|
 Introduction: Film speeches are normally
delivered orally and directed at an audience of three or more
people, although there can be exceptions. They are usually persuasive-type
speeches, either designed to promote or to dissuade, and they
are highly quotable.
Key to Iconic Symbol:
 - Entries in Blockbuster Video's Top 20 Best Film Speeches and Monologues with ranking number (#)
Note: The films that are marked
with a yellow star  are the films that
"The Greatest Films" site has selected as the 100 Greatest Films
 BEST FILM SPEECHES AND MONOLOGUES
(chronological by film title) - Part
13
Introduction | Part
1 | Part 2 | Part
3 | Part 4 | Part
5 | Part 6 | Part
7 | Part 8 | Part
9 | Part 10 |
Part 11 | Part
12 | Part 13 | Part
14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part
17 | Part 18 | Part
19 | Part 20 |
Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25
|
| Film
and Brief Title |
Speech
|
Example
|
Hoosiers
(1986)
 "We're
Gonna Be Winners!"
|
Coach Norman
Dale's (Gene Hackman) stirring motivational speech before the Indiana
state finals game: ("Forget about the crowds, the size of the
school, their fancy uniforms, and remember what got you here. Focus
on the fundamentals that we've gone over time and time again. And
most important, don't get caught up thinking about winning or losing
this game. If you put your effort and concentration into playing
to your potential, to be the best that you can be, I don't care
what the scoreboard says at the end of the game. In my book, we're
gonna be winners!") |
|
True
Stories (1986)
"No
Concept of Weekends Anymore"
|
VariCorps Corporation's
founder Earl Culver's (Spalding Gray) astonishing, magical speech
on business and changing lifestyles (explaining the disappearance of weekends due to a new work ethic), told over his family's dinner table, consisting of
a meal of lobster, asparagus, and pigs in blankets; he explained about how scientists and engineers in Virgil,
Texas had fled from corporations and government jobs to start
their own businesses, creating confusion and chaos: ("They don't work for money anymore,
but to earn a place in heaven, which was a big motivating factor once upon a time, believe you and me. They are working and inventing because
they like it! Economics has become a spiritual thing. I must admit
it frightens me a little bit. They don't seem to see the difference
between working and not working. It has all become
a part of one's life. Linda! Larry! There's no concept of weekends anymore!") |
|
Lying Woman's Tall-Tale Claims
|
The Lying Woman's (Jo Harvey Allen) funny, bizarre, increasingly outrageous claims (about having amazing psychic powers due to the presence of a tail) told during a date with incredulous, lonely, and shy panda bear-shaped bachelor and country-western singer Louis Fyne (John Goodman) who has a "Wife Wanted" sign on his front lawn: ("Yeah, I'm in the construction business. Got work goin' on at five sites right now. Bought me a condo last week! Shoot, real close to here, as a matter of fact. And next week, I just think I might buy me another house. Darlin', I'll tell you what now, I just have a feel for it, do you know what I mean? Of course, bein' overly psychic sure doesn't hurt anything. It's paid off for me! Listen, Mr. Fry ... Fine, ... Louis, darlin', listen, I'll tell you somethin' if you promise not to tell another livin' soul. Now, I'd never tell this to anybody else, but I believe that part of my extra-psychic ability's connected up with the fact that I was born with a tail. Little ol' bitty hairy thing about that long - had it surgically removed when I was just five years old. My Momma kept it in a fruit jar, up in the medicine cabinet, right between the 4-Way Cold Tablets and the monkey blood. I'd get up every morning - first thing I'd go in there in the bathroom brush my teeth and stare at my own tail at the same time. Now, somethin' like that can give you power - and that's the truth. Then Momma got a wild hair one Sunday and she decided to go make a lot of money off of it, you know. Took it out to a big ol' swap meet and sold it to Lyndon Johnson's top Secret Service agent. And he told a good personal friend of mine that he was gonna sell it for even more money to the Smithsonian Institute. Shoot, he might as well, it wouldn't do him any good. It wasn't HIS tail! Gee, I tell you, I could write a book. That thing would be a best seller... Songs are easy. I wrote "Billie Jean" and half of Elvis' songs...Hell, yes! You know, they pay me and I keep quiet. Somebody's got to do it!") |
|
Broadcast News (1987)
"It
Was Like Great Sex"
|
Handsome news
reporter Tom Grunick's (William Hurt) delighted thanks to quick-thinking network news producer
Jane Craig (Holly Hunter) in her desk for talking him through a crucial live news
report and feeding him information about Libyan jets attacking an
American military base in Sicily: ("You're an amazing woman.
