What is the greatest MONOLOGUE in movie history?

[battleknight24]

Since all you guys will mainly mention monologues from really famous films, I will mention what I believe to be, if not one of the greatest, one of the most UNDERRATED monologues in movie history.

Reading it on paper will not do it justice. Seeing a short clip of it on Youtube will not do it justice. Seeing the entire movie- soaking it in- and then seeing this part of the film will break your heart.

*

Kicking & Screaming
written by Noah Baumbach and Oliver Berkman




Grover: Are there any flights to Prague?

Ticket Agent (Jessica Hecht): We have our shuttle that goes to international terminals, then you change for Paris and change there for Prague.

Grover: And the shuttle, that leaves when?

Ticket Agent: In an hour.

Grover: Put me on it.

Ticket Agent: Oh, I'm sorry sir, that flight's all booked.

Grover: Look, everybody else in America's already been to Prague. What's the big deal if you send on extra? (Pause) I'm sorry. You see, I've been needing to go there for a long time now. I mean there's Czech and Slovakia, and a big Jewish cemetery, and the opera house. Maybe that's Vienna where the opera house is. But that's near by. You know, and given the opportunity I'd hit Vienna too. Hell, I'd do all of Europe if given the chance. I can imagine Jane and some Pragueian idiot dancing the night away. Horrible image. And the coffee. See, all I know is American coffee. Or the beer, or whatever is good over there. It's got to all be better over there. I mean, nothing I eat has any taste. It's been such a strange time. What if I was there now? How would things be different? Isn't there a big bridge with statues on it? I seem to remember that from a history class. I mean, Jane and some guy kissing on the bridge, in public. Probably some Czech writer. The image kills me. That's great. This is so frustrating because I'm terrible at conflict. I hate it. And if I would have imagined this problem while falling asleep at night I don't think I would have spoken up to you. Even in my fantasy life, I would have just accepted it. That's who I am. But today I have to go, I have to. And when I tell people about this in the future, I know that, uh, it'll be the time that I went. I know that when I review this whole episode in my head I'm not going to know what I did, or why I did it. I don't know, maybe I've done something to the real Grover. But it'll make a good story in my young adult life. The time I chose to go to Prague. I'll look back on it and won't believe that I actually went. You know, I went away. So let me go. I have to, I need. Just put me on the plane. Let me go.

Ticket Agent: I think I can find a seat for you. (takes Grover's credit card) Very good Mr. Carey. Now, I'll just need to see your passport. (Grover realizes that he doesn't have his passport.) You can always go tomorrow.

*

If you really want to see this scene, type in "Go to Prague" when you search on Youtube. But you must view the entire movie from start to finish to really feel how powerful it is, in my opinion.

Peace,

[MrScorpio]

1. Dr. Evil's Childhood monologue

Dr. Evil: The details of my life are quite inconsequential.

Therapist (Carrie Fisher): Oh no, please, please, let's hear about your childhood.

Dr Evil: Very well, where do I begin? My father was a relentlessly self-improving boulangerie owner from Belgium with low grade narcolepsy and a penchant for buggery. My mother was a fifteen year old French prostitute named Chloe with webbed feet. My father would womanize, he would drink, he would make outrageous claims like he invented the question mark. Some times he would accuse chestnuts of being lazy, the sort of general malaise that only the genius possess and the insane lament. My childhood was typical, summers in Rangoon, luge lessons. In the spring we'd make meat helmets. When I was insolent I was placed in a burlap bag and beaten with reeds, pretty standard really. At the age of 12 I received my first scribe. At the age of fourteen, a Zoroastrian named Vilma ritualistically shaved my testicles. There really is nothing like a shorn scrotum, it's breathtaking, I suggest you try it.

Therapist: You know, we have to stop.

[The Doctor.]

2. Oh, The Holy Hand Grenade is always near the top of this list...

"...And Saint Attila raised the hand grenade up on high, saying, "O Lord, bless this Thy hand grenade that with it Thou mayest blow Thine enemies to tiny bits, in Thy mercy." And the Lord did grin and the people did feast upon the lambs and sloths and carp and anchovies and orangutans and breakfast cereals, and fruit bats and large chu... {"skip a bit, brother"}... And the Lord spake, saying, "First shalt thou take out the Holy Pin, then shalt thou count to three, no more, no less. Three shall be the number thou shalt count, and the number of the counting shall be three. Four shalt thou not count, neither count thou two, excepting that thou then proceed to three. Five is right out. Once the number three, being the third number, be reached, then lobbest thou thy Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch towards thy foe, who being naughty in my sight, shall snuff it." Amen."

[Zavulon]

3. I'm not sure, but it's got to be in Pulp Fiction.

For now, I'll go with Samuel L. Jackson's "The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the iniquities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he, who in the name of charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother's keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who would attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know my name is the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon thee."

[Shell Beau]

50. Yep! Gotta love that one.

[Heidi]

4. Chaplin's "Unite" monologue in "The Great Dictator." Here's the video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1r0kT4q1B4

[Tom Kitten]

5. Tom Joad, Grapes Of Wrath

IMHO, hands down...

