How we cite our quotes: All quotations are from Sunset Boulevard.
Quote #1
JOE: You're Norma Desmond. You used to be in silent pictures. You used to be big.
NORMA: I am big. It's the pictures that got small.
JOE: I knew there was something wrong with them.
In a way, this represents Norma's entire stance toward everything. Nothing can diminish her stature—it's everything else that's small or not worthy of notice.
Quote #2
NORMA: They're dead. They're finished. There was a time when this business had the eyes of the whole wide world. But that wasn't good enough. Oh, no! They wanted the ears of the world, too. So they opened their big mouths, and out came talk, talk, talk...
Norma is trying to make "talkies" sound like a terrible defilement of movies—when, in plain reality, the movies commonly regarded as the greatest of all time, from Citizen Kane to The Godfather, are all talkies. She's a victim of Golden Age thinking, in a way—if only because it provides ammunition for her prideful celebrity.
Quote #3
JOE: Sometimes it's interesting to see just how bad bad writing can be. This promised to go the limit… I could sense her eyes on me from behind those dark glasses, defying me not to like what I read, or maybe begging me in her own proud way to like it. It meant so much to her.
Norma cares more about being liked and appreciated, at this point, than making sure that the thing she's written is actually worthy of admiration and appreciation. Her immense pride has blotted out her sense of perspective.