Quint's recollection of the Indianapolis in Jaws
Father Barry's sermon from the hold of a ship in On the Waterfront
Terrance Mann telling Ray that people will come in Field of Dreams
I'm thrilled to see Father Barry mentioned here. Karl Malden's work is better than Brando in that film and it feels like he's barely remembered for it.
His speech is so powerful and surprising, given he's been a tough-but-quiet presence to that point in the film. It's undeniably "stagey" so maybe that'll turn some people off, but I think Malden does a wonderful job performing for the camera and holding it with his expressions and his body.
https://youtu.be/yQ7im_l76fM?si=9pJ_RXDREmeW4MnY
A Few Good Men
Col Jessup played by Jack Nicholson
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, Lieutenant 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 of a life spent defending something. You use them as a punch line.
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 that I provide and then questions the manner in which I provide it.
I would rather that you just said "thank you" and went on your way. Otherwise, I suggest you pick up a weapon and stand the post. Either way, I don't give a DAMN what you think you're entitled to!
Do you mean not hungover? Cause usually a full nights sleep will sober up even the drunkest person.
Edit: Ok I get it y’all, you can wake up drunk. I was being hyperbolic. That’s not what happened in the movie.
I really wish they'd left the rebuttal to his monologue that was included in the Play version, as Kaffee points out that Jessup's cover-up of Santiago's death is extremely telling. I only discovered it from the TVTropes page.
"You trashed the law! But hey, we understand, you're permitted. You have a greater responsibility than we can possibly fathom. You provide us with a blanket of freedom. We live in a world that has walls and those walls have to be guarded by men with guns, and nothing is going to stand in your way of doing it. Not Willie Santiago, not Dawson and Downey, not Markinson, not 1,000 armies, not the Uniform Code of Military Justice, and not the Constitution of the United States! That's the truth isn't it Colonel? I can handle it."
I only found it about this just through you, thank you, but that rebuttal speech feels a little too much like drawing a red circle around the obvious thing that doesn't need outlining. Cutting it from the film was a good idea. I reckon it makes it feel a little like movie endings from decades earlier.
We joined the Marines because we wanted to live our lives by a certain code, and we found it in the Corps.
Now you're asking us to sign a piece of paper that says we have no honor.
You're asking us to say we're not Marines.
If a court decides that what we did was wrong, then I'll accept whatever punishment they give.
But I believe I was right sir, I believe I did my job, and I will not dishonor myself!, my unit!, **or the Corps!! so I can go home in six months!!**... Sir.
To play the devil's advocate, what's so interesting about this speech is that Jessep has a point. The world is not a benign place and it's naive to believe so. Jessep's methods are questionable, but it's easy to criticize from behind the protection he and his Marines are providing. Kaffee is meanwhile depicted as an arrogant, careerist little punk who has never been within a hundred miles of any real threat.
This brings up lots of themes and tough questions that are very relevant today:
- do those whose safety is ensured by others have the right to question or criticize those providing the protection? If you're not "on that wall" do you even know what you're taking about?
- how far should we go to save lives? Are there different moral standards when lives are at stake? Who sets those limits? What happens if Innocents die because of limits placed on those responsible for security? How do we assess the true seriousness of threats to determine how far we're willing to go?
- what is the role of the non-combat soldier like Kaffee or civilians in providing a check on military power and military strategy? How should this work in a democracy?
"Zero Dark Thirty" asks similar tough and nuanced questions.
-
Excellent points. Life is not black and white. Everything is gray, and deciding where lines need to be drawn has been a fundamental issue. Best that such lines are drawn in pencil, so they can be redrawn as we grown and learn from our mistakes, whether the mistakes were being too harsh or too lenient.
The great Hugo Weaving as Agent Smith in The Matrix. Hands down one of the greatest dialogues and delivery!
Agent Smith: Have you ever stood and stared at it, marveled at it’s beauty, it’s genius? Billions of people just living out their lives, oblivious. Did you know that the first Matrix was designed to be a perfect human world. Where none suffered. Where everyone would be happy. It was a disaster. No one would accept the program. Entire crops were lost. Some believed that we lacked the programming language to describe your perfect world. But I believe that as a species, human beings define their reality through misery and suffering. The perfect world would dream that your primitive cerebrum kept trying to wake up from. Which is why the Matrix was redesigned to this, the peak of your civilization. I say your civilization because as soon as we started thinking for you it really became our civilization which is of course what this is all about. Evolution, Morpheus, evolution, like the dinosaur. Look out that window. You had your time. The future is our world, Morpheus. The future is our time……
Neo and Trinity decide to go into the matrix to save Morpheus.
Agent Smith: I’d like to share a revelation during my time here. It came to me when I tried to classify your species. I realized that you’re not actually mammals. Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with the surrounding environment but you humans do not. You move to an area and you multiply and multiply until every natural resource is consumed. The only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is? A virus. Human beings are a disease, a cancer of this planet. You are a plague, and we are the cure.
Why, Mr. Anderson? Why? Why do you do it? Why? Why get up? Why keep fighting? Do you believe you're fighting for something? Something more than your survival? Can you tell me what it is? Do you even know? Is it freedom or truth? Perhaps peace? Could it be for love? Illusions, Mr. Anderson. Temporary constructs of a feeble human intellect trying desperately to justify an existence without meaning or purpose. And all as artificial as the Matrix itself, although, only a human mind could invent something as insipid as love. You must be able to see it Mr. Anderson. You must know it by now. You can't win. There's no point in fighting. Why, Mr. Anderson? Why? Why do you persist?
Neo: Because I choose to
One thing I particularly enjoy about this monologue is how he chews and spits out "insipid". In this one word you can hear how he loathes humans so deeply.
Upvite for Devils Advocate:
"It’s the goof of all time.