Well, maybe it's like Casey says. A fella ain't got a soul of his own, just a little piece of a big soul - the one big soul that belongs to ever'body. Then...then, it don't matter. I'll be all around in the dark. I'll be ever'-where - wherever you can look. Wherever there's a fight so hungry people can eat, I'll be there. Wherever there's a cop beatin' up a guy, I'll be there. I'll be in the way guys yell when they're mad - I'll be in the way kids laugh when they're hungry an' they know supper's ready. An' when the people are eatin' the stuff they raise, and livin' in the houses they build - I'll be there, too.

[Oeditpus Rex]

6. No question — Eric Idle as Mr. Smoketoomuch

in "Monty Python Live at the Hollywood Bowl."

The mind-boggling thing is that it was done live, and for about a third of it he was walking, and at times running, among the audience, so cue cards were not possible.

(Note: He can't pronounce the letter 'c'.)

Why, why, what's the point of going abroad if you're just going to be treated like a sheep? Carted around in buses surrounded by sweaty mindless oaves from Kettering and Boventry. Their bloth baps and their bardigans and their transistor radios, bomplaining about the tea — "Oh, they don't make it properly, do they?" And stopping at endless Majorcan bodegas selling fish and chips and Watney's Red Barrel and calamaries and two veg, and sitting in their cotton sun frocks, squirting Timothy White's sun cream all over their puffy, raw, swollen, purulent flesh 'cos they overdid it on the first day, and being herded into endless Hotel Miramars and Bellevueses, Bontinentals with their international luxury modern roomettes and swimming pools full of draught Red Barrel and fat German businessmen pretending to be acrobats and forming pyramids and frightening the children and barging into the queues. And if you're not at your table spot on seven you miss your bowl of Campbell's Cream of Mushroom Soup, the first item in the menu of International Cuisine. Every Thursday night there's bloody cabaret in the bar featuring some tiny, emaciated dago with nine-inch hips and some fat bloated tart with her hair Brylcreemed down and big arse presenting Flamenco for Foreigners, and adenoidal typists from Birmingham with flabby white legs and diarrhea trying to pick up hairy, bandy-legged, wop waiters called Manuel. And once a week there's an excursion to local Roman remains, where you can buy cherryade and melted ice cream and bleedin' Watney's Red Barrel. And one night they take you to a typical restaurant with local atmosphere and color and you sit next to a party of people from Rhyl who keep singing "I love the Costa Brava! I love the Costa Brava!" And you get cornered by some drunken greengrocer from Luton with an Instamatic camera and last Tuesday's Daily Express and he drones on and on and on about how Ian Smith should be running the country and how many languages Margaret Powell can speak and then she throws up all over the cuba libres. And spending four days on the tarmac at Luton Airport on a five-day package tour with nothing to eat but dry British Airways-type sandwiches. And you can't even get a glass of Watney's Red Barrel because you're still in England and the bloody bar closes every time you're thirsty. And the kids are crying and vomiting and breaking the plastic ashtrays. They keep telling you it'll only be another hour, but you know damned well your plane is still in Iceland and has to come back and take a party of Swedes to Yugoslavia before it can load you up at 3 a.m. in the morning. And then you sit on the tarmac for four hours because of unforeseen difficulties, i.e. the permanent strike of air traffic control over Paris. When you finally get to Malaga airport, everybody's queueing for the bloody toilet and queueing for the bloody armed customs officers and queueing for the bloody bus that isn't there, waiting to take you to the hotel that hasn't yet been built. When you finally get to the half-built Algerian ruin called the Hotel del Sol, by paying half your holiday money to a licensed bandit in a taxi, there's no water in the pool, there's no water in the bog, there's no water in the tap, there's only a bleeding lizard in the bidet, and half the rooms are double-booked, and you can't sleep anyway, 'cause of the permanent 24-hour drilling of the foundations of the hotel next door. Meanwhile, the Spanish National Tourist Board promises you the raging cholera epidemic is merely a mild outbreak of Spanish Tummy, rather like the previous outbreak in 1616 even the bloody rats are dying from it! Meanwhile, the bloody Guardia are busy arresting 16-year-olds for kissing in the streets. And finally, on the last day in the airport lounge, everybody's buying little awful horrid donkeys with their names on, and bullfight posters with their own names on, like Antonio ----, Mr Brian Pules of Norwich. And then finally when you get to bloody Luton, you're ---- around for another four hours, while they find a plane that has to take you back to Manchester. And when you finally get to Manchester, there's only another bloody bus you have to wait 16 hours for...



Here's the video, which includes the first part of the bit, but it cuts off just before he's finished: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDZl9WvCim4

[The Doctor.]

8. Those guys were the monologue kings....

...er... and sometimes queens.

And so much of it improvised.

[pokerfan]

7. Jaws

Hooper: You were on the Indianapolis?

Brody: What happened?