What a feeling having you inside my head... It's like indescribable -- you
knew just when to feed me the next line, you knew the second before I needed
it. There was like a rhythm we got into... it was like great
sex!") |
|
| Sour-Grapes
Prediction of the Future Between Friends |
After he quit his job, insecure network
TV reporter Aaron Altman (Albert Brooks) had a short discussion with his unrequited
love interest, network news producer Jane Craig (Holly Hunter), including a bitter and sour-grapes prediction of her future when she asked what would happen to them: ("Maybe the best part of your life is over and you don't want to get up and start the bad part...What will happen? OK, that's very easy. Five, six years from now, I'll be back in town to collect an award representing the surge in foreign coverage by local stations...Anyway, I'll be walking
along with my wife and my two lovely children and we'll bump into you. And my youngest son will say something, and I will tell him it's not nice
to make fun of single, fat ladies"); Aaron was embittered by how they were only friends throughout their entire close relationship: ("I'll miss you, we'll talk. We'll always be friends. We'll get hot for each other every few years at dinner, and we'll never act on it, OK?") |
|
Full Metal Jacket
(1987)
Drill Sergeant's Boot Camp Taunting of Recruits - "Here
You Are All Equally Worthless!"
|
# 18
Gunnery Sgt. Hartman's (R. Lee Ermy) introductory speech - a degrading taunting
of all the newly-inducted boot camp recruits at Parris Island, including Private Joker (Matthew Modine) and Private Pyle (Vincent D'Onofrio): ("I am Gunnery Sergeant Hartman, your Senior Drill Instructor. From now on, you will speak only when spoken to, and the first and last words out of your filthy sewers will be: "Sir!" Do you maggots understand that?...If you ladies leave my island, if you survive recruit training, you will be a weapon, you will be a minister of death, praying for war. But until that day, you are pukes! You're the lowest form of life on Earth. You are not even human f--king beings! You are nothing but unorganized grab-asstic pieces of amphibian s--t! Because I am hard, you will not like me. But the more you hate me, the more you will learn. I am hard, but I am fair! There is no racial bigotry here! I do not look down on niggers, kikes, wops or greasers. Here you are all equally worthless! And my orders are to weed out all non-hackers who do not pack the gear to serve in my beloved Corps! Do you maggots understand that?...Who said that? Who the f--k said that? Who's the slimy little Communist s--t twinkle-toed cocksucker down here, who just signed his own death warrant? Nobody, huh?! The fairy f--king godmother said it! Out-f--king-standing! I will P.T. you all until you f--king die! I'll P.T. you until your assholes are sucking buttermilk. Was it you, you scroungy little f--k, huh?!...(Joker: "Sir, I said it, Sir.") Well, no s--t. What have we got here, a f--king comedian? Private Joker? I admire your honesty. Hell, I like you. You can come over to my house and f--k my sister. (Sergeant Hartman punches Joker in the stomach) You little scumbag! I've got your name! I've got your ass! You will not laugh! You will not cry! You will learn by the numbers I will teach you! Now get up! Get on your feet! You had best unf--k yourself or I will unscrew your head and s--t down your neck!"...Do you think I'm
cute, Private Pyle? Do you think I'm funny?... Then wipe that disgusting
grin off your face... Well, any f--king time, sweetheart!... Private
Pyle, I'm gonna give you three seconds, exactly three-f--king
seconds to wipe that stupid-lookin' grin off your face or I will
gouge out your eyeballs and skull-f--k you!") |
|
Moonstruck (1987)
The
Reality of Love - Love Ruins Everything
|
Ronny Cammareri's
(Nicolas Cage) passionate, cynical view of love expressed to Loretta
Castorini (Cher), as he pleads for her to come upstairs and make
love to him: ("Loretta, I love you. Not, not like they told you love is and
I didn't know this either. But love don't make things nice, it ruins
everything! It breaks your heart, it makes things a mess. We aren't here to make things perfect. Snowflakes are perfect, stars are
perfect. Not us! Not US! We are here to ruin ourselves and...and
to break our hearts and love the wrong people and...and DIE...I
mean, I mean the storybooks are bulls--t. Now I want you to come upstairs
with me and...and GET in my bed. Come on, come on, come on.") |
|
Planes, Trains & Automobiles (1987)
"Didn't
That Give You Some Sort of Clue?"