Look, but don’t touch.
Touch, but don’t taste.
Taste, don’t swallow. Look – touch, touch – taste, taste – don’t swallow.
*laughter*
And while you’re jumping from one foot to the next, what is He doing?
He’s laughing his sick, fucking ass off.
He’s a tight-ass. He’s a sadist.
He’s an absentee landlord. Worship that?
Never!"
A - Do I have your Attention?
I - are you Interested? I know you are, cus it’s fuck or walk.
D - have you made you Decision for Christ?!
A - and Action.
Rutger Hauer as dying replicant Roy Batty in "Blade Runner":
*I've seen things you people wouldn't believe... Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion... I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain... Time to die.*
It also expands an entire universe in just a few sentences. Why were there attack ships off Orion?! What the hell are C-Beams and the Tannhauser Gate?!
This is the part that stands out to me as well! I love when franchises do this; give bits of exposition with no attempt or intention to expand on them. It's one of the draws of the Lord of the Rings and the Tolkien Legendarium for me. Seeing structures or hearing pieces of legend or experiences, but leaving enough out that there are so many questions that will forever remain unanswered. It gives a universe depth and makes it feel alive.
The monologue was so short yet it had the most depth to the character. The replicant had been around during his short life but it was filled with ventures that few people will ever experience in their lifetime
It’s not just the words, or that it’s economical and doesn’t feel like a speech. It’s the delivery, the indignation, the catch in the throat and then the acceptance.
Short and sweet, this is exactly what I came here for. Hauer advocated for this version of the dialogue (I guess originally it was a longer soliloquy with a lot of irrelevant world building) and he delivered it beautifully.
"Hey. If any of you are looking for any last-minute gift ideas for me, I have one. I'd like Frank Shirley, my boss, right here tonight. I want him brought from his happy holiday slumber over there on Melody Lane with all the other rich people and I want him brought right here...with a big ribbon on his head! And I want to look him straight in the eye, and I want to tell him what a cheap, lying, no-good, rotten, four-flushing, low-life, snake-licking, dirt-eating, inbred, overstuffed, ignorant, blood-sucking, dog-kissing, brainless, dickless, hopeless, heartless, fat-assed, bug-eyed, stiff-legged, spotty-lipped, worm-headed, sack of monkey shit he is! Hallelujah! Holy shit! Where's the Tylenol?"
—Clark W. Griswold Jr.
Kinda. They had all those insults on cards held by each of the actors across from him. You can see him looking left, right, up, down, throughout the scene as he says one and moves to the next. But the total product is a losely scripted rant.
I know it’s cliche but basically all of Fight Club. For example “Man, I see in fight club the strongest and smartest men who’ve ever lived. I see all this potential, and I see squandering. God damn it, an entire generation pumping gas, waiting tables; slaves with white collars. Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don’t need. We’re the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our Great War’s a spiritual war… our Great Depression is our lives. We’ve all been raised on television to believe that one day we’d all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won’t. And we’re slowly learning that fact. And we’re very, very pissed off.”
*You're not your job. You're not how much money you have in the bank. You're not the car you drive. You're not the contents of your wallet. You're not your fucking khakis. You're the all-singing, all-dancing crap of the world.*
[The Great Dictator](https://youtu.be/J7GY1Xg6X20?si=MhK-Fc35VHYxprES)
Partly for what Charlie says and partly because as a silent film actor in his first talkie he delivers such an passionate speech.
That movie is full of good quotes. My dad always loved the "for all the good it's done me, I might as well shove it up my ass!" quote. Usually did it before a colonoscopy.
Easy.
"I have no idea to this day what those two Italian ladies were singing about. Truth is, I don't want to know. Some things are best left unsaid. I'd like to think they were singing about something so beautiful, it can't be expressed in words, and makes your heart ache because of it. I tell you, those voices soared higher and farther than anybody in a gray place dares to dream. It was like some beautiful bird flapped into our drab little cage and made those walls dissolve away, and for the briefest of moments, every last man in Shawshank felt free."
I'm going to squeeze in one that I saw recently that doesn't get much attention. The monologue towards the end of the movie "Pearl". It's heartbreaking as it is disturbing. Mia Goth is very underrated, imo.
If you haven't seen it, here it is: https://youtu.be/Y1CbJlbafXQ?si=Zxec1eo9XzBAiA0e
Spoilers, btw.
"I was in the room here one day... watchin' the Mexican channel on TV. I don't know nothin' about Pele. I'm watchin' what this guy can do with a ball and his feet. Next thing I know, he jumps in the air and flips into a somersault and kicks the ball in - upside down and backwards... the goddamn goalie never knew what the fuck hit him. Pele gets excited and he rips off his jersey and starts running around the stadium waving it around his head. Everybody's screaming in Spanish. I'm here, sitting alone in my room, and I start crying.
"That's right, I start crying. Because another human being, a species that I happen to belong to, could kick a ball, and lift himself, and the rest of us sad-assed human beings, up to a better place to be, if only for a minute... let me tell ya, kid - it was pretty goddamned glorious. It ain't the six minutes... it's what happens in that six minutes."
---
Maybe not one of the greatest of all time - but more than worthy of honorable mention at the least.
I recognize some of those. Anyway, my entry:
“Let me tell you something you already know. The world ain't all sunshine and rainbows. It's a very mean and nasty place, and I don't care how tough you are, it will beat you to your knees and keep you there permanently if you let it. You, me, or nobody is gonna hit as hard as life. But it ain't about how hard you hit. It's about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward; how much you can take and keep moving forward. That's how winning is done! Now, if you know what you're worth, then go out and get what you're worth. But you gotta be willing to take the hits, and not pointing fingers saying you ain't where you wanna be because of him, or her, or anybody. Cowards do that and that ain't you. You're better than that! I'm always gonna love you, no matter what. No matter what happens. You're my son and you're my blood. You're the best thing in my life. But until you start believing in yourself, you ain't gonna have a life.”