Quint: Japanese submarine slammed two torpedoes into our side, chief. It was comin' back, from the island of Tinian Delady, just delivered the bomb. The Hiroshima bomb. Eleven hundred men went into the water. Vessel went down in twelve minutes. Didn't see the first shark for about a half an hour. Tiger. Thirteen footer. You know, you know that when you're in the water, chief? You tell by lookin' from the dorsal to the tail. Well, we didn't know. `Cause our bomb mission had been so secret, no distress signal had been sent. Huh huh. They didn't even list us overdue for a week. Very first light, chief. The sharks come cruisin'. So we formed ourselves into tight groups. You know it's... kinda like `ol squares in battle like a, you see on a calendar, like the battle of Waterloo. And the idea was, the shark would go for nearest man and then he'd start poundin' and hollerin' and screamin' and sometimes the shark would go away. Sometimes he wouldn't go away. Sometimes that shark, he looks right into you. Right into your eyes. You know the thing about a shark, he's got...lifeless eyes, black eyes, like a doll's eye. When he comes at ya, doesn't seem to be livin'. Until he bites ya and those black eyes roll over white. And then, ah then you hear that terrible high pitch screamin' and the ocean turns red and spite of all the poundin' and the hollerin' they all come in and rip you to pieces. Y'know by the end of that first dawn, lost a hundred men! I don't know how many sharks, maybe a thousand! I don't know how many men, they averaged six an hour. On Thursday mornin' chief, I bumped into a friend of mine, Herbie Robinson from Cleveland. Baseball player, boson's mate. I thought he was asleep, reached over to wake him up. Bobbed up and down in the water, just like a kinda top. Up ended. Well... he'd been bitten in half below the waist. Noon the fifth day, Mr. Hooper, a Lockheed Ventura saw us, he swung in low and he saw us. He'd a young pilot, a lot younger than Mr. Hooper, anyway he saw us and come in low. And three hours later a big fat PBY comes down and start to pick us up. You know that was the time I was most frightened? Waitin' for my turn. I'll never put on a lifejacket again. So, eleven hundred men went in the water, three hundred and sixteen men come out, the sharks ttook the rest, June the 29, 1945. Anyway, we delivered the bomb.

[southpaw]

19. I saw Jaws when I was 10 or 11 years old

and I was riveted by Robert Shaw's 'Indianapolis Story.'

Stuff like this made Jaws a truly great movie, in contrast to the series of sequels...

[Iggo]

20. That one's hard to beat.

Still makes my hair stand on end.

[Rambis]

33. Gets my vote and here it is...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-o_JxDtOoIE

55 seconds in

:hi:

[ET Awful]

9. I'm not a huge Matt Damon fan, but . . . Good Will Hunting has one of my favorites

Why shouldn't I work for the NSA?

That's a tough one, but I'll take a shot…

Say I'm working at the NSA and somebody puts a code on my desk, something that no one else can break. Maybe I take a shot at it and maybe I break it.

I'm real happy with myself because I did my job well but maybe that code was the location of some rebel army in North Africa or the Middle East and once they have that location, they bomb the village where the rebels are hiding. Fifteen hundred people that I never met, never had no problem with, get killed.

Now the politicians are saying, "Oh, send in the Marines to secure the area" 'cause they don't give a shit. It won't be their kid over there getting shot just like it wasn't them when their number got called because they were all pulling a tour in the National Guard. It'll be some kid from Southie over there taking shrapnel in the ass. He comes back to find that the plant he used to work at got exported to the country he just got back from and the guy who put the shrapnel in his ass got his old job because he'll work for fifteen cents a day and no bathroom breaks.

Meanwhile, he realizes the only reason he was over there in the first place was so that we could install a government that would sell us oil at a good price. And of course the oil companies use a little skirmish over there to scare up domestic oil prices. A cute little ancillary benefit for them, but it ain't helping my buddy at two-fifty a gallon. They're taking their sweet time bringing the oil back of course, maybe they even took the liberty to hire an alcoholic skipper who likes to drink martinis and fuckin' play slalom with the icebergs.

It ain't too long till he hits one, spills the oil and kills all the sea life in the North Atlantic. So now my buddy's out of work, he can't afford to drive so he's walking to the fuckin' job interviews, which sucks because the shrapnel in his ass is giving him chronic hemorrhoids. And meanwhile he's starving because every time he tries to get a bite to eat, the only blue-plate special they're serving is Northern Atlantic Scrod with Quaker State.

So what do I think? … I'm holding out for something better. I figure fuck it. While I'm at it why not just shoot my buddy, take his job, give it to his sworn enemy, hike up gas prices, bomb a village, club a baby seal, hit the hash pipe, and join the National Guard. I could be elected president. Thanks a ton!

[GCP]

12. That's the one I immediately thought of

It was an absolutely brilliant riff, and I don't know if either he or Ben wrote it, or they stole it, but it's still brilliant!

[I Have A Dream]

15. Yep - that's mine also! It gives me chills when I hear it. nt

[ghostsofgiants]

23. I'll second that one.

[terrya]

10. A classic monologue from "Network"

As delivered by Ned Beatty as Arthur Jensen, head of the Communication Corporation of America, to Howard Beale (Peter Finch). Still fucking brilliant.

Arthur Jensen: You have meddled with the primal forces of nature, Mr. Beale, and I won't have it! Is that clear? You think you've merely stopped a business deal. That is not the case! The Arabs have taken billions of dollars out of this country, and now they must put it back! It is ebb and flow, tidal gravity! It is ecological balance! You are an old man who thinks in terms of nations and peoples. There are no nations. There are no peoples. There are no Russians. There are no Arabs. There are no third worlds. There is no West. There is only one holistic system of systems, one vast and immane, interwoven, interacting, multivariate, multinational dominion of dollars. Petro-dollars, electro-dollars, multi-dollars, reichmarks, rins, rubles, pounds, and shekels. It is the international system of currency which determines the totality of life on this planet. That is the natural order of things today. That is the atomic and subatomic and galactic structure of things today! And YOU have meddled with the primal forces of nature, and YOU...WILL...ATONE!

