My Brilliant Career (1979)

Judy Davis: Sybylla Melvyn

Photos 

Quotes 

• [first lines] 

  Sybylla : Possum Gully, Australia. 1897. Dear fellow countrymen, just a few lines to let you know that this story is going to be all about me. So, in answer to many requests, here is the story of my career... here is the story, of my career... my *brilliant* career. I make no apology for being egotistical... because I am!

• Sybylla : I think ugly girls should be strangled at birth by their parents. It's bad enough being born a girl... but being born ugly and clever...

  Aunt Gussie : Aw, clever, are you?

  Sybylla : Well, I hope so. I'm done for if I'm not! There has to be something I'm good at.

  Aunt Gussie : There's sure to be.

• Uncle Julius : I see that Furlow's bought himself a very fine bull.

  Sybylla : He should make a few cows happy!

• Sybylla : Why does it always have to come down to marriage?

  Aunt Gussie : Don't be foolish child. It's natural to want someone as part of your life.

  Sybylla : Well, I don't want to be part of anyone.

  Aunt Gussie : Do you imagine you're the only female on earth to have such notions?

• Sybylla : [feeding the birds in the aviary]  They're fortunate, aren't they. Every day they get their food.

  Aunt Gussie : As long as I remember.

  Sybylla : They never have to look for water in a dried up creek. Scratch for a living, like all our countrymen, forced on the road to beg.

  Aunt Gussie : Peerhaps they're meant to counterbalance the ugly things in life.

• Mother : I've arranged a position for you.

  Sybylla : A position?

  Mother : As a general servant.

  Sybylla : A servant? I won't!

  Mother : You have no choice.

  Sybylla : You just want to get rid of me!

  Mother : I must do what I feel is right! Oh, I pray to God for guidance.

  Sybylla : And this is what he told you to do? God be damned!

• Grandma Bossier : I shall make quite sure my granddaughter will never marry a man unworthy of her. Don't worry.

  Sybylla : I don't. I'm not marrying anyone. I'm going to have a career!

  Grandma Bossier : A career? What in?

  Sybylla : Oh, literature, music, art. Maybe, the opera. I've not made up my mind yet.

• Harry Beecham : You're new here, aren't you? Do you work in the kitchen?

  Sybylla : I'd be obliged to you, sir, if you'd take yourself out of the way; unless, you want me foot in your big, fat face.

  Harry Beecham : [helps her down from a tree]  How about - a reward?

  Sybylla : Let me go.

  [Harry slaps Sybylla on her behind] 

  Sybylla : You should be ashamed. A gentleman like yourself, peepin' and pryin' on an innocent girl. You'll have me sacked, you know.

  [runs off] 

  Harry Beecham : What's your name?

  Sybylla : Wouldn't you like to know!

• Uncle Julius : By George, you're a good looking young lady.

  [kisses Sybylla on the lips] 

  Uncle Julius : You've changed, no doubt about that.

  Sybylla : You haven't. Your kisses still smell of whiskey and cigars.

  Uncle Julius : That's what makes me irresistible.

• Sybylla : Look, Aunt Helen, you don't have to worry. I know he can marry anyone. I know. But, I know he wouldn't want to marry me. Even if I wanted to get married; which I don't. He'd never ask me in a million years.

• Sybylla : I can't lose myself in somebody else's life, when I haven't lived my own yet.

• [last lines] 

  Sybylla : I want to tell everyone about my own people. How I love them and pity them. Pity all of us. The sun is shining on another day and hope is whispering in my ear. With love and good wishes to all. Good night. Goodbye. Amen.

• Sybylla : I was approached by one of them today. A very ill mannered sort. While I was picking blossoms.

  Grandma Bossier : Goodness dear!

  Sybylla : He was very forward. He wanted to kiss me.

• Sybylla : I have always known - that I belonged to - the world - of art - and the world - of - literature - and music.

• Mother : Sybylla, I want to have a talk with you.

  Sybylla : Talk away.

  Mother : You're a young woman now and - I have been thinking about this a great deal - we can't afford to keep you any longer.

• Sybylla : Gertie, don't you ever dream that there's more to life than this? Don't you want to meet people who talk about books and words and have visions? Gertie, I can't settle for a new dress, a picnic, now and then, living out in the bush for the rest of my life. I might just as well be dead.

  Gertie : Oh, Syb, don't say things like that.

  Sybylla : Well, why doesn't Mother understand? Why doesn't anyone?

  Gertie : I think you're the nicest, cleverest girl in the whole entire world!

  Sybylla : I'm not! I'm mad! It'd be better if I didn't think at all.

• Frank Hawdon : I'm Frank Hawdon.

  Sybylla : What are you?

  Frank Hawdon : A Jackeroo.

  Sybylla : That's poetry!

• Sybylla : Oh, I can give you a song.

  [singing] 

  Sybylla : There were three drunken maidens from the Isle of Wight, They drunk from Sunday morning, not stopped 'til Saturday night, Then Saturday did come around, the girls, they wouldn't go home, And those three drunken maidens, pushed the jug about.

  Uncle Julius : Where on earth did you learn that?

  Sybylla : In a Pub, of course.

  [laughs] 

• Grandma Bossier : Well, now that this fellow, Harry, has gone, you should pay some heed to my attentions.

  Sybylla : Do you mean attentions or your intentions?

• Aunt Helen : Marriage gives us respectability, dear, as you'll learn.

  Sybylla : No. That is just what men want us to believe! Stupid idiots like Frank Hawdon! Well, I won't be caught up in it. Not by him or anyone!

• Aunt Gussie : Dear Lucy's daughter, there's little resemblance.

  Sybylla : No, I'm sorry.

  Aunt Gussie : A pity. Well, come in. Come along, child, I'm not going to eat you.

• Aunt Gussie : You washed your hair. It'll never dry by dinner.

  Sybylla : Perhaps I should cut it all off!

  Aunt Gussie : No. No, dear. It'd be a pity to lose your finest asset.

  Sybylla : My only asset, more like.

  Aunt Gussie : Oh, I wouldn't go quite as far as that.

• Aunt Helen : Be careful how you treat him.

  Sybylla : What do you mean?

  Aunt Helen : Oh, you know what they say,"Heed the spark or you may dread the fire."

  Sybylla : For heaven's sake!

  Aunt Helen : Sybylla, he is a man of the world! He has quite a reputation with the ladies in - Melbourne.

  Sybylla : Yes, I bet he has.

• Aunt Gussie : Loneliness is a terrible price to pay for independence. Sybylla, don't throw away reality for some impossible dream.

  Sybylla : It's not impossible! It's not!

• Harry Beecham : Did you find the answers to all those questions? I mean, what was wrong with the world and...

  Sybylla : Oh, yes. Partly me.