Their early work was a little too new wave for my tastes, but when Sports came out in '83, I think they really came into their own, commercially and artistically. The whole album has a clear, crisp sound, and a new sheen of consummate professionalism that really gives the songs a big boost. He's been compared to Elvis Costello, but I think Huey has a far more bitter, cynical sense of humor.
Agreed! Bullet tooth Tony had some great lines..."Mullet, have you been brushing your teeth with dogshit?"....thank god for subtitles, otherwise I'd have missed half of it!
"See, there are three kinds of people: dicks, pussies and assholes. Pussies think everyone can get along and dicks just want to fuck all the time without thinking it through. But then you got your assholes. And all the assholes want is to shit all over everything. So pussies may get mad at dicks once in a while because, pussies get fucked by dicks. But dicks also fuck assholes! And if they didn't fuck the assholes, you know what you'd get? You'd get your dick and your pussy all covered in shit!"
As someone who grew up in a family where my father literally tried to kill my mom and she spent years in court still having to fight against him having custody rights after he was done with jail, Laura Dern’s speech from marriage story was poignant and she delivered it perfectly.
Johnny Nolan in A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945) talking to his young, sensitive and brilliant daughter Francie about a tree growing out of the cement behind their building: ‘Don’t tell me that tree is gonna lay down and die that easily. Look at that tree. See where it’s coming from. Right outta that cement! Didn’t nobody plant it. Didn’t ask the cement to grow. It just couldn’t help growing so much it just pushed that old cement out of the way.’
Robert Duvall in Apocalypse Now Everyone goes for the Napalm portion of the monologue but the "Someday this war's gonna end" pronouncement at the end and the look he gives of utter disappointment is what hits home for me
I got two that spring to mind.
Jefferson Smith, in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington when he is given a basket full of negative letters that the corrupt political crimes from his state have gotten sent.
Also the monologue Quint gives about the USS Indianapolis in Jaws
Angus: I'm still here, asshole! I'll always be here! You push me down and I'll get right back up again, and again, and again, and again and again!
I could beat you right here, right now! But I don't want to be better than you, Rick! I don't want to be better than anybody! I want to be who I am: a fat kid, who's good at science, and fair at football. That's who I am! I can live with it. Why can't you?
And so what? to be normal, we all have to be like YOU? There are 400 people in this room that are nothing like you! Some of them are fat, some of them are skinny. Some of them are tall, some of them are short. Some of them have braces, some of them have birth marks, or scars, or frizzy hair, or ears that stick out!
But most of them probably walk through these halls every day, never telling anybody the truth about what they really want, or need, or believe, because people like you, ‘normal’ people like you have them terrified of being who they are. I mean, if you're normal, what does that make them? So which is it, Rick? Are you normal? Or are you just one of us?
Rick : Whatever I am, it's something you're never gonna be.
Angus : Thank God.
Angus-1995.
Sylvester Stallone's [monologue at the end of First Blood ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KNBHO-a_8i4)is heartfelt and agonizing. It allows the audience to feel the disdain, contempt, and betrayal felt by a generation of Vietnam veterans.
Too bad some of the monologue is mumbled and unintelligible. I realized what a great scene it was when I watched the movie with subtitles on. The "Nothing is over" line hits home.
The book ends with >!Troutman killing Rambo,!< Stallone refused to end the movie that way since the US was losing \~\~20,000\~\~ \~4,880 Vietnam veterans to suicide each month, and he didn't want to become "part of the problem".
**Edit:** I did some research and in 1985, when they were making the movie the Vietnam veterans suicide rate was \~4,880 per month (58,000 in 1985). I want to note that we believe these numbers are wrong, but I'm sure Stallone and the crew didn't know that then.
Source: [https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/281341](https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2813418)
Thanks to [PandiBong](https://www.reddit.com/user/PandiBong/) for pointing it out.
When I first watched that film as a kid I couldn't understand why he had the breakdown. 20 years on active duty and a war later, I came back to it and understood all too well. Very bold and brilliant for it's time, and I don't know if Sly ever really gets enough credit for it.
You nailed a lot of the good ones. Blade Runner tesrs in the rain is probably my favorite of the ones you included. My favorite monologue might be Dennis Hopper with Christopher Walken in True Romance.
The details of my life are quite inconsequential.... 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 15-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. Sometimes, 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 14, a Zoroastrian named Vilmer ritualistically shaved my testicles. There really is nothing like a shorn scrotum — it's breathtaking... I suggest you try it.
“We're more of the love, blood, and rhetoric school. Well, we can do you blood and love without the rhetoric, and we can do you blood and rhetoric without the love, and we can do you all three concurrent or consecutive. But we can't give you love and rhetoric without the blood. Blood is compulsory. They're all blood, you see.”
― Tom Stoppard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead
Network I'm as mad as hell
Blade runner tears in the rain
Apocalypse now horror!
Third man ferris wheel scene
Nomadland swankie monologue
To kill a mockingbird closing argument
Pulp fiction has two, watch and diner scene monologue
No country for old men monologue
25th hour "fuck you" scene
There are more but these ten were on top of my pen!!
Brad Pitt monologue at end of Killing Them Softly. Says it all and nails delivery. America is not a country it’s a business. Those words have resonated with me ever since I heard them.
The “Great Wave” speech from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.
Perfectly explains the concept of the fall of the American dream and the counterculture movement.
Don't know if this could be considered a monologue,but I always loved AL Pacino's entire opening statement from "AND JUSTICE FOR ALL"...
Here's a part of it....
