Original subtitles

Love is like a butterfly, soft and gentle as the sky. The

multicolored moods of love are like its saddened wings.

Love makes your heart seem strange inside. It flutters like the wounds in

flight. Love is like a butterfly, a rare and gentle thing.

A golden rule.

Indulge in being a silly child for at least one hour a day.

That still leaves 23 hours to be a sensible, fretful adult.

Fretful? Why fretful? You seem to have everything going for you.

Yes, I am rather gifted, aren't I?

Forty -five years Mother Nature's been chiselling away at this particular work

of art.

She made me out of specially selected weathered stone.

Just one day after I told you that my son's girlfriend had left him.

I saw her across you outside our cafe.

She charmed me, captured me, and finally seduced me.

Ah, the joys of being free.

You so -called free people amuse me. All the time you're bursting forth about

the advantages of being unattached. Your face is wearing that, please catch me

and cage me look.

And you attach people are wearing that haunted, please let me go look.

You look like a little marmoset peering out of its jungle.

What do you see, little marmoset?

Anything worthwhile.

You're right.

It is nice to be a child just once a day.

Leonard, do you ever feel as if everything's sitting on top of your

pressing you into the ground?

My dear lady, I am the peg.

Life is the mallet.

It's just that...

When I'm walking along our street, sometimes I get this feeling of dread as

near the house.

Oh, I love the house and the people in it. It's just that I think to myself,

what crisis, what trauma, what disaster awaits me now?

Can I handle it, or will this be the day when I crack?

You won't crack.

Fact in on Francie.

Bent, but not broken. That's you.

Come on. Put your jungle down.

Hey!

Hurry up. We've got the swings to do.

Hartley.

Yes, dear?

I'm sitting here with a frisbee on my knee.

But those boys, they've been throwing this thing about again.

Oh.

Oh?

It's your favourite word, isn't it? Whatever happens in life, oh, you say.

If the universe exploded and we ended up dangling from the moon, oh, you'd say.

I mean, supposing this thing had sliced me in half?

Well, it could have been a flying saucer, couldn't it?

An army of Martians could come flooding through the sunroof and, oh, you'd say,

go and complain.

Just deliver your oh with a fierce face.

Mr. Conrad, we've just moved in opposite.

Oh, how nice.

Ben Parkins. No, it's not nice, Mr. Parkins.

But then few things in life are nice, are they?

No.

Yes.

Oh, whatever.

Would you like to come in? No, thank you.

Always find if you go inside somewhere, eventually you have to come out again.

And you do what's necessary.

I believe in the conservation of energy.

Oh.

That's two O's now, Mr. Parkinson.

Sorry. It's a habit.

There's nothing wrong with brevity.

It's like the single rose. It says much more than the dozen.

Yes.

About your sons, there's the skinny, curly -headed one and the pale,

stooped one.

They're not perfect, but I haven't quite seen them like that.

They keep throwing this thing about, back and forth, to and fro, every day.

It's all the time.

Pretty harmless occupation, wouldn't you say?

Or perhaps you wouldn't.

This came through my sunroof, Mr. Parkinson, at an angle of approximately

degrees and a speed of approximately 25 miles per hour at approximately...

1 .38 p .m.

And I'm not pleased.

Nor should you be.

Not nice having things come through your sunroof. No matter what time, angle or

speed, I will speak to my sons. Thank you.

I realise, of course, you can't help your offspring.

It's like feeding a fruit machine, isn't it?

You either get a lot or a little.

Or nothing.

Oh, perhaps you'd like to come round for dinner one evening.

Nice for the ladies, wouldn't it?

They like that sort of thing.

Oh, here it comes again.

That's the... I hope Ben's lunch looked better when I took it out of the oven

than when I put it in.

Polished cow.

Funny thing with faces.

It's about as cheerful as a Roman coin.

I have in my hand a toy.

Even when it's properly used, it's pathetic.

But this one is manned by two adults and goes crashing through people's

sunroofs.

Threatening decapitation and forcing me to spend my lunch out fraternising with

irate neighbours.

Come down, please.

You haven't finished your lunch?

No.

Was that the man from across the road?

Yes.

Funny, isn't it?

Since they've moved in, we haven't even spoken.

No.

Well, what did he want?

Oh.

Can you believe it?

The world is rich with challenge.

Endless mountains to climb, great chasms of opportunity opening up.

