : I am bored with your singleness! It is a bore for you to get to be middle aged and be lonely. It is! It's very boring for you to be lonely.

  Ross McElwee : Well, I've made attempts, though...

  Charleen : Well, see now, that's the other thing that's boring: failure. It is time to get on it. You have been insufficient in this quest; so, I have to take over. I have to! Because, otherwise, I'm going to be so bored with your loveliness, that I'm gonna have to dump you myself. I mean, we're just gonna have to, we've got to get on it. Really, now. You're too old to be one, alone and two failing in your attempts to couple. So, I'm coupling ya.

• Charleen : Forget the fucking film and listen to Dee Dee. This is your wife! This is your betrothed!

  Ross McElwee : Play the tape.

• Charleen : [Listening to a tape of Dee Dee singing]  That's really what I always wanted to do. I would rather - if you did that you wouldn't need to eat, you wouldn't need sex, you wouldn't need anything. If you had a mouth like Dee Dee Geraty.

• Charleen : I'm trying to remember what you said that irked me so because it is so absolutely, totally the wrong thing to say to a woman.

• Charleen : What she wants to hear, what all women want to hear, what children want to hear, is - you've got to be more passionate, Ross. If you had said, to Dee Dee, "Please, postpone your vacation. The only thing that matters to me is seeing you and being with you. Postpone your vaca-"

  Ross McElwee : I'd never met her!

  Charleen : I don't care, Ross! I'm telling you! You're not as interesting because you're so self effacing and polite. Now, its alright to have lovely manners. You must have them. Dee Dee wants you to have them. I want you to have them. But, I'm also telling you that that doesn't mean that you can't be passionate. Passion is the only thing. The important thing. You must say, "You're the only woman I've ever seen. I would die for you. I live for you. I breathe for you. Please! For god's sake, take your vacation and be with me because this is the most important point in my life!" You've got to learn to talk like that! You've got to learn to feel like that!

  Ross McElwee : I don't...

  Charleen : How can you be a film maker if you never have any passion?

  Ross McElwee : I have plenty of passion. I don't even know her. I don't know anything about her.

  Charleen : This doesn't matter! It doesn't matter that you don't know her. What matters is the quality of your passion. So what that you don't know her! That's not relevant!

• Ross McElwee : Can we walk through here?

  Charleen : Yes, we can walk through here.

  Ross McElwee : Where does it come out?

  Charleen : We don't know where it comes out! We just passionately gonna walk through here. We don't care where it comes out!

• Ross McElwee : Charleen, you know, General Sherman was here though. This is were he stayed for four years.

  Charleen : What? He stayed at Moultrie?

  Ross McElwee : Yeah.

  Charleen : He didn't stay in this fort?

  Ross McElwee : Yes, he did.

  Charleen : Sherman did?

  Ross McElwee : Yeah, from 1842 to 1846.

  Charleen : Well, now I know we ought to get out of here. Come on!

  Ross McElwee : No. He liked it here a lot. He liked the South. He had friends in Charleston. And he was a painter. He painted portraits of his friends in Charleston.

  Charleen : He painted portraits?

  Ross McElwee : Yeah. And he did still life watercolors of the landscape. He really did like the South. That's why I'm so fascinated by him, you know.

  Charleen : Well, Ross, it's certainly, I don't think you'll find many people who live down here who agree with you that he liked the South. I mean, he did a whole lot of things. I mean, I mean the late great unpleasantness was really a great unpleasantness. He destroyed everything!

• Charleen : Ross, do you want - do you like her? Mother'll try to buy her for ya.

• Charleen : Ross, you blew it with Dee Dee. But, while you were gone to Atlanta, I found a girl who's better than Dee Dee. I found a wonderful girl for you. She looks like - the angel on the top of the Christmas tree. She's absolutely perfectly beautiful. She's not a Mormon. In fact, she sleeps around! I can't wait for you to meet this girl. She's gorgeous. She's darling.