THE PROSECUTION...IS NOT GONNA GET THAT MAN TODAY....NO...BECAUSE I'M GONNA GET 'IM!!!!!
"THAT MAN IS A SLIME! HE IS A SLIME...IF HE'S ALLOWED TO GO FREE...THAN SOMETHING REALLY WRONG IS GOING ON HERE!!"
"YOU'RE OUT OF ORDER...THEY'RE OUT OF ORDER...THE WHOLE TRIAL IS OUT OF ORDER!!!"
"HEY FRANK..YOU WANNA MAKE A DEAL?
I GOT AN INSANE JUDGE ..WHO LIKES TO BEAT THE S**T OUT OF WOMEN...WHATTA YOU WANNA GIVE ME FRANK....THREE WEEKS PROBATION?!!!!!"
I loved this!!!
Quint's recollection of the Indianapolis in Jaws Father Barry's sermon from the hold of a ship in On the Waterfront Terrance Mann telling Ray that people will come in Field of Dreams
Black eyes. Like a doll's eyes.
He don’t seem to be livin.
Then they roll over white…
Charlie are you doing jaws? We don't have time for this.
So you're telling me that this was a wedding full of zombies?
Came here to say Quint. So good.
Oh yes that scene gives me goosebumps still to this day, and the score playing so subtly and sinisterly behind him speaking...
Charlie Kelly did it better.
I'm thrilled to see Father Barry mentioned here. Karl Malden's work is better than Brando in that film and it feels like he's barely remembered for it. His speech is so powerful and surprising, given he's been a tough-but-quiet presence to that point in the film. It's undeniably "stagey" so maybe that'll turn some people off, but I think Malden does a wonderful job performing for the camera and holding it with his expressions and his body. https://youtu.be/yQ7im_l76fM?si=9pJ_RXDREmeW4MnY
A Few Good Men Col Jessup played by Jack Nicholson 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, Lieutenant 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 of a life spent defending something. You use them as a punch line. 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 that I provide and then questions the manner in which I provide it. I would rather that you just said "thank you" and went on your way. Otherwise, I suggest you pick up a weapon and stand the post. Either way, I don't give a DAMN what you think you're entitled to!
“Did you order the code red!?” “YOURE GODDAM RIGHT I DID!” Nicholson is such a fantastic actor
After that tirade he gets up and tries walking out of court, LOL.
Excuse me. I didn’t dismiss you. Sit down.
👏🥲👏
This movie is one that I always watch if it’s on and I happen across it. Especially if I now this scene is coming up soon.
I like how Tom Cruise gets wasted the night before and suddenly is completely sober.
Do you mean not hungover? Cause usually a full nights sleep will sober up even the drunkest person. Edit: Ok I get it y’all, you can wake up drunk. I was being hyperbolic. That’s not what happened in the movie.
Had to smile at this. Usually a full night sleep and drunkest person aren't part of the same equation
Fair, but Tom Cruise definitely wasn’t on a 48 hour bender, he just got drunk at a bar the night before work.
I really wish they'd left the rebuttal to his monologue that was included in the Play version, as Kaffee points out that Jessup's cover-up of Santiago's death is extremely telling. I only discovered it from the TVTropes page. "You trashed the law! But hey, we understand, you're permitted. You have a greater responsibility than we can possibly fathom. You provide us with a blanket of freedom. We live in a world that has walls and those walls have to be guarded by men with guns, and nothing is going to stand in your way of doing it. Not Willie Santiago, not Dawson and Downey, not Markinson, not 1,000 armies, not the Uniform Code of Military Justice, and not the Constitution of the United States! That's the truth isn't it Colonel? I can handle it."
I only found it about this just through you, thank you, but that rebuttal speech feels a little too much like drawing a red circle around the obvious thing that doesn't need outlining. Cutting it from the film was a good idea. I reckon it makes it feel a little like movie endings from decades earlier.
This is great but there was another monologue by the black marine when Tom cruise says he can get them off in six months.
We joined the Marines because we wanted to live our lives by a certain code, and we found it in the Corps. Now you're asking us to sign a piece of paper that says we have no honor. You're asking us to say we're not Marines. If a court decides that what we did was wrong, then I'll accept whatever punishment they give. But I believe I was right sir, I believe I did my job, and I will not dishonor myself!, my unit!, **or the Corps!! so I can go home in six months!!**... Sir.
Fucking chills
That is a great monologue and amazing delivery!
To play the devil's advocate, what's so interesting about this speech is that Jessep has a point. The world is not a benign place and it's naive to believe so. Jessep's methods are questionable, but it's easy to criticize from behind the protection he and his Marines are providing. Kaffee is meanwhile depicted as an arrogant, careerist little punk who has never been within a hundred miles of any real threat. This brings up lots of themes and tough questions that are very relevant today: - do those whose safety is ensured by others have the right to question or criticize those providing the protection? If you're not "on that wall" do you even know what you're taking about? - how far should we go to save lives? Are there different moral standards when lives are at stake? Who sets those limits? What happens if Innocents die because of limits placed on those responsible for security? How do we assess the true seriousness of threats to determine how far we're willing to go? - what is the role of the non-combat soldier like Kaffee or civilians in providing a check on military power and military strategy? How should this work in a democracy? "Zero Dark Thirty" asks similar tough and nuanced questions. -
Excellent points. Life is not black and white. Everything is gray, and deciding where lines need to be drawn has been a fundamental issue. Best that such lines are drawn in pencil, so they can be redrawn as we grown and learn from our mistakes, whether the mistakes were being too harsh or too lenient.
