It Happened One Night Love Quotes

This, in a nutshell, is Peter's ideal, and it becomes Ellie's, too, since as soon as Peter shares his vision, she senses its appeal and wants it to be her future as well. She's already that person, though. Just think: The first thing we see her do is jump into the sea and run away from her father. Her adventurous spirit is exactly what Peter wants.

Peter may be right, if "going nuts" is just another name for being in love. Interestingly, It Happened One Night doesn't equate love with uninterrupted happiness. It's not all roses and lullabies: Love in this film is also about facing adversity and, above all, having fun together, even when that means being at odds. That's what keeps a life spent together interesting, the film suggests.

This is what Ellie proposes she and Peter should perform when they take their show on the road. She says this just after she and Peter have successfully convinced the detectives sent by Ellie's father that she's someone else—specifically, Peter's wife. Here again, a character speaks more of the truth than she means to and in doing so predicts the future—since "a real hot love story" is eventually what the film itself becomes.

These words are sung, not spoken, by the driver who picks Ellie and Peter up when they're hitchhiking. Again, they're pretending to be husband and wife, and again they're not yet in a position to recognize the happiness and future honeymoon that it foretells. The Highway of Love, in fact, might have been another title for It Happened One Night.

Here Ellie bravely pops the question—not "Will you marry me?" but "What does love mean to you?" Her willingness to ask lets her find out the answer, and that's what prompts Peter's comment about the "sort of a girl who'll jump into the surf." Note that here, too, it's the woman who shows guts, not the man. In this sense, as when she makes the decision to leave King Westley hanging at the altar, Ellie can be seen to wear the pants in that relationship. (Never mind that she's only ever seen in a skirt—or pajamas.)