Original subtitles

Do you remember the storm?

The bronze doors banging.

The roses in cellophane.

The man who threw the get together party

and was never seen again.

Do you remember how the sun came out on our last evening

just as it has done today?

So much to remember.

How many days have there been since then

when we haven't seen each other

A hundred.

Not so many.

Two Christmases

to keep up appearances for the sake of the children.

And the three days of good taste

before I followed you to Capri.

Our first summer.

Do you remember how I hung about in Naples and then followed.

How we met by arrangement on the hill path

and how flat it felt.

I went back to the villa and said Papa

Who do you think has arrived at the hotel?

And he said Charles Ryder, I suppose.

And I said Whatever made you think of him?

And he said He seems to have a penchant for my children.

There was a time when you had jaundice and wouldn't let me see you.

And when I had flu you were afraid to come.

A hundred days.

Out of two years and a bit.

Not a day's coldness or mistrust or disappointment.

Never that.

Let's go and change.

How many more do you think?

Another hundred?

A lifetime.

I want to marry you, Charles.

One day, why now?

War, this year, next year, sometime soon.

I want a year or two with you of real peace.

Isn't this peace?

What do you mean by peace if not this?

So much more.

Marriage isn't a thing we can take

when the mood strikes us. There must be a divorce

two divorces.

We must make plans.

Plans, divorce, war

On an evening like this.

Sometimes I feel the past and the future pressing so hard

on either side there doesn't seem room for the present at all.

Yes, Wilcox?

Lord Brideshead's just telephoned, my Lady.

He says not to wait dinner for him please

as he'll be a little late. Thank you, Wilcox.

It seem months since he was last here.

Yes

What does he do in London?

It was often a matter for speculation between us

Giving birth to many fantasies

for Bridey was a mystery.

The talk

of his going into the army

and into parliament and into a monastery

had all come to nothing.

All that he was known with certainty to have done

and this because in a season of scant news

it had formed the subject of a newspaper article

entitled "Peer's Unusual Hobby"

was to form a collection of match boxes.

Hello Bridey.

Oh Bridey, we're almost finished.

Well, well, only you two.

I hoped to find Rex here.

How are you?

What's the news?

As a matter of fact I do have some news

but it can wait.

Tell us now.

How's the painting Charles?

Which painting?

Whatever you have on the stocks.

Well, I've begun a picture of Julia

but the light was difficult all day today.

Julia?

Haven't you done her before?

I suppose it's a change from architecture and much more difficult.

The world is full of different subjects.

Very true, Bridey.

If I were a painter

I should choose a different subject every time.

Really?

What sort of subjects?

Oh I don't know really

subjects with plenty of action in them like

Macbeth, perhaps.

By the way, I've been meaning to ask you

What happened to mother's jewels?

Cordelia and I had most of her things.

This was hers.

And this.

The rest went to the bank.

Aren't there some rather famous rubies

someone was telling me?

Yes, a necklace. Mummy often used to wear it

don't you remember?

Why, anyway?

I just thought I'd like to take a look at them some day.

I say Papa isn't going to pop them, is he?

He's not in debt again?

No, no nothing like that.

Come on Bridey, don't be so mysterious. Out with it.

Well, you have only to wait until Monday

to see it in black and white in the newspapers.

I am engaged to be married.

I hope you're pleased.

Bridey! How very exciting!

Who to?

Oh, no one you know. Is she pretty?

I don't think you would exactly call her pretty.

Comely is the word I think of in her connection.

She's a big woman.

Fat?

No, big.

She's called Mrs. Muspratt.

Her Christian name is Beryl.

I've known her for quite a long time

But until last year she had a husband

now she's a widow.

Why do you laugh?

I'm sorry. It's not in the least funny.

It's just so unexpected.

Is she

Is she about your own age?

Just about, I believe.

She has three children

the eldest boy has just gone to Ampleforth.

She is not at all well off.

Where did you find her?

Her late husband, Admiral Muspratt

collected matchboxes.

You're not marrying her for her matchboxes?

No, the whole collection went to the Falmouth Town Library.

I have great affection for her.

In spite of all her difficulties

she's a very cheerful woman

very fond of acting.

She is a member of the Catholic Player's Guild.

Does Papa know?

I had a letter from him this morning giving me his approval.

He's been urging me for some time to marry.

Well

Congratulations, Bridey.

Yes.

Congratulations.

Thank you. Thank you.

I think I'm very fortunate.