The great Hugo Weaving as Agent Smith in The Matrix. Hands down one of the greatest dialogues and delivery! Agent Smith: Have you ever stood and stared at it, marveled at it’s beauty, it’s genius? Billions of people just living out their lives, oblivious. Did you know that the first Matrix was designed to be a perfect human world. Where none suffered. Where everyone would be happy. It was a disaster. No one would accept the program. Entire crops were lost. Some believed that we lacked the programming language to describe your perfect world. But I believe that as a species, human beings define their reality through misery and suffering. The perfect world would dream that your primitive cerebrum kept trying to wake up from. Which is why the Matrix was redesigned to this, the peak of your civilization. I say your civilization because as soon as we started thinking for you it really became our civilization which is of course what this is all about. Evolution, Morpheus, evolution, like the dinosaur. Look out that window. You had your time. The future is our world, Morpheus. The future is our time…… Neo and Trinity decide to go into the matrix to save Morpheus. Agent Smith: I’d like to share a revelation during my time here. It came to me when I tried to classify your species. I realized that you’re not actually mammals. Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with the surrounding environment but you humans do not. You move to an area and you multiply and multiply until every natural resource is consumed. The only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is? A virus. Human beings are a disease, a cancer of this planet. You are a plague, and we are the cure.
Hugo nailed that role like it was written with him in mind from the beginning. He had several great monologues in sequels as well.
"Why, mr. Anderson? Why must you persist?"
Why, Mr. Anderson? Why? Why do you do it? Why? Why get up? Why keep fighting? Do you believe you're fighting for something? Something more than your survival? Can you tell me what it is? Do you even know? Is it freedom or truth? Perhaps peace? Could it be for love? Illusions, Mr. Anderson. Temporary constructs of a feeble human intellect trying desperately to justify an existence without meaning or purpose. And all as artificial as the Matrix itself, although, only a human mind could invent something as insipid as love. You must be able to see it Mr. Anderson. You must know it by now. You can't win. There's no point in fighting. Why, Mr. Anderson? Why? Why do you persist? Neo: Because I choose to
One thing I particularly enjoy about this monologue is how he chews and spits out "insipid". In this one word you can hear how he loathes humans so deeply.
This is a good shout 👏🏼
Coffee is for closers! Also Al Pacino's speech at the end of The Devils Advocate is pretty spectacular
Upvite for Devils Advocate: "It’s the goof of all time. Look, but don’t touch. Touch, but don’t taste. Taste, don’t swallow. Look – touch, touch – taste, taste – don’t swallow. *laughter* And while you’re jumping from one foot to the next, what is He doing? He’s laughing his sick, fucking ass off. He’s a tight-ass. He’s a sadist. He’s an absentee landlord. Worship that? Never!"
What about love? Overrated. Biochemically, no different than eating large amounts of chocolate. 🤣
"I'M A FAN OF MAN!!!"
Have I got your attention now?
*It takes brass balls to sell real estate*
That’s the one part of that amazing speech I can’t stand, with those gimmicky brass balls he pulls out.
Yeah I came here for this.
Also Pacino seducing Pryce and later berating Spacey in GGR.
A - Do I have your Attention? I - are you Interested? I know you are, cus it’s fuck or walk. D - have you made you Decision for Christ?! A - and Action.
If you cant take this, how are you gonna take the abuse you get on a sit!
Fuck you, that’s my name!!
Every Al Pacino speech in that movie is so good
What amazes me about that one is that the room is stacked with amazing actors.
Rutger Hauer as dying replicant Roy Batty in "Blade Runner": *I've seen things you people wouldn't believe... Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion... I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain... Time to die.*
Truly breathtaking. That monologue changes the whole perception of the villain and by the end of it you actually feel for him.
It goes from, gotta stop the bad guys to a what if I was given an expiration date. Great switch.
Spoiler alert: You were.
It also expands an entire universe in just a few sentences. Why were there attack ships off Orion?! What the hell are C-Beams and the Tannhauser Gate?!
This is the part that stands out to me as well! I love when franchises do this; give bits of exposition with no attempt or intention to expand on them. It's one of the draws of the Lord of the Rings and the Tolkien Legendarium for me. Seeing structures or hearing pieces of legend or experiences, but leaving enough out that there are so many questions that will forever remain unanswered. It gives a universe depth and makes it feel alive.
Ah nice. LOTR has the appendices, unfinished tales, and the Silmarillion. Actually A LOT of the universe is explained in depth.
it’s beautifully organic world building.
The monologue was so short yet it had the most depth to the character. The replicant had been around during his short life but it was filled with ventures that few people will ever experience in their lifetime
This is my favorite monologue as well. Blade Runner is so freaking good. The exchange of dialogue between Batty and Tyrell is epic too.
It’s not just the words, or that it’s economical and doesn’t feel like a speech. It’s the delivery, the indignation, the catch in the throat and then the acceptance.
Even more amazing when you know that Rutger Hauer changed the scriptwriters original speech without letting anyone know before the filming
Yes
Thinking on this now - did they have FTL travel in the Blade Runner universe? How does living for 4 years get affected by FTL travel?
I got chills just reading that. Guess I need to watch blade runner again tonight!
That's exactly where my mind went
Short and sweet, this is exactly what I came here for. Hauer advocated for this version of the dialogue (I guess originally it was a longer soliloquy with a lot of irrelevant world building) and he delivered it beautifully.
My favorite of all time, absolutely incredible and still gives me chills after so many years.
This is it. Seems too quick the first time you see it, so you want to see it again.And again...Then you realise its so much more.
Roy Batty: the best one for sure!
"Hey. If any of you are looking for any last-minute gift ideas for me, I have one. I'd like Frank Shirley, my boss, right here tonight. I want him brought from his happy holiday slumber over there on Melody Lane with all the other rich people and I want him brought right here...with a big ribbon on his head! And I want to look him straight in the eye, and I want to tell him what a cheap, lying, no-good, rotten, four-flushing, low-life, snake-licking, dirt-eating, inbred, overstuffed, ignorant, blood-sucking, dog-kissing, brainless, dickless, hopeless, heartless, fat-assed, bug-eyed, stiff-legged, spotty-lipped, worm-headed, sack of monkey shit he is! Hallelujah! Holy shit! Where's the Tylenol?" —Clark W. Griswold Jr.