|
Neal Page's
(Steve Martin) furious unleashing of criticism and rage at his undesired
traveling companion Del Griffith (John Candy): ("...Didn't
you notice on the plane when you started talking, eventually I started
reading the vomit bag? Didn't that give you some sort of clue, like
maybe this guy is not enjoying it?...") |
|
Prince of Darkness (1987)
The
Nature of Reality
|
The opening,
philosophical lecture to a class by theoretical quantum physicist
Prof. Howard Birack (Victor Wong) on the nature of reality: ("We
believe nature is solid, and time a constant. Matter has substance
and time a direction. There is truth in flesh and the solid ground.
The wind may be invisible, but it's real. Smoke, fire, water, light
-- they're different! Not as to stone or steel, but they're tangible.
And we assume time is narrow because it is as a clock -- one second
is one second for everyone! Cause precedes effect -- fruit rots,
water flows downstream. We're born, we age, we die. The reverse
NEVER happens... None of this is true! Say goodbye to classical
reality!") |
|
The Princess Bride (1987)
'To the Pain' Speech
|
Partially-paralyzed Westley's (Cary Elwes) brave "To the pain!" speech while lying helpless in bed - his daring and bluffing response to the nefarious Prince Humperdinck's (Chris Sarandon) "To the death!" challenge with his sword drawn: ("No! 'To the pain'! (I don't think I'm quite familiar with that phrase.) I'll explain and I'll use small words so that you'll be sure to understand, you warthog-faced buffoon. (That may be the first time in my life a man has dared insult me.) It won't be the last. 'To the pain' means the first thing you lose will be your feet below the ankles. Then your hands at the wrists. Next your nose...I WASN'T FINISHED! The next thing you lose will be your left eye followed by your right. (And then my ears, I understand, let's get on with it.) WRONG! Your ears you keep and I'll tell you why. So that every shriek of every child at seeing your hideousness will be yours to cherish. Every babe that weeps at your approach, every woman who cries out: 'Dear God! What is that thing?!' will echo in your perfect ears. That is what 'to the pain' means. It means I leave you in anguish, wallowing in freakish misery forever. (I think you're bluffing.) It's possible, Pig, I might be bluffing. It's conceivable, you miserable, vomitous mass, that I'm only lying here because I lack the strength to stand. Then again... perhaps I have the strength after all. (He stands uneasily) DROP... YOUR... SWORD!") |
|
Radio Days (1987)
A Sports Legend ("He Had Heart") Speech
|
The narrator's (Woody Allen) recollection of radio sports columnist Bill Kern whom his Uncle Abe (Josh Mostel) loved, and the tall tale he told about an accident-prone pitcher named Kern: ("Hello, sports fans and welcome to today's edition of Bill Kern's 'Favorite Sports Legends'... Today's story is about a baseball player. His name was Kirby Kyle, a lean southpaw from Tennessee. He played for the old St. Louis Cardinals. He threw fast, and he had a good curve ball and all the hitters knew it. He was a kid with a great future, but one day, he went hunting. He loved to hunt just like his father and his father's father. Chasing a rabbit, he stumbled, and his rifle went off. The bullet entered his leg. Two days later, it was amputated. They said he would never pitch again. But the next season, he was back. He had one leg but he had something more important. He had heart. The following winter, another accident cost Kirby Kyle an arm - fortunately not his pitching arm. He had one leg and one arm, but more than, that he had heart. The next winter going after duck, his gun misfired. He was blind but he had instinct as to where to throw the baseball. Instinct...and heart. The following year, Kirby Kyle was run over by a truck and killed. The following season, he won 18 games in the Big League in the sky. This has been Bill Kern with another 'favorite sports legend.'") |
|
"Those Voices Do Seem to Grow Dimmer and Dimmer" Speech
|
The narrator's achingly poignant closing monologue (in voice-over from a nightclub rooftop in Times Square), as he remembered New Year's Eve of 1943, and how his childhood memories of the Golden Age of Radio, and his Rockaway family were fading as time passed: ("I never forgot that New Year's Eve when Aunt Bea awakened me to watch 1944 come in. And I've never forgotten any of those people or any of the voices we used to hear on the radio. Although the truth is... with the passing of each New Year's Eve, those voices do seem to grow dimmer and dimmer.") |
|
Raising Arizona (1987)
Prophetic
Dream With a Happy Ending
|
H.I. McDonnough's
(Nicolas Cage) closing dream fantasy while in bed, envisioning future
events: ("But still I hadn't dreamt nothin' about me'n Ed.
