• Columnists
• Art
• Books
• Celebrities
• Comics
• Events
• Horoscopes
• Lottery
• Movies
• Music
• Restaurants
• Stage
• Television
• Visitors Guide
email this
print this
reprint or license thisgreat movie quotes ensure you're never out of the lines
BY CHRIS HEWITT
Movie Critic
I imagine myself in a world where people sample artisanal cheeses and have ready access to quotations from Rainer Maria-Rilke, but the people I know wolf down burritos and talk about the guy peeing on Jeff Bridges' rug in "The Big Lebowski."
If that sounds like your crowd, too, these quotable movies will help you keep up. And, even if you've already seen a few of them, these are movies you can't see too many times.
Airplane! (1980)
Voted the 10th-funniest movie of all time in an American Film Institute poll, virtually every line is a punch line.
Great lines: "This woman has to be taken to a hospital."/"A hospital? What is it?"/"It's a big building with patients, but that's not important right now."
"There's no reason to be alarmed, and we hope you'll enjoy the rest of your flight. By the way, is there anyone on board who knows how to fly a plane?"
Lines you can steal for home use: "I speak jive."
"Looks like I picked the wrong week to stop sniffing glue."
"Surely you can't be serious."/"I am serious, and don't call me Shirley."
All About Eve (1950)
Theater people, including Bette Davis and Celeste Holm, dish out compliments while stabbing each other in the back. Fun fact: The actors hated each other in real life, too.
Great lines: "I wouldn't worry so much about your heart. You can always put that award where your heart ought to be."
"Miss Casswell (Marilyn Monroe) is an actress, a graduate of the Copacabana School of Dramatic Arts."
Lines you can steal for home use: "Fasten your seatbelts. It's going to be a bumpy night."
"Bill's 32. He looks 32. He looked it five years ago; he'll look it 20 years from now. I hate men."
"You have a point. An idiotic one, but a point."
Annie Hall (1977)
Woody Allen's most beloved film — No. 4 on the AFI list — features an Oscar-winning performance by Diane Keaton as a virtual quote machine.
Great lines: "I don't want to move to a city where the only cultural advantage is being able to make a right turn on a red light."
"I would have killed myself, but I was in analysis with a strict Freudian, and if you kill yourself, they make you pay for the sessions you miss."
Lines you can steal for home use: "La-dee-da. La-dee-da."
"Sometimes when I'm driving on the road at night, I see two headlights coming toward me. Fast. I have this sudden impulse to turn the wheel quickly, head-on into the oncoming car."
"Lyndon Johnson is a politician. You know the ethics those guys have. It's like a notch underneath child molester."
"Broadcast News (1987)
One of the funniest, sharpest romantic comedies ever. So, of course, the couple doesn't end up together.
Great lines: "I would give anything if you were two people, so that I could call up the one who's my friend and tell her about the one that I like so much."
"It must be nice to always believe you know better, to always think you're the smartest person in the room."/"No. It's awful."
"Now, if there's anything I can do for you…"/"Well, I certainly hope you'll die soon."
Lines you can steal for home use: "Except for socially, you're my role model."
"OK, I'll meet you at the place near the thing where we went that time."
"Wouldn't this be a great world if insecurity and desperation made us more attractive? If 'needy' were a turn-on?"
"I am beginning to repel people I'm trying to seduce."
Fargo (1996)
Wisecracks and homicidal wood chippers. What's not to love?
Great lines: "There's more to life than a little money, ya know. Dontcha know that? And here ya are. And it's a beautiful day. Well. I just don't understand it."
"Hey, I know this place outside Brainerd where we can get laid."
Lines you can steal for home use: "I'm not sure I agree with you 100 percent on your police work there, Lou."
"He's fleeing the interview! He's fleeing the interview."
"You have no call to get snippy with me. I'm just tryin' to do my job here."
Heathers (1989)
The dark comedy that gave birth to a million not-as-smart teen comedies.
Great lines: "Great pate, mom. But I gotta motor if I want to be ready for that party tonight."
"If you were happy every day of your life, you wouldn't be a human being. You'd be a game-show host."
"Do they even have Thanksgiving in Africa?"/"Oh, sure. Pilgrims, Indians, Tater Tots. It's a real party continent."
Lines you can steal for home use: "What is your damage, Heather?
"Did you have a brain tumor for breakfast?"
"What's the upchuck factor on that?"
The Opposite of Sex (1998)
The comedy contrasts a heartless vixen (Christina Ricci) with an uptight prude (Lisa Kudrow) and gives both of them tons of hilarious dialogue.
Great lines: "Teachers everywhere have to learn that 'no' means 'no.' At least until we've dropped out."
"I don't have a heart of gold and I don't grow one later, OK? But relax. There's other people a lot nicer coming up. We call them losers."
"My mother was the kind of mother who always said she was her daughter's best friend. Whenever she did, I thought, 'Great, not only do I have a s——- mother, but my best friend's a loser b——.' "
Lines you can steal for home use: "This is the planet Maturia. We have much to teach you."
"I'm bisexual."/"Please. I went to a bar mitzvah once. That doesn't make me Jewish."
"How does a woman get so bitter?"/"Observation."
Pulp Fiction (1994)
Quentin Tarantino's trashterpiece gets its juju from being shockingly violent one minute and shockingly witty the next. (Sadly, many of the best lines cannot be quoted in this paper.)
Great lines: "Whether or not what we experienced was an According-to-Hoyle miracle is insignificant. What is significant is that I felt the touch of God. God got involved."
"That gives us exactly 40 minutes to get the f—- out of Dodge. Which, if you do what I say when I say it, should be plenty. Now, you've got a corpse in a car, minus a head, in a garage. Take me to it."
Lines you can steal for home use: "Let's get into character."
"If my answers frighten you, then you should cease asking scary questions."
"Don't you just love it when you come back from the bathroom and find your food waiting for you?"
"Mind if I have some of your tasty beverage to wash this down with?"
| Chris Hewitt can be reached at chewitt@pioneerpress.com or 651-228-5552. |