If I'm not mistaken, this wasn't scripted either? Just Chevy doing his thing
Kinda. They had all those insults on cards held by each of the actors across from him. You can see him looking left, right, up, down, throughout the scene as he says one and moves to the next. But the total product is a losely scripted rant.
Dennis Hopper in True Romance. The girl at the end of The Mother and the Whore.
You're part Eggplant.
You’re a cantaloupe
Can I have one of those chesterfields now
Do you know who I am, Mr Whorley?
I haven't killed a man in 7 years. Get me a towel so I can wipe this egg off my face.
Since 1984
That’s an excellent monologue, because it’s not showy at all, but perfectly in character, drama and situation. He plays the Italians to perfection.
Plus it's just a really tense scene between Dennis Hopper and Christopher Walken. You can't get much cooler than that.
I know it’s cliche but basically all of Fight Club. For example “Man, I see in fight club the strongest and smartest men who’ve ever lived. I see all this potential, and I see squandering. God damn it, an entire generation pumping gas, waiting tables; slaves with white collars. Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don’t need. We’re the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our Great War’s a spiritual war… our Great Depression is our lives. We’ve all been raised on television to believe that one day we’d all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won’t. And we’re slowly learning that fact. And we’re very, very pissed off.”
*You're not your job. You're not how much money you have in the bank. You're not the car you drive. You're not the contents of your wallet. You're not your fucking khakis. You're the all-singing, all-dancing crap of the world.*
One of the few examples of a movie that outshined the book.
[The Great Dictator](https://youtu.be/J7GY1Xg6X20?si=MhK-Fc35VHYxprES) Partly for what Charlie says and partly because as a silent film actor in his first talkie he delivers such an passionate speech.
Was looking for this one!
The Lighthouse. Willem DaFoe as Thomas Wake
"Alright, have it your way. I like your cooking."
I laughed so hard after Robert said that. My wife looked at me like I was crazy.
HAAARK!!!
And he doesn’t blink once while delivering his speech! Truly chilling
It’s sooo good!! I remember standing up halfway through with my hands on my head, fingers in hair. Had to hit pause after to decompress.
“May Neptune strike ye dead, Winslow!”
Ewan McGregor in Trainspotting. The ending monologue always stuck with me.
It’s a shorter one, but the “It’s shite being Scottish..” monologue is very good and quotable as well.
That movie is full of good quotes. My dad always loved the "for all the good it's done me, I might as well shove it up my ass!" quote. Usually did it before a colonoscopy.
The remix of the choose life speech in the sequel is also very good.
I'd go either with the "choose life" monologue or the "no theory explains a moment like this" one
Scent of a Woman. Al Pacino gives the greatest monologue of all time.
If I was any younger I’d take a FLAMETHROWER to this place!
“But he’s not a snitch”!
This. 110% this.
“Over? Did you say "over"? Nothing is over until we decide it is! Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor?”
Hahahahaha, was literally just thinking about this film today!! **EDIT:** “Forget it, he’s rolling.”
Germans?
There is only one possible answer: To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentations of their women.
That is good!
The only possible answer involves drinking milkshakes.
Easy. "I have no idea to this day what those two Italian ladies were singing about. Truth is, I don't want to know. Some things are best left unsaid. I'd like to think they were singing about something so beautiful, it can't be expressed in words, and makes your heart ache because of it. I tell you, those voices soared higher and farther than anybody in a gray place dares to dream. It was like some beautiful bird flapped into our drab little cage and made those walls dissolve away, and for the briefest of moments, every last man in Shawshank felt free."
ooooo, good one!
My name is Maximus Decimus Meridius…
commander of the Armies of the North, General of the Felix Legions and loyal servant to the true emperor, Marcus Aurelius.
Father to a murdered son. Husband to a murdered wife. And I will have my vengeance, in this life or the next.
Well done gentlemen, well done indeed.
I was Entertained ….
This is the one I thought of too!
Ned Beatty’s monologue in Network is even better!
A real "not even the best drummer in the band" situation
AND YOU! WILL! ATONE!
They sell I can sell anything. I’m gonna try to sell you an idea.
Pretty much every monologue by Kurtz in Apocalypse Now.
This is peak acting in my books. I've seen many performances yet this out stands out for me.
From what I've read, much of it was improvised. That's. like, pure genius.
One of the greatest to ever do it and one of the most interesting men of the last century
I'm going to squeeze in one that I saw recently that doesn't get much attention. The monologue towards the end of the movie "Pearl". It's heartbreaking as it is disturbing. Mia Goth is very underrated, imo. If you haven't seen it, here it is: https://youtu.be/Y1CbJlbafXQ?si=Zxec1eo9XzBAiA0e Spoilers, btw.
The cook from the hotel telling Loudon McSwain (Matthew Modine) why he is coming to watch him wrestle in "Vision Quest"
It ain’t the 6 minutes, it’s what HAPPENS in that 6 minutes.
YES!!
"I was in the room here one day... watchin' the Mexican channel on TV. I don't know nothin' about Pele. I'm watchin' what this guy can do with a ball and his feet. Next thing I know, he jumps in the air and flips into a somersault and kicks the ball in - upside down and backwards... the goddamn goalie never knew what the fuck hit him. Pele gets excited and he rips off his jersey and starts running around the stadium waving it around his head. Everybody's screaming in Spanish. I'm here, sitting alone in my room, and I start crying. "That's right, I start crying. Because another human being, a species that I happen to belong to, could kick a ball, and lift himself, and the rest of us sad-assed human beings, up to a better place to be, if only for a minute... let me tell ya, kid - it was pretty goddamned glorious. It ain't the six minutes... it's what happens in that six minutes." --- Maybe not one of the greatest of all time - but more than worthy of honorable mention at the least.
