Ten Mysterious Movie Quotes

Okay, if it’s not too obvious, this is a variation on the lyrics quiz I recently posted. In this case, you just need to figure out what movie each quote is from. Feel free to comment on the movie as well, if you have a hankerin’.

We love talking of the movies ’round these parts.

All of the movies I’m quoting from have a place in my heart for one reason or another.

As you probably can imagine, searching for the quote is considered cheating.

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UPDATE:

Okay, since nobody got #3 and #9, I’m going to just answer them and be done with it.

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1. “Are you waving the flag at me?”
 &nbsp  — Skip McCoy (Richard Widmark), Pickup on South Street (identified by bubs)

Oh, man, this movie. One of my favorites by Samuel Fuller, who has really done some wonderful movies. This quote’s greatness is only amplified by the fact that it was a delivered in the 1950’s, when the US was knee-deep in patriotism, blacklisting and the Cold War. The line just drips with cynicism, as Richard Widmark’s character snarls it at an FBI agent, who tries pushing his “You’re an American, not a Commie” button to recover some microfilm Widmark unwittingly pickpocketed off a Soviet agent.

Wow.

Some people like to say, “Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel,” but I’ll stick with this quote.

2. “An intellectual carrot? The mind boggles!”
 &nbsp  — Ned “Scotty” Scott (Douglas Spencer), The Thing From Another World (identified by bubs)

I have only seen this movie once or twice, and honestly my memory of it has faded. The John Carpenter remake is one of my favorite movies — it’s actually much closer to the source material, Joseph Campbell’s short story “Who Goes There?”.

Still, I shot up when this line was delivered. An intellectual carrot? A mind boggling? I am so there.

3. “How does it feel? Getting paid for it? Getting paid to sit back and hire your killings… with the law’s arms around you? How does it feel to be so goddamn right?”
 &nbsp  — Deke Thornton (Robert Ryan), The Wild Bunch (never identified)

One of my favorite lines, delivered by one of my favorite character actors, in one of my favorite movies. The answer to Deke Thornton’s question — “Good. It feels good.” — to which Deke then replies, “You sonuvabitch!” Man, I love this movie.

4. “Death to the demoness Allegra Geller!”
 &nbsp  — Noel Dichter (Kris Lemche), eXistenZ (identified by mob)

I’m not sure how many people actually caught this David Cronenberg movie, but it’s one of my favorites of his. It’s got a lot of great acting talent, some notably being Willem Dafoe and Ian Holm. Jude Law gives a great performance, before all of his ridiculous overexposure where he seemed legally required to appear in 80% of all movies in a given year. Jennifer Jason Leigh has a great role as game designer Allegra Geller.

This quote is actually repeated by several characters in the film, but the Noel Dichter character says it first, right before shooting her with an organic gun that has teeth for bullets. Cool!

5. “Nothing is more reliable than a man whose loyalties can be bought with hard cash.”
 &nbsp  — Boris Balkan (Frank Langella), The Ninth Gate (identified by samuraifrog)

I love pretty much every movie by Roman Polanski I have ever seen. I have probably seen The Ninth Gate more than any other. I’m not exactly sure why, I just find the need to rewatch it from time to time.

Frank Langella’s Boris Balkan character is one of my favorite parts of the film, whether he makes an appearance as a politely sinister phone voice urging Dean Corso (Johnny Depp) to continue his mission despite the growing pile of dead bodies, or is scaring away a group of amateur devil worshippers with a loud “BOO!” after strangling their leader.

Balkan desribes his faith in Dean Corso in the quote cited, but turns out to be mistaken. Corso wants more than the money.

6. “I said I wanna see a Plaster of Paris bagel and cream cheese paperweight, now cough it up.”
 &nbsp  — Paul Hackett (Griffin Dunne), After Hours (identified by becca)

This is one my favorite Martin Scorsese films, possibly only being outdone by The King Of Comedy.

Who knew that a simple bagel paperweight could spark such an agonizing night?