Arthur Jensen: Am I getting through to you, Mr. Beale? You get up on your little twenty-one inch screen and howl about America and democracy. There is no America. There is no democracy. There is only IBM, and ITT, and AT&T, and DuPont, Dow, Union Carbide, and Exxon. Those *are* the nations of the world today. What do you think the Russians talk about in their councils of state, Karl Marx? They get out their linear programming charts, statistical decision theories, minimax solutions, and compute the price-cost probabilities of their transactions and investments, just like we do. We no longer live in a world of nations and ideologies, Mr. Beale. The world is a college of corporations, inexorably determined by the immutable bylaws of business. The world is a business, Mr. Beale. It has been since man crawled out of the slime. And our children will live, Mr. Beale, to see that . . . perfect world . . . in which there's no war or famine, oppression or brutality. One vast and ecumenical holding company, for whom all men will work to serve a common profit, in which all men will hold a share of stock. All necessities provided, all anxieties tranquilized, all boredom amused. And I have chosen you, Mr. Beale, to preach this evangel.

[ForrestGump]

11. He worked one day on that film, was onscreen mere minutes, and got nominated for an Oscar

on the strength of that performance. That scene is still brilliant and as relevant today (more so, probably) as the day it was filmed.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_AI8mC8XucY

[hellbound-liberal]

17. That was AWESOME, terrya! Network was my first choice too but this is the scene that I had in mind

Mad as Hell

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=90ELleCQvew

[Enrique]

13. George Bailey telling off Mr. Potter in "It's a Wonderful Life"

and it goes for you too!

[sarge43]

14. "I have no sons". Henry's 'my life when it is written ...' The Lion in Winter n/t

[mainegreen]

16. Christopher Walken's monologue in 'The Comfort of Strangers' is damned good.

That one really sticks out as having left a 'damn, man, damn' impression on me.

[YankeyMCC]

18. Bluto in Animal house

rallying the Deltas.

[ghostsofgiants]

24. He was indeed on a roll.

[bif]

21. Henry V

Kenneth Brannaugh's St. Crispen's Day speech to the troops before they go into battle.

Here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDZVxbrW7Ow

[Orsino]

28. Beat me to it.

I'm not a hooah soldier-type anymore, except for a few fleeting moments when Branagh's voice and the music swell in this speech. He makes dying for an inbred elitist sound pretty damned good.

[SidneyCarton]

36. Yeah, but the only reason he makes dying for him look good

Is because he is resolved to die with his men. The utter lack of hypocrisy in that speech is what inspires.

[Orsino]

47. Well, the "if the cause be not good" question is begged...

...and his actual ability to refuse ransom is side-stepped. He wasn't really in as much danger as were his men, depending on how much hand-to-hand fighting he indulged in.

But he makes us believe, and that's enough for a play. Branagh's performance, in turn, is good enough for a king--the warmongering king we would want to have, if we have to have warmongering kings.

[SidneyCarton]

51. Agreed.

Maybe we yearn for it all the more, knowing that our current leader is essentially a warmongering coward.

[Orsino]

53. You are completely and totally wrong to try to force a parallel with current events.

A war for property, abetted by religious leaders and propagandists of the day, initiated by the ego of a formerly dissolute monarch and son of royalty, and fought by a cross-section of a nation's citizenry who hardly dare question it, has absolutely nothing to do with any modern American events.

:evilgrin:

:toast:

[SidneyCarton]

54. Oh crap, for a moment I thought you were being serious!!!

L oh freakin L

:spray:

[montanto]

32. Henry V is Shakespeare.

If we are gonna include Shakespeare there are too many to mention.

[SidneyCarton]

34. Amen, one of the greatest monolouges in the history of the english language.

[tigereye]

44. yes, Shakespearean monologues are always good...

esp. if delivered by a really good actor or actress.

[PassingFair]

22. Arthur Kirkland.

"You're out of order! You're out of order! The whole trial is out of order! They're out of order! That man, that sick, crazy, depraved man, raped and beat that woman there, and he'd like to do it again! He *told* me so! It's just a show! It's a show! It's "Let's Make A Deal"! "Let's Make A Deal"! Hey Frank, you wanna "Make A Deal"? I got an insane judge who likes to beat the shit out of women! Whaddya wanna gimme Frank, 3 weeks probation?"

Not really a monologue, though.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIAODV43YGU

Dr. Evil is a good choice, and
Ned Beatty's turn as Arthur Jensen
is MAGNIFICENT!

[Steerpike]

25. true romance

the dennis hopper mono

[southpaw]

26. Gary Cooper in The Fountainhead

:hide:

I kid!

[Tripper11]

27. For some reason this one popped in my head

Always worth a good laugh! More of a rant perhaps...either way.

Steve Martin in Planes, Trains & Automobiles after he got hosed on the rental car!

Welcome to Marathon. May I help you?

Yes.

How may I help you?

You can start by wiping that fucking dumb-ass smile off your rosy fucking cheeks. Then give me a fucking automobile.
A fucking Datsun,a fucking Toyota, a fucking Buick. Four fucking wheels and a seat.