Until the end... And this was cloudier 'cause it was years, years
away. But I saw an old couple bein' visited by their children -
and all their grandchildren too. And the old couple wasn't screwed
up, and neither were their kids or their grandkids. And I don't
know, you tell me. This whole dream, was it wishful thinking? Was
I just fleein' reality, like I know I'm liable to do? But me'n Ed,
we can be good, too... and it seemed real. It seemed like us. And
it seemed like well... our home... If not Arizona, then a land,
not too far away, where all parents are strong and wise and capable,
and all children are happy and beloved... I dunno, maybe it was
Utah...") |
|
Roxanne (1987)
Elongated
Nose Joke Insults
|
Modern-day Cyrano - C.D. Bales's (Steve Martin) suggestion of at least twenty better insults about his elongated
nose, to an insulting, boorish, obnoxious, and drunken bullying customer in a crowded bar who called him "Big-Nose" - his response was listened to by the cheering crowd: ("What a waste of an opportunity!...All right, twenty something betters. Here it goes. Let's start with, uh, Obvious: Excuse me, is that your nose, or did a bus
park on your face; Meteorological: Everybody take cover, she's
going to blow!; Fashionable: You know, you could de-emphasize
your nose if you wore something larger, like Wyoming; Personal:
Well, here we are, just the three of us; Punctual: All right, Dellman,
your nose was on time, but you were fifteen minutes late; Envious:
Ooh, I wish I were you. Gosh, to be able to smell your own ear; Naughty:
Pardon me sir, some of the ladies have asked if you wouldn't mind
putting that thing away; Philosophical: It's not the size of a nose that's important, it's what's in it that matters; ...Sympathetic: Ooh, what happened? Did
your parents lose a bet with God?; Complimentary: You must love the little birdies to give them this to perch on; Scientific:
Say, does that thing there influence the tides?; Obscure: Whoa, I'd hate to see the grindstone!... Inquiry: When you stop and smell the flowers, are they afraid?;...Pornographic: Finally, a man who can satisfy two women at once!..."), before
finishing with the hostile, taunting "Dirty: Your name
wouldn't be Dick, would it?" - he then called the taunting man: "Flat-faced, flat-nosed, flat-head" before punching him unconscious |
|
"I Love Your Nose!" Speech
|
Roxanne (Daryl Hannah) delivered a heartfelt, romantic speech in the film's happy ending, to profess her love to a disbelieving, long-nosed C.D. Bales (Steve Martin), as he sat on her rooftop and listened: ("...Your eyes, your face. The way you walk. And your style. Your wit. And your nose, Charlie...I went inside and I thought what it was about Chris that attracted me. It wasn't the way he looked. Well, that's not true - at first it was the way he looked. But it was how he made me feel. He made me feel romantic, intelligent, feminine. But it wasn't him doing that to me. It was you. All these other men, Charlie, they've got flat, featureless faces. No character! No fire! No nose! Charlie - you have a big nose. You have a beautiful, great big, flesh-and-bone nose! I love your nose! I love your nose, Charlie. I love you, Charlie. Well?"); in response, he told her: "Are you kidding?", then slid down her roof onto the porch and acrobatically performed a full body somersaulting flip off the porch to the ground in front of her, where after a few awkward moments of finding the right angle and having him tilt his head to the right, she kissed him
|
|
Swimming to Cambodia (1987)
"Genocide"
|
From Spalding
Gray's 85-minute monologue - the famous, dark "genocide"
passage: ("So... five years of bombing, a diet of bark, bugs,
lizards and leaves up in the Cambodian jungles, an education in
