Stupid Movie Lines (13 page)
Read Stupid Movie Lines Online
Authors: Kathryn Petras
Michelangelo, make up your mind, once and for all: Do you want to finish that ceiling?
The Agony and the Ecstasy,
1965, starring Charlton Heston as Michelangelo
On One for Each Eye:
See Jane Russell in 3-D; She’ll Knock
Both
Your Eyes Out!
Ad for
The French Line,
1954
On One Million Eight Thousand One Hundred and Four Reasons to See This Film:
1,965 pyramids, 5,337 dancing girls, one million swaying bullrushes, 802 sacred bulls!
Ad for
The Egyptian,
1954
On Ooga Bonga, Meaning of:
Native Chief:
Ooga bonga dongay!
Jack:
He wants to make a deal. Six of them for Dwan.
Dwan:
Jack, can you tell him I like him, too, but not
that
way?
Dwan (Jessica Lange) explaining to Jack (Jeff Bridges) that she doesn’t want to be traded to the savage native chief, in
King Kong,
1976
On Opening Lines, Enigmatic:
Pull the string! Pull the string! Life has begun! A story must be told!
Narrator 2 (Bela Lugosi) in
Glen or Glenda?,
1953
On Opening Lines, Intriguing:
In a deserted date-palm ranch in the off-season …
Opening line of narration in
Beast with a Million Eyes,
1955
On Orders, Hard to Follow:
Suck the coffin mushroom now.
The Ultimate Vampire,
1991
On Pain and Suffering, Beyond the Pale:
It’s bad enough having no immune system, but having to wear this giant cabbage on my head is too much.
John Travolta as a boy with a rare immune disorder in the tear-jerker, disease-of-the-week film
The Boy in the Plastic Bubble,
1976
On Paleontology, Essential Facts About:
Dr. Blake:
Do you know anything about paleontology?
Molly:
I know that very attractive men study it.
Professor and young student, in
Monster on the Campus,
1958
On Parties, Downers at:
Him:
The food has been cooked, the wines chilled …
Her:
And the guest of honor’s on the bottom of the lake.
Rock Hudson and Dorothy Malone commiserating over the fact that her pilot husband has just crashed his plane instead of coming to his party in
Tarnished Angels,
1957
On Past-Life Experiences, Bad:
Ow! I’m shot!
Lyle Wheeler (Marjoe Gortner) reliving a past life as Billy the Kid under the influence of peyote in
Bobbie Jo and the Outlaw,
1976
On Past-Life Memories, Fuzzy:
Psychiatrist:
What is your name?
Hypnotized patient:
Laura Carson.
Psychiatrist:
Go on …
Hypnotized patient:
Angora sweater—was such a beautiful thing. Soft, like kitten’s fur. Felt so good on me. As if it belonged there. Felt so bad when it was gone.
Psychiatrist:
Dan, do you realize we’ve just witnessed a portion of your wife’s previous existence? … Her talk about maribou, Angora, and furlike materials … I believe that it’s derived from her past existence.
Dan:
Aw, come on. You don’t really believe she was a gorilla?
Psychiatrist:
All the evidence points to it. Her fixation for furlike materials comes from that fact.
Dan:
I’m sorry, Doctor, I just don’t buy any of this.
Psychiatrist:
Well, you have a right to your own opinion.
Psychiatrist (William Justine) takes patient (Charlotte Austin) back to her past life as a gorilla. Unfortunately, her husband (Lance Fuller) doesn’t buy it in
The Bride and the Beast,
1958
On Pat Boone Lines, Typical:
Emily:
I’ve been around.
Wayne:
Does that mean you’re a bad girl?
Ann-Margret and Pat Boone in
State Fair,
1962
On Patriotism:
We’re hoodlums—but we’re
American
hoodlums!
Frank Jenks as Jimbo, an escaped con, dealing with Nazis in
Seven Miles from Alcatraz,
1942
On Peace, Need for No War in:
If we are to live together in peace, there must be no war between us!
George Chakiris as Balam getting down to the real nitty gritty, to Yul Brynner as Chief Black Eagle in
Kings of the Sun,
1963
On Penises, Glaringly Obvious Puns and:
Let’s see how it stands up in the light of day.
Surgical nurse after the operation in the penis-transplant comedy
Percy,
1971, starring Denholm Elliott and Britt Ekland
On People, Gaseous:
People are like gas … I mean, gas fills whatever space it’s in … and people do, too.
Sexy French lover girl/philosopher/archeologist Valerie Quennessen in
Summer Lovers,
1982, also starring Daryl Hannah and Peter Gallagher
On Philistines, Snappy Comments from:
Samson:
If you had not plowed with my heifer, you would not have answered my riddle.
Philistine:
You’re a bad loser, strongman.
Samson and Delilah,
1949, starring Victor Mature and Hedy Lamarr
On Philosophical Talks About Death, Stupid:
Billy Jack:
Long ago, I learned that he’s my constant companion. He eats with me, he walks with me, he even sleeps with me.
