There are lines spoken by characters in various movies that have crept into my own everyday language, serving as a kind of shorthand. Some of these lines have slipped into a lot of people’s speech–maybe even yours.
1. Mandy Patinkin, to the villain with six fingers, in The Princess Bride: “Hello! My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die.” The fact that he’s holding a sword when he says this lends credibility.
2. Roy Scheider in Jaws, having just looked down the gullet of the meanest shark in the ocean: “You’re gonna need a bigger boat.” Yes, many situations turn out to be a lot more challenging than you expected.
3. The Mexican bandit, Gold Hat, to Humphrey Bogart in Treasure of the Sierra Madre: “We don’t need no stinkin’ badges!” You can replace “badges” with just about any word you happen to need at the moment. As in, “We don’t need no stinkin’ cat license!”
4. The Witch to her slowly-being-hypnotized victims in The Silver Chair: “There is no sun…” Just like there’s no left-wing bias in the “news” media.
5. Stan Laurel to Oliver Hardy in Block-Heads: “Remember how dumb I used to be? Well, I’m better now.” Uh-huh.
I could keep this up all day, but those five above will always be among my favorites.
What are some of yours?
“It’s a hundred and six miles to Chicago, we’ve got a full tank of gas, a half a pack of cigarettes, it’s dark and we’re wearing sunglasses.”