Dogville

"This year I didn't bring any notes with me. Because I'm not gonna pretend, I can read them. Which brings me to a point. A point I wanna make. And that point is you Grace. Yes. You have made Dogville a wonderful place to live in. As a matter of fact, somebody tells me they ran into grumpy old Chuck down the street and he was actually smiling. Well, I've never seen your smile, Grace, but I will bet you I could describe it. Because it obviously has every color that's refracted from the shiniest prism in the world. You probably have a face to match that. Does she have a face to match that, Tom?"

"We are proud to have you among us. And we thank you for showing us who you are. Here's to you, Grace. Stay with us as long as you damn please."

"Grace was the same and so was the town. That the gangsters had fixed to have charges made against Grace in their efforts to neutralize her came as no surprise. But everything had changed a little yet again."

"Well, they couldn't really argue that anything had changed. But by not telling the police they felt they were committing a crime themselves."

"I think I should leave."

"Tom: From a business perspective, from a business perspective, your presence in Dogville has become more costly. Because it's more dangerous for them to have you here — not that they don't want you — since they feel there should be some counterbalance, some quid pro quo. Grace: That sounds like words that the gangsters would use... Tom: There is also more of an incentive if you don't wanna stay. See, with all those wanted posters hanging around the place, I can hardly think of anywhere else you could hide."

"I'm willing to do whatever it takes. If I have to work harder, longer hours for less pay. Then I'm willing to do that, of course I am. I just wanna be sure that they wouldn't prefer that I left town."

"I have to get some sleep. My days are gonna be much busier now."

"I hate it for you to see me like this. I can't bear that I'm doubting you. I'm sorry. Goodnight."

"Everybody was really against any changes to Grace's working conditions at all when the subject occasionally came up in conversation. Oh, Ben had declared in sympathy that he wouldn't accept any more work than before, and Grace was grateful for that, even if he was a bit drunk when he said so. Busy minutes became busy hours and busy hours became busy days, and irrespective of whether they thought the idea of increasing Grace's services had any fairness and justification to it or not, it didn't seem to make anyone any happier. More to the contrary."

"Vera wants me to picking apples from trees that are barely in the ground. Things take time. That's love, seeing what they need and respecting those needs. If anyone understands that, it's you. At least I thought so."

"Grace: Don't be upset. I'm sorry if I doubted you. It won't happen again. I promise you. Chuck: I wouldn't make that promise if I was you. When you fended me off, a thought came into my mind that made me ashamed. A thought that you would hate me for."

"You've really been alone up here, haven't you? You haven't had anyone to comfort you and I should ask you for forgiveness... Still friends?"

"I was just resting. Awful lot to do here in Dogville, considering nobody needs anything done. Jason wants to sit on my lap all the time."

"Grace: You can see through it all, can't you. I'll tell you, I'm gonna be asleep in two minutes. Tom: What if I don't want you to go to sleep? Grace: I don't think you have a choice tonight."

"Tom: I do love you, Grace. Grace: I'm glad you love me. I love you, too. I really do."

"We have our whole lives ahead of us. The thing that I love about you is that you don't demand anything of me. That we can just be together."

"I have been mean to the others too, even baby Achilles. And he's so tiny he can't put up a fight. It's not right... I got it coming to me, I know. I deserve a spanking."

"I don't care how much fun you think it would be. I'm not gonna spank you, Jason."

"Maybe I should go stand in the corner and be ashamed?"

"Just as Dogville had done from its open, frail shelf on the mountainside, quite unprotected from any capricious storms, Grace, too, had laid herself open. And there she dangled from her frail stalk like the apple in the Garden of Eden. An apple so swollen that the juices almost ran. And once again the police had come to Dogville."

"God only knows what that woman’s capable of."

"It wasn't me who wanted you here. You were far to beautiful and frail for this place. You tricked me into feeling that I meant something to you. It's your own damn fault I need your respect, Grace."

"Please. Stop it. Please. Please don't. Please look at me. Look at me, talk to me. We're friends. You are my family, stop it."

"That evening Tom had sensed at once that something had taken place, but had to plead with Grace for ages before she finally broke down and unburdened herself."

"I came here with all these ideas and these stupid prejudices. He is not strong, Tom. He looks strong, but he's not."

"Next day the weather changed. The fog came rolling down from the mountains. And although there were no sunsets to be seen, McKay thought it best that she sat by him anyway. She had sat by Jack McKay so many times now, but Jack had not got better at judging the distance between them. On the contrary, where fingers alone had previously brushed her young flesh, now it was a hand that remained in place throughout the allotted span."