Paris environs in a strict Maoist doctrine with a touch of Rousseau,
and other things that we will probably never know about in our lifetime
-- including, perhaps, an invisible cloud of evil that circles the
Earth and lands at random in places like Iran, Beirut, Germany,
Cambodia... America -- set the Khymer Rouge out to commit the worst
auto-homeo genocide in modern history...") |
|
| Farewell
to Thailand |
The closing
"farewell" speech, in which Gray describes his regretful
departure from Thailand (with intermittent clips shown from The
Killing Fields (1984)): "Farewell, to the fantastic breakfasts, free every morning and there they were, waiting on you
with the papaya, mango, and pineapple like I'd never tasted before.
Farewell, to the Thai maids with the king-sized cotton sheets and
the big king-sized beds. Farewell, to the fresh meat flown in from
America, daily. Roast potatoes, green beans and roast lamb, at 110
degrees under a circus tent, according to British Equity. Farewell
to the drivers with the tinted glasses and the Mercedes with the
tinted windows. Farewell to the cakes, teas and ices every day exactly
at four o'clock. Farewell to those beautiful smiling people.
Farewell to that single, fresh rose in a vase on my bureau every
day. And just as I was climbing into that first-class seat, and
wrapping myself in a blanket, just as I was adjusting my pillow
behind my head, and having a sip of that champagne, and just as
I was bringing down and adjusting my Thai purple sleep mask... I
had an inkling, I had a flash... I suddenly thought I knew what
it was that had killed Marilyn Monroe...") |
|
Wall Street (1987)
"Greed is Good"
|
# 5
Gordon Gekko's (Michael Douglas) financial advice
to the annual stockholder's meeting of Teldar Paper: ("I
am not a destroyer of companies. I am a liberator of them. The
point is, ladies and gentleman, that greed - for lack of a better
word - is good. Greed is right. Greed works. Greed clarifies,
cuts through and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit.
Greed, in all of its forms - greed for life, for money, for love,
knowledge - has marked the upward surge of mankind. And Greed
- you mark my words - will not only save Teldar Paper but that
other malfunctioning corporation called the USA. Thank you very
much.") |
|
The Witches of Eastwick (1987)
Denouncing
God for Creating Women
|
During a supernatural windstorm and after suffering from a "domestic problem...a little female problem" (he was betrayed by his female lovers/students, played by Cher, Michelle Pfeiffer and Susan Sarandon, all housewives in the New England town), devil-like Daryl Van Horne (Jack Nicholson) delivered a shouting rant to the small-town
Eastwick church congregation to angrily denounce God and the opposite sex: ("Ungrateful little bitches, aren't they?...Do you think
God knew what He was doing when He created woman? Huh? No s--t!
I really want to know. Or do you think it was just another one of his minor mistakes like tidal waves, earthquakes, floods. Do you think women are like that? (He puked) What's the matter? You don't think God makes
mistakes? Of course He does. We all make mistakes! Of course, when we
make mistakes they call it evil! When God makes mistakes, they call
it nature! (He chuckled) So whaddya think? Women. A mistake?! Or did He DO
IT TO US, ON PURPOSE!? Because I really want to know! Because if
it's a mistake maybe we can do somethin' about it! Find a cure!
Invent a vaccine! Build up our immune systems! (More chuckling) Get a little exercise!
You know, twenty push-ups a day, and you never have to be afflicted
with women EVER AGAIN!"); as he spoke the final words, the women, with a voodoo doll, poked his head with pins, causing him to fall backwards to the floor and convulse |
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