I don't care for the way you're speaking.

I don't care for the way your company left me in fucking nowhere with keys to a fucking car that isn't fucking there.
I didn't care to fucking walk down a fucking highway and across a fucking runway to get back here to have you smile
at my fucking face. I want a fucking car right fucking now.

May I see your rental agreement?

I threw it away.

Oh, boy.

Oh, boy, what?

You're fucked.

[MrCoffee]

29. I love Carlito Brigante's address to the court

"I want to thank that man, Mr. Norwalk, for making the tapes in an illegal fashion. I want to thank the Court of Appeals for overturning you, Your Honor, and I want to thank Almighty God, without whom no case gets tossed."

[Starbucks Anarchist]

30. Arthur Jensen (Ned Beatty) in "Network."

The clip is even better.

Jensen: You have meddled with the primal forces of nature, Mr. Beale, and I won't have it!! Is that clear?! You think you've merely stopped a business deal. That is not the case. The Arabs have taken billions of dollars out of this country, and now they must put it back! It is ebb and flow, tidal gravity! It is ecological balance!

You are an old man who thinks in terms of nations and peoples. There are no nations. There are no peoples. There are no Russians. There are no Arabs. There are no third worlds. There is no West. There is only one holistic system of systems, one vast and immane, interwoven, interacting, multivariate, multinational dominion of dollars. Petro-dollars, electro-dollars, multi-dollars, reichmarks, rins, rubles, pounds, and shekels.

It is the international system of currency which determines the totality of life on this planet. That is the natural order of things today. That is the atomic and subatomic and galactic structure of things today! And YOU have meddled with the primal forces of nature, and YOU WILL ATONE!

Am I getting through to you, Mr. Beale?

You get up on your little twenty-one inch screen and howl about America and democracy. There is no America. There is no democracy. There is only IBM and ITT and AT&T and DuPont, Dow, Union Carbide, and Exxon. Those are the nations of the world today.

What do you think the Russians talk about in their councils of state -- Karl Marx? They get out their linear programming charts, statistical decision theories, minimax solutions, and compute the price-cost probabilities of their transactions and investments, just like we do.

We no longer live in a world of nations and ideologies, Mr. Beale. The world is a college of corporations, inexorably determined by the immutable bylaws of business. The world is a business, Mr. Beale. It has been since man crawled out of the slime. And our children will live, Mr. Beale, to see that perfect world in which there's no war or famine, oppression or brutality -- one vast and ecumenical holding company, for whom all men will work to serve a common profit, in which all men will hold a share of stock, all necessities provided, all anxieties tranquilized, all boredom amused.

[bif]

31. Dennis Hoper's rant in Apocalypse Now

Was pretty good too.

[BarenakedLady]

35. I've always been fond of this one

Spencer Tracy in Guess Who's Coming To Dinner. The monologue about his daughter's interracial relationship with Sidney Poitier's character. It just touches me because he died so soon after and for his true life love for Katharine Hepburn who played his wife.

Matt: Now it became clear that we had one single day in which to make up our minds as to how we felt about this whole situation. So what happened? My wife typically enough decided to simply ignore every practical aspect of the situation, and was carried in some kind of romantic haze which made her in my view totally inaccessible to anything in the way of reason.
Now I have not as yet referred to His Reverence, who began by forcing his way into the situation, and insulted my intelligence by mouthing 300 platitudes and ending just a half hour ago by coming up to my room and challenging me to a wrestling match.
Now, Mr. Prentice, clearly a most reasonable man, says he has no wish to offend me, but wants to know if I'm some kind of a nut. And Mrs. Prentice says, that like her husband, that I'm a burnt out old shell of a man, who cannot even remember what its like to love a woman the way her son loves my daughter ... and strange as it seems, that's the first statement made to me all day with which I'm prepared to take issue. Cause I think you're wrong. You're as wrong as you can be.
I admit that I hadn't considered it, hadn't even thought about it but I know exactly how he feels about her, and there is nothing, absolutely nothing, that your son feels for my daughter that I didn't feel for Christina. Old? Yes. Burnt out? Certainly. But I can tell you the memories are still there -- clear, intact, indestructible. And they'll be there if I live to be 110. Where John made his mistake I think was attaching so much importance to what her mother and I might think. 'Cause in the final analysis it doesn't matter a damn what we think the only thing that matters is what they feel, and how much they feel for each other. And if it's half of what we felt ... that's everything.

[Hell Hath No Fury]

37. Henry Fonda as Tom Joad in "The Grapes of Wrath"...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8wke1RBvcN


"Well, maybe it's like Casy says. A fella ain't got a soul of his own, just a little piece of a big soul - the one big soul that belongs to ever'body. Then...then, it don't matter. I'll be all around in the dark. I'll be ever'-where - wherever you can look. Wherever there's a fight so hungry people can eat, I'll be there. Wherever there's a cop beatin' up a guy, I'll be there. I'll be in the way guys yell when they're mad - I'll be in the way kids laugh when they're hungry an' they know supper's ready. An' when the people are eatin' the stuff they raise, and livin' in the houses they build - I'll be there, too."


Here is a great side with a listing fo best monologues:

http://www.filmsite.org/bestspeeches.html

I completely forgot about Jimmy Stewart in "Mr Smith Goes to Washington" -- one of the best, ever.