I recognize some of those. Anyway, my entry: “Let me tell you something you already know. The world ain't all sunshine and rainbows. It's a very mean and nasty place, and I don't care how tough you are, it will beat you to your knees and keep you there permanently if you let it. You, me, or nobody is gonna hit as hard as life. But it ain't about how hard you hit. It's about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward; how much you can take and keep moving forward. That's how winning is done! Now, if you know what you're worth, then go out and get what you're worth. But you gotta be willing to take the hits, and not pointing fingers saying you ain't where you wanna be because of him, or her, or anybody. Cowards do that and that ain't you. You're better than that! I'm always gonna love you, no matter what. No matter what happens. You're my son and you're my blood. You're the best thing in my life. But until you start believing in yourself, you ain't gonna have a life.”
Rambo: First blood. Classic.
Correct actor, incorrect film. It’s from *Rocky Balboa* (2006).
I know. It was a joke.
Right, everyone knows this is from Cliffhanger.
My bad, I thought it was from Tango & Cash
Clearly it’s Stop or my mom will shoot
I remember this from Demolition Man
Do you like Huey Lewis and the News?
... They're ok.
Their early work was a little too new wave for my tastes, but when Sports came out in '83, I think they really came into their own, commercially and artistically. The whole album has a clear, crisp sound, and a new sheen of consummate professionalism that really gives the songs a big boost. He's been compared to Elvis Costello, but I think Huey has a far more bitter, cynical sense of humor.
Toss up between this and Robin Williams’s park bench scene in “Good Will Hunting.”
That’s a great one, not showy, just perfect for the character. Edit: even though his baseball/wife story is even better!
Al Pacino in The Devil's Advocate. He has a couple of them in this movie which are great.
Billy Madison - industrial revolution https://youtu.be/NJ9yHTS2bG0?feature=shared
I award you no points. And may God have mercy on your soul.
R Lee Emery in Full Metal Jacket
Came here for this.
Brick Top's soliloquy in 'Snatch' on feeding a body to pigs, and what the word 'nemesis' means.
You could add Bullet Tooth Tony’s monologue to the bumbling thieves about their obviously fake gun.
Agreed! Bullet tooth Tony had some great lines..."Mullet, have you been brushing your teeth with dogshit?"....thank god for subtitles, otherwise I'd have missed half of it!
Quint in Jaws
Cookie - RocknRolla Alec Baldwin - Glen Gary Glenn Ross
"See, there are three kinds of people: dicks, pussies and assholes. Pussies think everyone can get along and dicks just want to fuck all the time without thinking it through. But then you got your assholes. And all the assholes want is to shit all over everything. So pussies may get mad at dicks once in a while because, pussies get fucked by dicks. But dicks also fuck assholes! And if they didn't fuck the assholes, you know what you'd get? You'd get your dick and your pussy all covered in shit!"
Scrolled way too far down to find this...
I'm a fan of Rutgar Hauer in Blade Runner, but Jules' speech is pretty good too. I mean... he's tryin' real hard to be the shepherd.
As someone who grew up in a family where my father literally tried to kill my mom and she spent years in court still having to fight against him having custody rights after he was done with jail, Laura Dern’s speech from marriage story was poignant and she delivered it perfectly.
Dennis Hopper in True Romance
Ned Beatty in Network, The Indianapolis Speech in Jaws, the V Speech in V for Vendetta, and Chaplin's closer in The Great Dictator
Another good one from V for Vendetta [V for Vendetta - Revelation (youtube.com)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dyVCCD9OrbQ&t=90s)
One of The best I didn’t see in the comments is in Andor. What have I sacrificed? Everything! [link](https://youtu.be/-3RCme2zZRY?si=7fav4-6QI6Pn7tPs)
When Charlie Chaplain speaks in The Great Dictator. It should be required viewing.
Sorry, it’s Amy Adams in Talladega Nights. One of the best monologues ever. https://youtu.be/IzkrKfk4kYE?si=iwK0sZcDQEhV7kru
I’m as hard as a diamond in an ice storm
The opening scene in Patton
I’m going to go with Ben Afleck as JimYoung in Boiler room.
Johnny Nolan in A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945) talking to his young, sensitive and brilliant daughter Francie about a tree growing out of the cement behind their building: ‘Don’t tell me that tree is gonna lay down and die that easily. Look at that tree. See where it’s coming from. Right outta that cement! Didn’t nobody plant it. Didn’t ask the cement to grow. It just couldn’t help growing so much it just pushed that old cement out of the way.’
Robert Duvall in Apocalypse Now Everyone goes for the Napalm portion of the monologue but the "Someday this war's gonna end" pronouncement at the end and the look he gives of utter disappointment is what hits home for me
Quint from Jaws Pacino from The Devil's Advocate Fred Williamson from From Dusk Till Dawn
I got two that spring to mind. Jefferson Smith, in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington when he is given a basket full of negative letters that the corrupt political crimes from his state have gotten sent. Also the monologue Quint gives about the USS Indianapolis in Jaws
Angus: I'm still here, asshole! I'll always be here! You push me down and I'll get right back up again, and again, and again, and again and again! I could beat you right here, right now! But I don't want to be better than you, Rick! I don't want to be better than anybody! I want to be who I am: a fat kid, who's good at science, and fair at football. That's who I am! I can live with it. Why can't you? And so what? to be normal, we all have to be like YOU? There are 400 people in this room that are nothing like you! Some of them are fat, some of them are skinny. Some of them are tall, some of them are short. Some of them have braces, some of them have birth marks, or scars, or frizzy hair, or ears that stick out! But most of them probably walk through these halls every day, never telling anybody the truth about what they really want, or need, or believe, because people like you, ‘normal’ people like you have them terrified of being who they are. I mean, if you're normal, what does that make them? So which is it, Rick? Are you normal? Or are you just one of us? Rick : Whatever I am, it's something you're never gonna be. Angus : Thank God. Angus-1995.
