Vicky Cristina Barcelona

Juan Antonio:
Maria Elena used to say that only unfulfilled love can be romantic.

Juan Antonio:
We are meant for each other and not meant for each other. It's a contradiction.

Cristina:
I'll go to your room, but you'll have to seduce me.

Cristina:
If you don't start undressing me soon this is going to turn into a panel discussion.

Narrator:
Vicky and Cristina decided to spend the summer in Barcelona. Vicky was completing her master's in Catalan Identity, which she had become interested in through her great affection for the architecture of Gaudí. Cristina, who spent the last six months writing, directing, and acting in a 12-minute film which she then hated, had just broken up with yet another boyfriend and longed for a change of scenery. Everything fell into place when a distant relative of Vicky's family who lived in Barcelona offered to put both girls up for July and August. The two best friends had been close since college and shared the same tastes and opinions on most matters, yet when it came to the subject of love, it would be hard to find two more dissimilar viewpoints. Vicky had no tolerance for pain and no lust for combat. She was grounded and realistic. Her requirements in a man were seriousness and stability. She had become engaged to Doug because he was decent and successful and understood the beauty of commitment...Cristina, on the other hand, expected something very different out of love. She had reluctantly accepted suffering as an inevitable component of deep passion, and was resigned to putting her feelings at risk. If you asked her what it was she was gambling her emotions on to win, she would not have been able to say. She knew what she didn't want, however, and that was exactly what Vicky valued above all else.

Narrator:
Vicky returned home to have her grand wedding to Doug. To the house they finally planned to settle in. And to lead the life she envisioned for herself, before that summer in Barcelona. Cristina continued searching... certain only, of what she didn't want.

Juan Antonio:
American?

Cristina:
I'm Cristina, and this is my friend Vicky.

Juan Antonio:
What color are your eyes?

Cristina:
Uh, they're blue.

Juan Antonio:
Well, I'd like to invite you both to come with me to Oviedo.

Vicky:
To come where?

Juan Antonio:
To Oviedo. For the weekend. We leave in one hour.

Cristina:
What- Where is Oviedo?

Juan Antonio:
A very short flight.

Vicky:
By plane?

Juan Antonio:
Mmm-hmm.

Cristina:
What's in Oviedo?

Juan Antonio:
I go to see a sculpture, that is very inspiring to me. A very beautiful sculpture. You will love it.

Vicky:
Oh, right. you're asking us to fly to Oviedo and back.

Juan Antonio:
Mmmm. No, we'll spend the weekend. I mean, I'll show you around the city, and we'll eat well. We'll drink good wine. We'll make love.

Vicky:
Yeah, who exactly is going to make love?

Juan Antonio:
Hopefully, the three of us.

Cristina:
[Looking at a sculpture of Jesus] Are you very religious?

Juan Antonio:
No, no, no, no, I'm not. The trick is to enjoy life, accepting it has no meaning whatsoever.

Cristina:
No meaning? You don't think that authentic love gives life meaning?

Juan Antonio:
Yes, but love is so transient. Isn't it? I was in love with a most incredible woman... and then in the end...

Vicky:
Yes?

Juan Antonio:
She put a knife into me.

Cristina:
My God, that's terrible!

Vicky:
Well, maybe you did something to deserve it.

Juan Antonio:
Well, now that the day's almost over, is it reasonable of me to ask you if you'll both join me in my room?

Vicky:
Oh, come on, I thought we'd settled that.

Cristina:
Vicky's just trying to say that she's engaged to be married, that's all.

Juan Antonio:
Great. Then these are her last days of freedom.

Vicky:
No. Look, I'm not free. I'm committed. You know what my theory is? And when I drink, I get brutally frank. I think that you're still hurting from the failure of your marriage to Maria Elena, and you're trying to lose yourself in empty sex.

Juan Antonio:
Empty sex? Do you have such a low opinion of yourself?

Maria Elena:
You're still searching for me in every woman.

Juan Antonio:
That is not true, Maria Elena. I was in Oviedo some weeks ago with a woman who was the antithesis of you. An American, and something beautiful happened with her. So you're mistaken.

Maria Elena:
You'll always seek to duplicate what we had. You know it.

Vicky:
So, uh, tell me why, why won't your father publish his poems?

Juan Antonio:
Well, because, ungh, he hates the world and that's his way of getting back at them, to create beautiful works and then to deny them to the public, which I think it's...

Vicky:
My god.

Juan Antonio:
Hmmm.

Vicky:
Oh, what makes him so angry toward the human race?

Juan Antonio:
Because after thousands of years of civilization they still haven't learned to love.

Cristina:
How long is she going to stay here?

Juan Antonio:
Christina, I know - this is not what you had in mind.

Cristina:
No.

Juan Antonio:
But, she has to stay with us.

Cristina:
I understand. I understand.

Juan Antonio:
She has no one else.

Cristina:
I understand. It's only for a short time.

Juan Antonio:
Yes, a few months, at most.

Cristina:
She's staying for a few months?

Maria Elena:
You speak no Spanish?

Cristina:
No, I uh-uh studied Chinese.

Maria Elena:
Chinese? Why?

Cristina:
I thought it sounded pretty.

Maria Elena:
Say something in Chinese.

Cristina:
Me?

Maria Elena:
Mm-hm.

Cristina:
Um... ni hao ma?

Maria Elena:
You think that sounds pretty?

Juan Antonio:
Life is short. Life is dull. Life is full of pain. And this is a chance for something special.

Cristina:
I just have to come face to face with the fact that I’m not gifted. I can appreciate art and I like music, but it’s sad, really because I feel like I have a lot to express, and I’m not gifted.