[Forkboy]

38. The opening speech by George C. Scott in Patton.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YDecLiA_Qbw



Be seated.

Patton salutes during 'Ruffles and Flourishes'.Now, I want you to remember that no bastard ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor dumb bastard die for his country. Men, all this stuff you’ve heard about America not wanting to fight, wanting to stay out of the war, is a lot of horse dung. Americans traditionally love to fight. All real Americans love the sting of battle. When you were kids, you all admired the champion marble shooter, the fastest runner, the big league ball player, the toughest boxer. Americans love a winner and will not tolerate a loser. Americans play to win all the time. I wouldn’t give a hoot in hell for a man who lost and laughed. That’s why Americans have never lost and will never lose a war. Because the very thought of losing is hateful to Americans.

Now, an Army is a team. It lives, eats, sleeps, fights as a team. This individuality stuff is a bunch of crap. The bilious bastards who wrote that stuff about individuality for the Saturday Evening Post don’t know anything more about real battle than they do about fornicating.

We have the finest food and equipment, the best spirit and the best men in the world. You know, by God I actually pity those poor bastards we’re going up against. By God, I do. We’re not just going to shoot the bastards, we’re going to cut out their living guts and use them to grease the treads of our tanks. We’re going to murder those lousy Hun bastards by the bushel.

Now, some of you boys, I know, are wondering whether or not you'll chicken out under fire. Don't worry about it. I can assure you that you will all do your duty. The Nazis are the enemy. Wade into them. Spill their blood. Shoot them in the belly. When you put your hand into a bunch of goo that a moment before was your best friend's face, you'll know what to do.

Now there’s another thing I want you to remember. I don’t want to get any messages saying that we are holding our position. We’re not holding anything. Let the Hun do that. We are advancing constantly and we’re not interested in holding onto anything except the enemy. We're going to hold onto him by the nose and we're going to kick him in the ass. We're going to kick the hell out of him all the time and we're gonna go through him like crap through a goose.

There’s one thing that you men will be able to say when you get back home. And you may thank God for it. Thirty years from now when you’re sitting around your fireside with your grandson on your knee and he asks you what did you do in the great World War II, you won’t have to say, "Well, I shoveled shit in Louisiana."

Alright now, you sons-of-bitches, you know how I feel. Oh, and I will be proud to lead you wonderful guys into battle – anytime, anywhere.

That’s all.

[terrya]

49. Excellent choice.

That is a good monologue.

[SidneyCarton]

55. Patton was crazy.

I'm glad he was on our side.

[Mr. Blonde]

39. 3 worthy of nomination that haven't been mentioned

Patton
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Y9gXgcW5xs

Glengarry Glen Ross
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-AXTx4PcKI

25th Hour
http://youtube.com/watch?v=ponWum-8JRc

Don't make me pick a favorite.

[SurfingAtWork]

40. My personal favorite is the Eddie Barzoon Monologue from Devils Advocate

John Milton:
Eddie Barzoon.
Eddie Barzoon!
Ha! I nursed him through two divorces, a cocaine rehab, and a pregnant receptionist.
God's creature, right?
God's special creature?
Ha! And I've warned him, Kevin, I've warned him every step of the way.
Watching him bounce around like a fucking game, like a wind-up toy!
Like 250 pounds of self-serving greed on wheels!
The next thousand years is right around the corner, Kevin, and Eddie Barzoon--take a good look.
Because he's the poster child for the next millennium!
These people, it's no mystery where they come from.
You sharpen the human appetite to the point where it could split atoms with its desire, you build egos the size of cathedrals, fiberopticly connect the world to every-eager-impulse, grease even the dullest dreams with these dollar-green gold-played fantasies until every human becomes an aspiring emperor!
Becomes his own God!
Where can you go from there?
And as for scrambling from one deal to the next, who's got his eye on the planet?
As the air thickens, the water sours, even the bees honey takes on the metallic taste of radioactivity--and it just keeps coming!
And it just keeps coming!
Faster and faster!
There's no chance to think, to prepare, it's `buy futures, sell futures' when there is no future!!
We've got a runaway train, boy!!
We've got a billion Eddie Barzoons all jogging into the future.
Every one of them reading to fist-fuck God's ex-planet, lick their fingers clean as they reach out with their pristine cybernetic keyboards to total up their billable hours!!
And then it hits home!
It's a little late in the game to buy out now!!
Your belly's too full, your dick is sore, your eyes are bloodshot, and you're screaming for someone to help!!
But guess what?
There's no one there!!
You're all alone, Eddie!!
You're God's special little creature!!
Maybe it's true. Maybe God threw the dice once too often. Maybe He let us all down.

[SidneyCarton]

56. Even the Devil can speak the truth...

When it serves his purposes.

:evilgrin:

[mitchum]

41. This one by Robert Blake...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yk9rnAymsW8

sheer poetry spoken by a murderous "gimpy little aspirin freak"

[montanto]

42. I love the smell of napalm in the morning . . .

Apocalypse Now! Kilgore: "You smell that? Do you smell that? ... Napalm, son. Nothing else in the world smells like that. I love the smell of napalm in the morning. You know, one time we had a hill bombed, for twelve hours. When it was all over I walked up. We didn't find one of 'em, not one stinkin' dink body. The smell, you know that gasoline smell, the whole hill. Smelled like ... victory. Someday this war's gonna end ...(said sadly)"

That scene says it all: all of our national drives, desires, jingoism, racism, demonization, waste, futility, effort for nothing but corporate profit; it sums up the entire movie, it sums up Heart of Darkness; its sad; its us.