"The hours in the orchard were long now, for the harvest was underway. And Grace had long since given up arguing with Chuck's perception that respect for cultivation, harvest, and fruit could be directly measured in provision of carnality."

"Though reluctant to leave Grace alone Tom wandered around quite often now, lost in thought as he tried to crack the problem of possible escape. And as Grace's wages no longer found their way to her purse he had stepped in, and together they had triumphantly picked up the last of the seven figurines from Ma Ginger's window."

"She saw you, Grace. She saw you. Behind this pile of broken limbs... with Chuck... He said it wasn't the first time you'd made advances towards him. He never told me before because he wanted to spare my feelings. He's a withdrawn and primitive man, but at heart he's loyal and he is good. What do you want with my husband?"

"I believe smashing them is less a crime than making them."

"Vera, remember how I taught your children... Remember how happy you were, when I... When I taught your children about the doctrine of stoicism and they finally understood it."

"All right, for that, I'm gonna be lenient. I'm going to break two of your figurines first, and if you can demonstrate your knowledge of the doctrine of stoicism by holding back your tears, I'll stop. Have you got that."

"In her lifetime Grace had had considerable practice at constraining her emotions, and would never have believed it would be hard to control them now. But as the porcelain pulverized on the floor it was as if it were human tissue disintegrating. The figurines were the offspring of the meeting between the township and her. They were the proof that in spite of everything, her suffering had created something of value. Grace could no longer cope. For the first time since her childhood, she wept. ."

"Knowing the exact time to harvest is the greatest art of all, Chuck had said, and the time had come. For the apples and for Grace."

"June is near to bursting. She can't use the pot on her own, as you well know. It ain't fitting' to toy with her just 'cause she's crippled and can't help herself."

"The evening before the escape Tom tactically thought it best not to press his desires of the flesh too hard upon Grace, and instead he adopted a more sensitive approach."

"There is a right and a wrong time to plant seeds and you can't plant seeds in the winter."

"You love me and we will meet again in love and in freedom."

"I shouldn't be ashamed wanting you, should I? It's nothing to be ashamed of."

"Its lovely. It's lovely that we want each other. But not this way."

"As Grace hastened to the garage, she grew more and more pleased with the decision to keep her departure under wraps. There was actually quite a bit of work Dogville didn't need doing that its residents would have to carry out for themselves in future."

"You said once, you said once, that there aren't many pleasures in my life. And you know... I go to Miss Laura once a week. And you got me to see that it weren't nothing to be ashamed of. I was gonna go there tonight and of course it costs me. I mean, not as much... not as much as a surcharge for dangerous goods, but still... it does cost me, you know."

"It's not personal, Grace. It's not personal. I just... I have to take due payment, that's all. I don't... I don't have a choice."

"Grace fell asleep on the long highway, thanks to her healthy ability to push any unpleasantness around her far away. A generous God had blessed her with the rare talent of being able to look ahead, and only ahead. And later when the truck slowed down about to reach its destination and she slowly returned to consciousness, she had no way of knowing how long she had slept. All she knew was that she would be happy to see the light of day again. And then she heard the dog."

"It didn't help Grace that the first theft ever registered in Dogville had taken place the previous evening, when most people were assembled for the town meeting. Old Tom Edison Senior had had a considerable sum of money stolen from his medicine closet and suspicion soon fell on Grace, who had apparently been planning an escape that would surely require funding. Grace chose to remain silent in the face of these new charges."

"Grace, we don't like having to do this. We don't have much of a choice if we are to protect our community."

"I'm here to do the thinking for you. If we are to have the slightest chance of getting you out of here, they can never know how close we really are. They can't know I'm trying to help you. If they knew it was me that took the money, I wouldn't be here talking to you now."

"Please don't disappear, Tom. I need you."

"Grace opened her eyes after an almost unconscious sleep, and was confused... Judging by the light coming through the cracks in the walls, it had to be nearly midday... "The grey hour" as Jack McKay for some reason called noon in Dogville, being a man of many ideas and proclivities, quite a few of which Grace would prefer to remain ignorant of! But why had nobody roused her? Nobody had hammered furiously at her door. Not a child had thrown mud into her bed or broken her remaining windowpanes. Now she remembered. She recalled the meeting the previous day, and puzzled still more. Why had she not been confronted with the outcome of that meeting? Or even killed? It was quite unlike Dogville to restrain its indignation at any point. Perhaps things had turned out well after all?"