The Magnificent Ambersons (1942)

Tim Holt: George Minafer

Photos 

11 more photos

Quotes 

• Maj. Amberson : So your devilish machines are going to ruin all your old friend, eh Gene? Do you really think they're going to change the face of the land?

  Eugene : They're already doing it major and it can't be stopped. Automobiles...

  [cut off by George] 

  George : Automobiles are a useless nuisance.

  Maj. Amberson : What did you say George?

  George : I said automobiles are a useless nuisance. Never amount to anything but a nuisance and they had no business to be invented.

  Jack : Of course you forget that Mr. Morgan makes them, also did his share in inventing them. If you weren't so thoughtless, he might think you were rather offensive.

  Eugene : I'm not sure George is wrong about automobiles. With all their speed forward they may be a step backward in civilization. May be that they won't add to the beauty of the world or the life of the men's souls, I'm not sure. But automobiles have come and almost all outwards things will be different because of what they bring. They're going to alter war and they're going to alter peace. And I think men's minds are going to be changed in subtle ways because of automobiles. And it may be that George is right. May be that in ten to twenty years from now that if we can see the inward change in men by that time, I shouldn't be able to defend the gasoline engine but agree with George - that automobiles had no business to be invented.

• Lucy : What are you studying at school?

  George : College.

  Lucy : College.

  George : Oh, lots of useless guff.

  Lucy : Why don't you study some useful guff?

  George : What do you mean, useful?

  Lucy : Something you'd use later in your business or profession.

  George : I don't intend to go into any business or profession.

  Lucy : No?

  George : No.

  Lucy : Why not?

  George : Well, just look at them. That's a fine career for a man, isn't it? Lawyers, bankers, politicians. What do they ever get out of life, I'd like to know. What do they know about real things? What do they ever get?

  Lucy : What do you want to be?

  George : [fatuously]  A yachtsman!

  [Lucy reacts with astonishment] 

• George : I said, automobiles are a useless nuisance. Never amount to anything but a nuisance. They had no business to be invented.

• George : How'd all these ducks get to know you so quick?

  Lucy : Oh, I've been here a week.

  George : Seems to me you've been pretty busy.

• George : Anybody that really is anybody ought to be able to do about as they like in their own town, I should think.

• George : [disparagingly]  Horseless carriages. Auto-mobiles. People aren't going to spend their lives lying on their backs on the road letting grease drip in their face. No, I think you're father better forget about 'em.

  Lucy : Papa will be so grateful if he could get your advice.

  George : I don't know that I've done anything to be insulted for.

  Lucy : You know, I don't mind you being such a lofty person, at all. I think its ever so interesting. But, Papa's a great man.

• Lucy : Who's that?

  George : Oh, I didn't catch his name when my mother presented him to me. You mean the queer looking duck?

  Lucy : The who?

  George : The queer looking duck.

• George : How is that for a bit of freshness?

  Lucy : What was?

  George : That queer looking duck waving his hand at me like that.

  Lucy : He meant me!

  George : Oh, he did? Everybody seems to mean you.

• George : Most girls are usually pretty fresh. They ought to go to a man's college for about a year. They'd get taught a few things about freshness. Look here, who sent you those flowers you keep making such a fuss over?

• Lucy : How lovely your mother is.

  George : I think she is.

  Lucy : She's the gracefullest woman. She dances like a girl of 16.

  George : Most girls of 16 are pretty bad dancers. Anyhow, I wouldn't dance with one of 'em unless I had to.

• Lucy : Don't you remember? We'd had a quarrel and we didn't speak to each other all the way home from a long, long drive. And since we couldn't play together like good children, of course, it was plain we oughtn't of play at all.

  George : Play?

  Lucy : What I mean is, we've come to the point where it was time to quite playing. Well, what we were playing.

  George : That being love, as you mean, don't you?

  Lucy : Something like that. It was absurd.