[tigereye]

43. Jimmy Stewart in Mr. Deeds Goes to Washington

John Belushi in Animal House



Ruth Gordon in Harold and Maude has some good ones...


I can't think of any others at the moment... well, except some Katharine Hepburn speeches....

[azmouse]

45. deleted... been posted already. sorry.

[Bombero1956]

46. A Few Good Men

Jessep: You can't handle the truth! Son, we live in a world that has walls. And those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Who's gonna do it? You? You, Lt. Weinberg? I have a greater responsibility than you can possibly fathom. You weep for Santiago and you curse the Marines. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know: that Santiago's death, while tragic, probably saved lives. And my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, saves lives...You don't want the truth. Because deep down, in places you don't talk about at parties, you want me on that wall. You need me on that wall.


We use words like honor, code, loyalty...we use these words as the backbone to a life spent defending something. You use 'em as a punchline. I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom I provide, then questions the manner in which I provide it! I'd rather you just said thank you and went on your way. Otherwise, I suggest you pick up a weapon and stand a post. Either way, I don't give a damn what you think you're entitled to!

[PBS Poll-435]

48. One of my faves

Miranda Priestly: Something funny?

Andy Sachs: No, no, nothing. Y'know, it's just that both those belts look exactly the same to me. Y'know, I'm still learning about all this stuff.

Miranda Priestly: This... 'stuff'? Oh... ok. I see, you think this has nothing to do with you. You go to your closet and you select out, oh I don't know, that lumpy blue sweater, for instance, because you're trying to tell the world that you take yourself too seriously to care about what you put on your back. But what you don't know is that that sweater is not just blue, it's not turquoise, it's not lapis, it's actually cerulean. You're also blithely unaware of the fact that in 2002, Oscar De La Renta did a collection of cerulean gowns. And then I think it was Yves St Laurent, wasn't it, who showed cerulean military jackets? I think we need a jacket here. And then cerulean quickly showed up in the collections of 8 different designers. Then it filtered down through the department stores and then trickled on down into some tragic casual corner where you, no doubt, fished it out of some clearance bin. However, that blue represents millions of dollars and countless jobs and so it's sort of comical how you think that you've made a choice that exempts you from the fashion industry when, in fact, you're wearing the sweater that was selected for you by the people in this room. From a pile of stuff.

[johnnie]

52. This was excellent the first time I saw it

From "And Justice For All" with Al Pacino:

Well actually it is more of a scene than a monologue, but....



Arthur Kirkland: The one thing that bothered me, the one thing that stayed in my mind and I couldn't get rid of it, that haunted me, was why. Why would she lie? What was her motive for lying? If my client is innocent, she's lying, why? Was it blackmail? No. Was it jealousy? No. Yesterday I found out why. She doesn't have a motive, you know why? Because she's not lying... And ladies and gentlemen of the jury, the prosecution is not going to get that man today, no, because I'm gonna get him! my client, the Honorable Henry T. Fleming, should go right to fucking jail! The son of a bitch is guilty!
That man is guilty! That man, there, that man is a slime! he is a *slime*! If he's allowed to go free, then something really wrong is goin' on here!

Judge Rayford: Mr. Kirkland you are out of order!

Arthur Kirkland: You're out of order! You're out of order! The whole trial is out of order! They're out of order! That man, that sick, crazy, depraved man, raped and beat that woman there, and he'd like to do it again! He *told* me so! It's just a show! It's a show! It's "Let's Make A Deal"! "Let's Make A Deal"! Hey Frank, you wanna "Make A Deal"? I got an insane judge who likes to beat the shit out of women! Whaddya wanna gimme Frank, 3 weeks probation?

Frank Bowers: *Dammit!*

Arthur Kirkland: You, you sonofabitch, you! You're supposed to *stand* for somethin'! You're supposed to protect people! But instead you rape and murder them!


Arthur Kirkland: You killed McCullough! You killed him! Hold it! Hold it! I just completed my opening statement!

[C_eh_N_eh_D_eh]

57. Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels

Tom: Okay, how 'bout this one. You open up a company, called Arse Ticklers Faggots Fan Club.

Soap: You what?

Tom: And you take out an ad in the back page of some gay mag, advertising the latest in arse-intruding dildos. You sell it with, I dunno, "Does what no other dildo can do until now", "The latest and greatest in sexual technology", "Guaranteed results or your money back", all that bollocks. Now, these dils cost twenty-five quid a pop. That's a snip for the amount of pleasure they're gonna give the recipients. But they send their cheques to the other company name - nothin' offensive, say Bobby's Bits or something - for twenty-five. You take that cheque for twenty-five quid and you stick it in a back 'til it clears.

Now this is the smart bit.

You send back a cheque for twenty-five quid from the other company name, Arse Ticklers Faggots Fan Club, saying "We're sorry" and "We couldn't get the supplies in from America because they've run out of stock." Now, you see how many people cash that cheque. Not a single soul. 'Cause who want their bank manager to know they tickle arse when they're not payin' in cheques, eh?