And my two, those fat pink babies who lolled about in their expensive plans,

devouring every crumb I managed to work for.

end up wearing spray -on trousers and hurling bits of plastic at each other.

We are not to surround me by tall plants. I'm a man, not a tropical bird.

I guess it gets a bit out of hand. Right.

Not only have you displeased the Conrads opposite, but now there is a distinct

possibility that your mother and I might have to go to dinner.

Oh. Sorry.

Yeah, sorry's right.

Isn't there anything more constructive you could do?

I mean, doesn't your brain feel slightly underprivileged when it realises that

the highlight of its career is centred around a frisbee?

Perhaps I'm out of touch with this brave new world.

Perhaps my... Closed my dental practice.

Bought a yo -yo. I could stand out there, happily pinging away in whole new

vistas without not performing.

A yo -yo.

Wow, that's really something else there.

Is that a joke?

Is that a joke?

And if you're going to wear those obscene T -shirts, will you kindly

yourself so that I am not accused of being a sex object?

Now listen to me.

Your father is a very busy man.

He comes home in his lunch hour to sample a paste of the house that he pays

and the piece that he works for and the food which I... All right, all right,

the food which I ruin.

I know I ruin it. I ruin everything. I'm only happy when I'm ruining things.

These...

Last time I came here, I was upset, you know.

You're really piling it on now.

God fits the back for the burden.

That's what my mother always used to say.

She wasn't a liar.

But I don't even know what my burden is.

My back is certainly not the right fit.

There's all this aggro, all these somersaults, my stomach.

I know you have a lot to cope with, but... Well, if you made it all

for us down here, you'd have less to cope with up there, because we'd all be

going around loving each other and smiling at each other and being

and amazingly and wholeheartedly...

Bored?

Right.

Well, I'll just nip back to my proper place and get into my proper position

and speak to you.

I'm fine.

Just fine.

It's a lovely day in a lovely world, full of lovely people.

I'm lucky I've got Ben, and I love him.

Oh, that wonderful, craggy face.

It lies there in the bed, full of wisdom.

Like a piece of crushed velvet.

And I've got Adam and Russell.

How handsome they are. How thin. How carefree. How healthy.

How lazy.

How young. How noisy.

That

was

a stupid thing to do, wasn't it?

Don't you know that is the road?

My nerves have got enough on coping with human beings without you adding to my

problem.

I mean, just how much space do you need?

If I hadn't been a particularly alert person, you, my scruffy little friend,

would have been dead by now.

Yes, dead.

And not a lot happens after that, you know.

I just didn't want him dead, that's all.

Well, Ria, it's fairly obvious what's happening to you.

I've examined you thoroughly and there's nothing physically wrong.

You're suffering from what we call nervous exhaustion.

There's no medical cure as such. All I can do is offer you an assortment of

pills which will conveniently comatise you until the anxiety goes.

But you wouldn't want that, would you?

Oh, no, no. I definitely want to be around when it goes.

I...

I'm not going insane, am I?

We're all of us standing on the edge of that particular pool.

Some of us, unfortunately, fall headfirst.

Most of us peer into it and decide not to go.

Some of us, aided and abetted by those around us, just dip our big toe in. We

around yelling and screaming for a while, that's all, until the pain gets

better.

It's ridiculous.

I told a dog off.

I walked right into the church.

I'm told God off.

I'm all geared up to row with anybody and everybody. In fact, if you're not

careful what you say, you could very well be next.

I'm sorry, Doctor.

This... This feeling of dread that I get when I get near the house, it will go,

won't it?

It'll go.

Are you sure?

Yes, I'm sure.

Well, thank you.

Come back if you can't cope.

Yes, I will.

Are you sure?

Why don't you stick to messing about with people's teeth and leave the rest

their anatomy to me?

Of course, sorry.

She's been very strange.

Tense, is the word.

Picked up the fish from my plate yesterday and dangled it.

Kept rushing to the table and coming back with things to dangle like a

retriever.

Yes, we do funny things when we're tense.

I remember this chap at university.

Nice fellow, shy.

Every time the exam results were due, he got drunk and dashed through the halls

of residence wearing nothing but a woolly hat and a pair of wellies.

God, you had funny legs.

Yes.

Look, she'll be home any minute. I haven't given her any tablets. A few

outbursts and she'll be fine, all right?

I'm not very good at these things. You know, the endless complexity of a

mind. If she had a cold or something, I could put a bandage on.

Emotions.