Prosecutor:
I’m sorry, I must have missed something back there. Who is this faithful companion of yours?
Billy Jack:
Death.
Tom Laughlin (Billy), during his trial in
The Trial of Billy Jack,
1974
On Philosophy, Cool, Man:
We’re just God’s grass. We get burned and He gets a high, man.
Dennis Hopper as a drunk staying in a very bad motel where he’s about to be stabbed in
Eye of the Storm,
1991
On Philosophy Degrees, What You Learn with:
Man’s search for faith, that sort of shit.
Cool bouncer Patrick Swayze explaining what he learned while getting his philosophy degree, to Kelly Lynch in
Road House,
1989
On Pick-up Lines, One of the Worst:
Is it just me or does the jungle make you really, really horny?
Owen Wilson, as documentary sound mixer Gary in the Amazon jungle, to his coworker in
Anaconda,
1997
On Plants, Smart ’n’ Sassy:
Plants are the most cunning of all life forms!
Doc Roller (Bernard Kates) in
Seedpeople,
1992
On Pleas, Heartfelt:
I don’t want to be killed! I just want to teach English.
Panicking actor in the TV movie
Echoes in the Darkness,
1987
On the Pleasures of Life:
Texan:
A little poontang might ease your mind a bit.
Cochran:
I killed a man I hated today.
Texan:
I got ya. You don’t want to mix your pleasures.
James Gammon (Texan) and Kevin Costner (Cochran) as two down-and-outers bent on revenge against Anthony Quinn in
Revenge,
1990
On Poems About Electricity, Bad:
Oh, I had worshiped thee, false god,
For thou art false—electricity!
But one day, our god Kilowatt left us;
Could we then go back to the gods of our childhood?
To reindeer?
Santa Claus?
Poem written and recited by rich poetess Olivia de Havilland when she’s trapped in an elevator in
Lady in a Cage,
1964
On Poems, Monstrously Bad:
Atomic bombs, hydrogen bombs,
and radioactive fallout
Fall into the sea.
Godzilla would rage,
If he could see.
He’d turn the page
And clear it for you and me.
Poem written and read by youngster Ken to a rapt audience in
Godzilla vs. the Smog Monster,
1972
On Points About Demons, Good:
I may not be able to kill you, but I can dismember you.
Girl to demon in
The Granny,
1995
THE STUPIDEST QUASI-INTELLECTUAL MOVIE LINES
H
ollywood, many insiders say, is not the most intellectual of places. People spend their free time in pursuits other than talking about the meaning of life or what Spinoza really meant.
Yet, all too often, a film character is called upon to say something (theoretically) profound. How can one be sure that the not-terribly-profound profundity is adequately appreciated by the audience?
Often screenwriters take the simplest route—have one character say the erstwhile profound line, then have the next character reply by saying something such as, “That was very profound.” (This, of course, is designed to tip off any confused viewers.)
Other screenwriters—particularly those who believe in their own mighty intellectualism—opt for the more highbrow: A character spouts forth a slew of random words and thoughts, most often in a bored manner. The savvy viewer will notice that these lines make no sense. This is the vital clue that something profound was just said.
In either case, the results, if not thought-provoking, are singularly laughter-provoking.
On Time, Ponderous Thoughts About:
Girl:
What are you thinking about?
Boy:
Time.
Girl:
It’s about two-thirty.
Boy:
I meant centuries. I was thinking about the guy who made this [Greek ruin]. His work is still here after two thousand years. What was he thinkin’ when he chipped right there?
Daryl Hannah and Peter Gallagher as young American lovers vacationing in Greece in
Summer Lovers,
1982
On Ugliness, Wisdom About:
Ugly bad guy:
Maybe if a man is ugly, he does ugly things.
Plastic surgeon:
You are saying something profound.
Boris Karloff (ugly guy) and Bela Lugosi (surgeon) having a discussion in
The Raven,
1935
On Existential Observations About Hotel Hallways:
Once again everything was deserted in the immense hotel. Empty salons, corridors, salons, doors, doors, salons … empty chairs, deep armchairs … stairs, steps, steps one after another … glass objects, empty glasses … a dropped glass, a glass partition … letters, a lost letter … keys hanging from their rings … marked door keys, 309, 307, 305, 303 … chandeliers, chandeliers, pearls, mirrors … corridors without a soul in sight … and the garden, like all else, was deserted.
Fascinating monologue delivered by the intense young man X (Giorgio Albertazzi) intent on finding a woman he might have known, in
Last Year at Marienbad,
1962
On Dialogue, Anyway but Good:
There’s a thousand sides to everything, not just heroes and villains.… So anyway … so anyway … so anyway … “So anyway” ought to be one word. Like a place or a river.
Daria Halprin, a far-out young woman in
Zabriskie Point,
1970