Bridey, when are we going to meet her?

I do think you might have brought her down with you.

Bridey

you sly, smug old brute why didn't you bring her here?

Oh, I couldn't do that, you know.

Why couldn't you?

I'm dying to meet her.

Let's ring her up and ask her.

She'll think us most peculiar

leaving her alone at a time like this.

She has the children.

Besides

you are peculiar, aren't you?

What can you mean?

I could hardly ask her here, as things are.

It wouldn't be suitable.

After all, I'm only a lodger here.

This is Rex's house at the moment, so far as it's anybody's.

What goes on here is his business. But I couldn't bring Beryl here.

I simply don't understand.

Of course

Rex and I want her to come.

Oh yes, I don't doubt that.

But the difficulty is quite otherwise.

You must understand that Beryl is a woman

Of strict Catholic principles

fortified by the prejudices of the middle classes.

I couldn't possibly bring her here.

It's a matter of indifference whether you choose to live in sin

With Rex or Charles or both

I have always avoided inquiry into the details of your m�nage

but, in no case would Beryl consent to be your guest.

Why you pompous ass?

I may have given the impression that this

was a marriage of convenience.

I cannot speak for Beryl.

No doubt the security of my position

has some influence on her.

Indeed, she has said as much.

But for myself, let me emphasis

I am ardently attracted.

Bridey

what a bloody offensive thing to say to Julia.

There was nothing she should object to.

I was merely stating a fact well known to her.

Aren't you cold?

My darling, what is it?

Why do you mind?

What does it matter what the old booby says?

I don't.

It doesn't.

It's just the shock.

Don't laugh at me.

How dare he speak to you like that?

The cold-blooded old humbug

No, it's not that.

He's quite right.

They know all about it, Bridey and his widow.

They bought it for a penny at the church door.

You can get anything there for a penny in black and white

and nobody to see you pay. Just take your tract.

There you�ve got it.

All in one word, too

one little, flat, deadly word that covers a lifetime.

Living in sin

not just doing wrong, as I did when I went to America

doing wrong, knowing it is wrong

stopping it, forgetting it.

That's not what they mean. That's not Bridey's pennyworth.

He means just what it says.

Living in sin, every hour

every day, year in year out.

Always the same.

Like an idiot child, carefully nursed

guarded from the world.

Poor Julia they say, 'she can't go out. "

She's got to take care of her little sin.

A pity it ever lived they say

But it's so strong

Children like that always are.

Julia's so good to her little, mad sin.

All those years when I was trying

to be a good wife

in the cigar smoke.

When I was trying

To bear his child

Torn in pieces by something already dead

putting him away, forgetting him, finding you

the past two years with you

All the future with you or without you

War coming

World ending

sin.

It's a word from so long ago.

From Nanny Hawkins stitching by the hearth

and the nightlight burning before the Sacred Heart.

Me and Cordelia with the catechism, in Mummy's room

before lunch, on Sundays.

Mummy carrying my sin with her to church.

Bowed under it.

Mummy dying with my sin eating at her

more cruelly than her own deadly illness.

Mummy dying with it

Christ dying with it

nailed hand and foot.

High among the crowds and the soldiers.

No comfort except a sponge of vinegar

and the kind words of a thief

hanging forever

over the bed in the night nursery.

There's no way back.

The gate's barred.

All the saints and angels posted along the wall.

Thrown away, scrapped, rotting down.

Nameless and dead.

Like the baby they wrapped up

and took away before I had a chance to see her.

Well, Bridey is one for bombshells, isn't he?

Considering that I've just recovered from a fit of hysteria

I don't call that at all bad.

Most hysterical women look as if they've got a bad cold.

Come on.

We're not going down again?

Of course.

We can't leave Bridey alone on his engagement night.

Can't we?

I'm sorry about that appalling scene, Charles.

I can't explain it.

Was it nice out?

If I'd known you were going I'd have come too.

Rather cold.

I hope it's not going to be inconvenient for Rex

moving out of here.

You see, Barton Street is much too small for us

and the three children.

Besides, Beryl likes the country.

In his letter

Papa proposed making over the whole estate right away.

I'm sure he'll be sorry to leave.

Oh, don't worry. Rex'll find another bargain somewhere.

Trust him.

Beryl has some furniture of her own she's very attached to.

I don't think it would go very well here.

You know, oak dressers and coffin stools and things.

I thought you could put it in Mother's room.