I'm delving into a woman's mind as almost as horrific as delving into a

Don't do anything. Just think of her as a kind of female Vesuvius.

When she erupts, all you can do is watch.

Next one.

Just

as

beautiful, just as difficult to handle.

Funny ass, this doesn't have normal things like a muddle and a bit of dust.

has the bloodiest shrimp.

Maybe she's tinying our room.

It must look very nice upstairs.

Your mother is undergoing some stress.

We will carry on in normal fashion.

I hope she doesn't throw my guitar.

It costs a lot of doll money.

We must allow her to get it out of her system.

begin and end when you want. No one to cook for, no one to tidy up after.

The only disaster that could possibly visit your world would be the sudden

disappearance of those unfettered chests that bounce their way in and out of

this house.

Right, absolutely.

Deep depression.

Well, yes.

Would you stop noticing those sort of things, sir?

I mean, about what age?

You don't stop noticing them. You stop being obsessed.

You actually find yourself thinking about other things, like work and money,

that you can afford them.

violin concerto.

Today you did the same distance, but I had to play it twice.

So I'm getting slower.

Rather more gracious, sir.

I no longer felt that you'd been wrongly constructed.

You will keep a lookout for my friend, won't you?

She's usually in the park about now.

May I advise you, sir?

No, Thomas.

then may I make a suggestion?

They are one and the same, Thomas.

Oh, I know what you're going to say.

She's married, she's unavailable, somebody's going to get hurt.

Well, by the time you get to my age, everybody's married, nobody's available,

and I always get hurt.

If I may say so, sir, I've seen you turn a head or two.

Well, I'm not denying it, Thomas, not denying it.

You and I know that with a practice technique and a steady supply of

Any man's bed can become as busy as the first night at the proms.

But what of the morning, Thomas? What of the morning?

That unsure plod from the bed to the safety of the bathroom.

Those watchful eyes comparing your threadbare body with the youth of the

before.

With his ever -going, never -stopping, always bloody well -managing appetite.

I'm afraid I'm not familiar with that.

My wife, who goes for plodding to the kitchen, not the bathroom.

I'm too tired to watch.

Yes, yes, I've been through all that too.

Not that I mind it, sir.

Marriage at its best is just a dash of joy topped up with misery.

Like drinking whiskey drowned in water.

After 25 years, one is too drunk.

I think, sir, I've already requested that you remain calm in the car whilst

driving, that you don't suddenly grab me or loom up in my driving mirror without

warning. You have, Tom? Yes.

It's just that your friend is in the park, sir.

Where? Where?

Get back to the wheel, if you don't mind.

Pull in! Pull in!

important business appointment in four minutes. All right, I'll be back. I'll

back.

Idiot.

Ria!

Ria!

Hi.

Your chauffeur saw me, I know.

I have a business meeting in four minutes.

You'll never make it.

I know.

You look well.

Oh, thank you.

And what's your name again?

Oh, yes, Mrs.

Parkinson, wasn't it? Yes, of course. How silly of me. I have to keep on

reminding myself, you see. You look remarkably like all the rest. No, no.

all right.

Don't explain. But for your hot and cold moods, these orgies we have in the park

would lose their fascination.

you want to know, will you kindly fill in a questionnaire?

Or are you trying to annoy me? Or scare me?

Because I have news for you, Mrs Conrad. You have succeeded in all three.

And I... Why did you go to church?

I didn't go to church. I went into the church. And the doctors?

You nosy cow.

And the park? Why are you in the park?

Well, people who go to church, the doctors and the park are worried.

Worried? What have I got to be worried about?

I have nothing to worry about. I am totally unworried.

You're very lucky.

Yes, I'm that too.

I went to church because... I don't have any children, you see.

And I went to the doctors because I have nerves, because I don't have children.

And I'm here in the park because I've nothing else to do.

I don't have children.

I went to the church because I have children.

And I went to the doctors because I have nerves.

Because I have children. And I'm here in the park because there's so much to do

in the house because of these children.

I wish I had children.

They're a lot of work.

A lot of worry. I know.

By the time you've brought them up, you've lost so much.

Time, sleep, energy, your mind. I know, but I wish I had children.

Do you know something, Mrs Conrad?

No.

I wish you had children, too.

Love is like a butterfly.

It's as gentle as it's soft. A multicolored blue butterfly.

Love makes your heart sing.

Love is like a beautiful flower. Love is like a butterfly of rare

and gentle pain.

Love is like a butterfly of rare and gentle pain.