7. “The enormous flies flapping slowly away into the sunset, small brown babies clutched in their beaks.”
 &nbsp  — Vince Ricardo (Peter Falk), The In-Laws (identified by bubs)

It has dated a bit, but I still think the original In-Laws is incredibly funny. The interplay between Alan Arkin and Peter Falk is fantastic, especially in the scene where their characters first meet at a dinner. That scene contains the above quote, as well as the equally classic, “Sadly, there is very little you can do because of the tremendous red tape in the bush.”


8. “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”
 &nbsp  — Inigo Montoya (Mandy Patinkin), The Princess Bride (identified by becca)

One of my favorite parts of this movie is the dialogue between the kidnappers of the Princess Bride – Inigo, Fezzik (Andre the Giant) and Vizzini (Wallace Shawn).

Inigo is filled with hate towards the six-fingered man that killed his father, but is a pussycat to everyone else, including the verbally abusive Vizzini.

It’s probably my favorite line in the movie, for reasons I can’t or don’t really want to explain. It’s just nice.

9. “The commander’s dead. Everybody in the mine has gone insane.”
 &nbsp  — Sgt. Jericho Butler (Jason Statham), Ghosts Of Mars (never identified)

It should be acknowledged that I really have an unhealthy soft spot for the films of John Carpenter. This movie was the first time I saw Jason Statham, a pasty-faced British action hero. I like the way he talks, his accent and phrasing, and I especially liked the way he delivered the above lines.

10. “Do you realize I haven’t kissed you in over an hour?”
 &nbsp  — Ramon Miguel ‘Mike’ Vargas (Charlton Heston), Touch Of Evil (identified by samuraifrog)

Oh man, one of my all-time favorite movies. This is my favorite Orson Welles movie — better than Citizen Kane, The Magnificent Ambersons, Lady From Shanghai. This is the one.

So many fantastic performances — Welles himself delivers the best acting performance of his career. Then there’s Marlene Dietrich, Akim Tamiroff as ‘Uncle Joe’ Grandi, Dennis Weaver as a motel manager (a definite precursor of Norman Bates, and perhaps even a little creepier than Bates), Mercedes McCambridge as a leather-clad butch biker chick(!) — goddammit, there is some wonderful acting in evidence. Wonderful story, wonderful cinematography, music, *everything*.

There are many quotable lines from this movie, but my favorite is the one above, a kind of a clunker piece of dialogue badly delivered by Charlton Heston near the beginning of the movie. It’s one of the few pieces of cheesiness in the movie, but a piece of cheesiness I have infinite love of.

I’ll actually say this line to my wife from time to time.

9 thoughts on “Ten Mysterious Movie Quotes”

  1. A few of the quotes sound familiar, but first thing in the morning these are the only ones I’m sure of:

    1- Richard Widmark from Pickup on South Street.

    2- from The Thing (the original)

    6- from After Hours, but I can’t remember who says it. Was it Catherine O’Hara?

    7-Peter Falk in The In-Laws

  2. becca, thanks for looking! You are correct on #6 and #8. If I can give you a hint about #10 — think “strange ethnic casting”.

    Thanks for the kind comments about me blog. I am quite fond of yours as well.

    bubs, your answers are right on. I might be remembering wrong, but didn’t you at one point say that Richard Widmark quote to me?

  3. 5 is The Ninth Gate, I think. 3 sounds incredibly familiar, but it’s probably not Seven Days in May, is it?

    10 is Touch of Evil, one of my faves. I showed that opening in a film class during a presentation, and the teacher interjected with “Is that a Mexican accent I didn’t hear?”

  4. Right on #5 and #10.

    #3 isn’t Seven Days In May. I’m pretty sure you have seen the movie #3 is from, though.

    Loved the opening of Touch Of Evil.

  5. Splotchy, yes I did! Good memory. I think I followed up with my other favorite flag quote, this one from WIlliam Burroughs:

    “He asked what the American Flag means to me, and I told him ‘soak it in heroin, doc, and I’ll suck on it'”.

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