Yes, that would be the place for it

of course nobody has used that room for years.

So brother and sister sat and talked

about the arrangement of the house until bed-time.

An hour ago, I thought

by the fountain, she wept her heart out

for the death of her God.

Now she is discussing whether Beryl's children

Shall take the old smoking room

or the school room for their own.

I was all at sea.

I won't believe that great spout of tears came just

from a few words of Bridey's.

You must have been thinking about it before.

Hardly at all.

Now and then.

more, lately with the Last Trump so near.

Of course, it's a thing psychologists could explain.

A pre-conditioning from childhood

feelings of guilt from the nonsense you were taught in the nursery.

You do know in your heart

that it's all bosh, don't you?

How I wish it was.

Do you know, Sebastian once said almost the same thing to me.

He's gone back to the Church, you know.

Of course, he's never left it as definitely as I did.

I've gone too far.

There's no turning back.

I know that, if that's what you mean by thinking it all bosh.

Let's go out again.

It's like the setting for a comedy.

Scene: A baroque fountain in a nobleman�s grounds.

Act one, sunset.

Act two, moonlight.

Act three, towards dawn.

The characters keep assembling at the fountain for no very clear reason.

Comedy.

Drama

tragedy, farce

What you will.

This is the reconciliation scene.

Was there a quarrel?

Misunderstanding and estrangement in Act Two.

Don't talk in that damned bounderish way.

Why must you see everything second hand?

Why must this be a play?

It's a way I have.

I hate it.

Now do you see how I hate it?

Did that hurt?

Yes.

Did it?

Did I?

Cat on the rooftop.

Beast!

Cat in the moonlight.

Your poor face.

Will there be a mark tomorrow?

I expect so.

Charles, am I going crazy?

What's happened here tonight?

I'm so tired.

So tired

Tired and crazy and good for nothing.

All I can hope to do is put my life in some sort of order.

That's why I want to marry you.

I should like to have a child.

That's one thing I can do

So you're being divorced.

Isn't that rather unnecessary after being happy together

all these years?

We weren't particularly happy, you know.

Weren't you?

Were you not?

I distinctly remember last Christmas seeing you together and thinking

how happy you looked, and wondering why.

You'll find it very disturbing, you know, starting off again.

How old are you, thirty four?

That's no time to be starting. You ought to be settling down.

Have you made any plans?

Yes.

I intend to get married again as soon as the divorce is through.

Well, I do call that a lot of nonsense.

I can understand a man wishing he hadn't married

And trying to get out of it

Though I never felt anything of the kind myself

But to get rid of one wife and take up another immediately

is beyond all reason.

I've seen quite a few divorces in my time.

I've never known one work out so happily

for all concerned.

Almost always

However matey people are at the start

bad blood crops up as soon as they get down to detail.

Mind you, I don't mind saying that there have been times

In the last couple of years when I thought

you were a bit rough on Celia.

Course it's different when it's one's own sister.

I've always thought her a jolly attractive girl.

The sort of girl any chap would be glad to have

artistic too

just down your street.

I must admit.

You're a good picker.

I've always had a soft spot for Julia.

Well, I suppose if Julia insists on a divorce

she must have one.

My God, she couldn't have chosen a worse time.

Things had not gone as smoothly for Rex

as he had planned.

Only war could put his fortunes right

and carry him into power.

A divorce would do him no great harm

but he was like a gambler with a big bank running

He could not look up from the table.

Tell her to

tell her to hang on a bit, Charles, there's a good fellow.

I met the widow at luncheon.

Did you?

Do you know what she said to me?

So you're divorcing one divorced man

and marrying another. It sounds rather complicated

but my dear, she called me my dear about twenty times

I've usually found that every Catholic family

has one lapsed member, and it's often the nicest.

What's she like?

Majestic.

And voluptuous.

Common, of course.

I'll tell you one thing. She's lied to Bridey

about her age. She's a good forty five.

I don't see her providing an heir.

Bridey can't take his eyes off her.

He was gloating on her in the most revolting way all through luncheon.

Was she friendly?

Goodness, yes

In a condescending way.

I think it put her rather at ease to have me there as the black sheep.

She concentrated on me in fact, said rather pointedly

she hoped to see me often in London.

I think Bridey's scruples only extend to her sleeping

under the same roof with me. Apparently I can do her

no serious harm in a hat shop or hairdresser's.

The scruples are all on Bridey's part, anyway.

The widow is madly tough.

Does she boss him?