Bacon: So how long to do have to wait to see the return?

Tom: Probably not more'n four weeks.

Bacon: So what fucking good is that if we need the money in six.. no, five days?

Tom: (short pause) Well, it's still a good idea.

[petronius]

58. There are some great monologues in Lord of War, for example:

"The reason I'll be released is the same reason you think I'll be convicted. I *do* rub shoulders with some of the most vile, sadistic men calling themselves leaders today. But some of these men are the enemies of *your* enemies. And while the biggest arms dealer in the world is your boss - the President of the United States, who ships more merchandise in a day than I do in a year - sometimes it's embarrassing to have his fingerprints on the guns. Sometimes he needs a freelancer like me to supply forces he can't be seen supplying. So. You call me evil, but unfortunately for you, I'm a necessary evil."

[Gidney N Cloyd]

59. HAL near the end of 2001 (how's that for an off-beat nomination?)

I'm afraid. I'm afraid, Dave. Dave, my mind is going. I can feel it. I can feel it. My mind is going. There is no question about it. I can feel it. I can feel it. I can feel it. I'm a... fraid. Good afternoon, gentlemen. I am a HAL 9000 computer. I became operational at the H.A.L. plant in Urbana, Illinois on the 12th of January 1992. My instructor was Mr. Langley, and he taught me to sing a song. If you'd like to hear it I can sing it for you...Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer do. I'm half crazy all for the love of you. It won't be a stylish marriage, I can't afford a carriage. But you'll look sweet upon the seat of a bicycle built for two.

[pokerfan]

60. José Ferrer in The Caine Mutiny

Well, well, well. The officers of the Caine in happy celebration. I've got a guilty conscience. I thought the wrong man was on trial, so I torpedoed Queeg for you. I had to torpedo him and I feel sick about it. When I was studying law, and Mr. Keefer was writing his stories, and Willie was tearing up the playing fields of Princeton, who was standing guard over this country of ours? Not us. We knew you couldn't make any money in the service. Who did the dirty work for us? Queeg did, and a lot of other guys. Tough guys who didn't crack up like Queeg.

He didn't endanger any lives. You did. A fine bunch of officers. I left out one detail in court. It wouldn't have helped our case. At one point, Queeg came to you for help, and you turned him down. He wasn't worthy of your loyalty. So you turned on him. You made up songs about him. If you'd been Ioyal to Queeg, do you think all this would have come up?

I'm asking you, Steve. would it have been necessary to take over? You don't work with the captain because of his hairstyle, but because he's got the job, or you're no good. The case is over. You're all safe. It was like shooting fish in a barrel.

And now we come to the man who should have stood trial. The Caine's favorite author. The Shakespeare whose testimony nearly sunk us all. Tell 'em, Keefer.

You ought to read his testimony. He never even HEARD of Captain Queeg! Queeg was sick, he couldn't help himself. But you, you're real healthy. Only you didn't have one-tenth the guts that he had.

I wanna drink a toast to you, Mr. Keefer. From the beginning you hated the Navy. And then you thought up this whole idea and you managed to keep your skirts nice and starched and clean, even in the court martial. Steve Maryk will always be remembered as a mutineer. But you, you'll publish your novel, you'll make a million bucks, you'll marry a big movie star, and for the rest of your life you'll live with your conscience, if you have any. Here's to the real author of the Caine mutiny. Here's to you, Mr. Keefer.

(throws his drink in Keefer's face)

If you wanna do anything about it, I'll be outside. I'm a lot drunker than you are so it'll be a fair fight.

[PVnRT]

61. The Warden showing how evil he is in The Shawshank Redemption

Warden Samuel Norton: I'm sure by now you've heard. Terrible thing. Man that young, less than a year to go, trying to escape... Broke Captain Hadley's heart to shoot him, truly it did. We just have to put it behind us... move on.

Andy Dufresne: I'm done. Everything stops. Get someone else to run your scams.

Warden Samuel Norton: Nothing stops. Nothing... or you will do the hardest time there is. No more protection from the guards. I'll pull you out of that one-bunk Hilton and cast you down with the Sodomites. You'll think you've been fucked by a train! And the library? Gone... sealed off, brick-by-brick. We'll have us a little book barbecue in the yard. They'll see the flames for miles. We'll dance around it like wild Injuns! You understand me? Catching my drift?... Or am I being obtuse?


Warden Samuel Norton: Give him another month to think about it.

EDIT: Typo in subject

[PVnRT]

62. Another deranged one, from Syriana

Danny Dalton: Some trust fund prosecutor, got off-message at Yale, thinks he's gonna run this up the flagpole, make a name for himself, maybe get elected some two-bit, congressman from nowhere, with the result that Russia or China can suddenly start having, at our expense, all the advantages we enjoy here. No, I tell you. No, sir. Corruption charges! Corruption? Corruption is government intrusion into market efficiencies in the form of regulations. That's Milton Friedman. He got a goddamn Nobel Prize. We have laws against it precisely so we can get away with it. Corruption is our protection. Corruption keeps us safe and warm. Corruption is why you and I are prancing around in here instead of fighting over scraps of meat out in the streets. Corruption is why we win.

[Arkham House]

63. Sterling Hayden in *Dr Strangelove*--

--going on about our precious bodily fluids...