Not yet, much.

He's in an amorous stupor, poor beast and doesn't know where he is.

She's just a good-hearted woman who wants a good home

for her children and isn't going to let anything stand in her way.

A telephone message, my Lady, from Lady Cordelia.

Lady Cordelia? How marvelous.

Where is she?

In London, my Lady.

Wilcox, how lovely.

Is she coming home?

Just starting for the station. She'll be here after dinner.

Thank you.

I haven't seen her since I took her to dinner at the Ritz

and she talked about becoming a nun.

It must be twelve years!

She was an enchanting child.

She's had an odd life.

First the convent

and when that was no good, the war in Spain.

Then staying on when the war was over and helping in the camps.

She's grown up quite plain, you know.

Does she know about us?

Yes.

She wrote me a sweet letter.

It hurt to think of Cordelia

growing up quite plain.

To think at all that.

Burning love

spending itself on serum injections

and delousing powder.

When she arrived

tired from her journey

rather shabby

moving in the manner of one who has no interest in pleasing

I thought her an ugly woman.

It was odd, I thought

how the same ingredients, differently dispersed

could produce Brideshead, Sebastian, Julia and her.

It's wonderful to be home.

My job's over in Spain.

The authorities were very polite

thanked me for all I'd done

gave me a medal

and sent me packing.

Mind you, it looks as though there'll be plenty

of the same sort of work over here soon.

Rex seems pretty certain.

He's made up his mind there's going to be a war.

I wonder what Papa will do?

Where is Rex? Is he coming down?

No. The lawyers insisted on a formal separation

so he's moved back to London. I'm only staying until

Bridey is installed with the widow and her children.

He wrote to me and said if I was homeless

I could stay here after they've moved in.

I don't know though

Mrs. Muspratt and the three boys.

Maybe I'll get myself a flat in London.

Hello Nanny.

I knew you'd be up.

Mr. Wilcox sent to tell me you were coming.

I brought you some lace.

That is nice, dear.

Just like her poor Ladyship used to wear at Mass.

Though why they made it black? I never did understand

seeing lace is white naturally.

Well, that'll be very welcome I'm sure.

May we turn the wireless off Nanny?

Why of course. I didn't notice it was on

in the pleasure of seeing you.

Isn't it splendid about Julia and Charles getting married?

Well I hope it's all for the best.

Brideshead has certainly taken long enough to make up his mind.

I've hunted all through Debrett and I couldn't find any mention

of Mrs. Muspratt's connections.

She caught him, I daresay.

What have you done to your hair?

Oh I know, it's terrible.

I must get all that put right now I'm back.

Darling nanny.

I saw Sebastian last month.

What a time he's been gone. Was he quite well?

Not very. That's why I went.

It's quite near you know, from Spain to Tunis.

He's with the monks there.

Oh, well I hope they look after him properly.

I expect they find him a regular handful.

He always sends to me at Christmas.

Though it's not the same as having him home.

He's got a beard now and he's very religious.

That I won't believe, not even if I see it.

He was always a little heathen.

Brideshead was one for Church, not Sebastian.

And a beard!

Only fancy

Such a nice, fair skin as he had

Always looked clean, though he'd not been

near water all day.

While Brideshead there was no doing anything with.

Cordelia!

What?

Come and tell me about Sebastian.

Not now, Charles.

It's a long story. Tomorrow.

Goodnight.

Goodnight.

I had not forgotten Sebastian.

He was with me daily in Julia

or perhaps it was Julia I had known in him

in those distant Arcadian days.

Every stone of the house had a memory of him

And hearing him spoken of by Cordelia

As someone she had seen a month ago

my lost friend filled my thoughts.

I heard he was dying.

A journalist in Burgos told me

who'd just arrived from North Africa.

A down and out called Flyte

who people said was an English Lord

Has been found starving

And taken in to a monastery

near Carthage.

That was how the story reached me.

I knew it couldn't quite be true

however little we did for Sebastian

he at least got his money sent to him.

But I started off at once.

It was quite easy to find him.

I just went to the consulate.

Apparently he'd turned up in Tunis one day

and applied to be taken on as a missionary lay brother.

The fathers took one look at him and turned him down.

Then he started drinking again.

He lived in a little hotel on the edge of the Arab Quarter.

I went to see the place later.

It was a bar with a few rooms over it

Smelling of hot oil and garlic and stale wine.

He stayed there a month drinking Greek absinthe.

They loved him there.

He's still loved you see.

Whatever he does, whatever condition he's in.

It's a thing about him he'll never lose.

They thought very ill of his family for leaving him like that.

It wouldn't happen with their people, they said.

And I daresay they're right.

Anyway, that was later.

After the consulate

I went straight to the monastery and I saw the Superior.

He told me his part of the story.

So I sent him away.

He kept coming back

two or three times a week

always drunk

until I gave orders to the porter to keep him out.

He must have been a terrible nuisance to you.

I don't know what I can do to help him

except pray.

Finally, we found him unconscious outside the main gate

he had fallen down and had lain there all night.

At first we thought that he was merely drunk again

then we realised that he was very ill

so we took him to the Infirmary.

He's been there ever since.

They'd given him a room to himself

just off the cloisters.

He looked terrible.

Any age.

At first he couldn't talk much

But I stayed a fortnight with him

until he was over the worst of his illness.

Then he told me what had been happening to him.

It was mostly about Kurt, his German friend.

Well you've met him, so you know all about that.

Sounds gruesome.

He said they went to Greece

And Kurt had got arrested after some brawl

and sent back to Germany.

It was a time when they were rounding up all their nationals

from all parts of the world, to make them into Nazis.

Sebastian followed.

For a year he couldn't find any trace of him.

Then in the end he ran him to earth dressed as a storm trooper

in a provincial town.

At first he wouldn't have anything to do with Sebastian

spouting all that official jargon about the rebirth of his country.

But it was only skin deep with him.

Six years of Sebastian had taught him more

than a year of Hitler.

Eventually Kurt chucked it and admitted he hated Germany

and wanted to get out.

I don't know how much it was simple the call of the easy life

sponging on Sebastian.

He said it wasn't entirely that

but Kurt had just begun to grow up.

Maybe he's right.

Anyway, it didn't work.

Kurt always got into trouble whatever he did.

Finally they caught him and they put him in a concentration camp.

Sebastian couldn't get near him.

He didn't even know what camp he was in.

So he hung about in Germany for another year

Drinking again.

Until one day in his cups

He took up with a man who'd just been out of the camp

Where Kurt had been

And learned that he had hanged himself in his hut

in the first week.

So that was the end of Europe for Sebastian.

He went back to North Africa

where he had been happy.

I once had a governess who jumped off this bridge and drowned herself.

I know.

How could you know?

It was the first thing I ever heard about you

before I ever met you.

How very odd.

Have you told Julia this about Sebastian?

The substance of it.

Not quite as I told you.

She never really loved him

You know, as we do.

Poor old Sebastian.

It's quite pitiful.

How will it end?

I think I can tell you exactly, Charles.

I've seen others like him.

And I believe they are very near and dear to God.

They'll let him stay there

living half in and half out of the community.

He'll be a great favorite with the old fathers

and something of a joke with the novices.

There's usually a few odd hangers on in a religious house.

You know

People who don't quite fit in to either the world

or the monastic rule.

I suppose I'm something of that sort myself

but as I don't happen to drink I'm more employable.

He'll disappear for two or three days every month

Or so and they'll all nod and smile and say

Old Sebastian on a spree again.

Then one day, after one of his drinking bouts

he'll be picked up at the gate dying

and show by the mere flicker of his eyelids

that he is conscious when they give him the last sacraments.

Not such a bad way of getting through one's life.

It's not what one would have foretold.

I suppose he doesn't suffer?

Oh yes, I think he does.

One has no idea what the suffering may be

to be as maimed as he is.

No dignity.

No power of will.

No one is truly holy without suffering.

Holy?

Yes.

That's what you've got to understand about Sebastian.

He's in a very beautiful place, you know

White cloisters, a bell tower

Rows of green vegetables and a monk watering them when the sun is low.

You knew I wouldn't understand.

You and Julia.

Tell me Charles

When you first met me last night

Did you think, Poor Cordelia, such an engaging child

grown into a plain and pious spinster, full of good works?

Did you think

thwarted?

Yes, I did.

But now I'm not so sure.

It's funny you know

That's exactly the word that I thought for you and Julia

when I saw you up in the nursery with Nanny.

Thwarted passion' I thought.

My divorce case

or rather my wife's

was due to be heard at about the same time as Bridey was married.

But he was to have no triumphal return.

Lord Marchmain

with a taste for the dramatically inopportune

declared his intention in view of the international situation

of returning to England

and passing his declining years in his old home.