Sylvester Stallone's [monologue at the end of First Blood ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KNBHO-a_8i4)is heartfelt and agonizing. It allows the audience to feel the disdain, contempt, and betrayal felt by a generation of Vietnam veterans. Too bad some of the monologue is mumbled and unintelligible. I realized what a great scene it was when I watched the movie with subtitles on. The "Nothing is over" line hits home. The book ends with >!Troutman killing Rambo,!< Stallone refused to end the movie that way since the US was losing \~\~20,000\~\~ \~4,880 Vietnam veterans to suicide each month, and he didn't want to become "part of the problem". **Edit:** I did some research and in 1985, when they were making the movie the Vietnam veterans suicide rate was \~4,880 per month (58,000 in 1985). I want to note that we believe these numbers are wrong, but I'm sure Stallone and the crew didn't know that then. Source: [https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/281341](https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2813418) Thanks to [PandiBong](https://www.reddit.com/user/PandiBong/) for pointing it out.
When I first watched that film as a kid I couldn't understand why he had the breakdown. 20 years on active duty and a war later, I came back to it and understood all too well. Very bold and brilliant for it's time, and I don't know if Sly ever really gets enough credit for it.
Game of inches speech in Any Given Sunday
You nailed a lot of the good ones. Blade Runner tesrs in the rain is probably my favorite of the ones you included. My favorite monologue might be Dennis Hopper with Christopher Walken in True Romance.
In the movie There Will Be Blood when Daniel starts talking about milkshakes.
The details of my life are quite inconsequential.... 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 15-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. Sometimes, 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 14, a Zoroastrian named Vilmer ritualistically shaved my testicles. There really is nothing like a shorn scrotum — it's breathtaking... I suggest you try it.
I’m sorry, but I don’t want to be an emperor. That’s not my business. I don’t want to rule or conquer anyone. I should like to help everyone - if possible - Jew, Gentile - black man - white. We all want to help one another. Human beings are like that. We want to live by each other’s happiness - not by each other’s misery. We don’t want to hate and despise one another. In this world there is room for everyone. And the good earth is rich and can provide for everyone. The way of life can be free and beautiful, but we have lost the way. Greed has poisoned men’s souls, has barricaded the world with hate, has goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed. We have developed speed, but we have shut ourselves in. Machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical. Our cleverness, hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little. More than machinery we need humanity. More than cleverness we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost… The aeroplane and the radio have brought us closer together. The very nature of these inventions cries out for the goodness in men - cries out for universal brotherhood - for the unity of us all. Even now my voice is reaching millions throughout the world - millions of despairing men, women, and little children - victims of a system that makes men torture and imprison innocent people.  To those who can hear me, I say - do not despair. The misery that is now upon us is but the passing of greed - the bitterness of men who fear the way of human progress. The hate of men will pass, and dictators die, and the power they took from the people will return to the people. And so long as men die, liberty will never perish… Soldiers! don’t give yourselves to brutes - men who despise you - enslave you - who regiment your lives - tell you what to do - what to think and what to feel! Who drill you - diet you - treat you like cattle, use you as cannon fodder. Don’t give yourselves to these unnatural men - machine men with machine minds and machine hearts! You are not machines! You are not cattle! You are men! You have the love of humanity in your hearts! You don’t hate! Only the unloved hate - the unloved and the unnatural! Soldiers! Don’t fight for slavery! Fight for liberty! In the 17th Chapter of St Luke it is written: “the Kingdom of God is within man” - not one man nor a group of men, but in all men! In you! You, the people have the power - the power to create machines. The power to create happiness! You, the people, have the power to make this life free and beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure. Then - in the name of democracy - let us use that power - let us all unite. Let us fight for a new world - a decent world that will give men a chance to work - that will give youth a future and old age a security. By the promise of these things, brutes have risen to power. But they lie! They do not fulfil that promise. They never will! Dictators free themselves but they enslave the people! Now let us fight to fulfil that promise! Let us fight to free the world - to do away with national barriers - to do away with greed, with hate and intolerance. Let us fight for a world of reason, a world where science and progress will lead to all men’s happiness. Soldiers! in the name of democracy, let us all unite! Final speech from The Great Dictator Copyright © Roy Export S.A.S. All rights reserved The Great Dictator was Chaplin’s first film with dialogue. Chaplin plays both a little Jewish barber, living in the ghetto, and Hynkel, the dictator ruler of Tomainia. In his autobiography Chaplin quotes himself as having said: “One doesn’t have to be a Jew to be anti Nazi. All one has to be is a normal decent human being.” Chaplin and Hitler were born within a week of one another. “There was something uncanny in the resemblance between the Little Tramp and Adolf Hitler, representing opposite poles of humanity, ” writes Chaplin biographer David Robinson, reproducing an unsigned article from The Spectator dated 21st April 1939: “Providence was in an ironical mood when, fifty years ago this week, it was ordained that Charles Chaplin and Adolf Hitler should make their entry into the world within four days of each other….Each in his own way has expressed the ideas, sentiments, aspirations of the millions of struggling citizens ground between the upper and the lower millstone of society. (…) Each has mirrored the same reality – the predicament of the “little man” in modern society. Each is a distorting mirror, the one for good, the other for untold evil.” Chaplin spent many months drafting and re-writing the speech for the end of the film, a call for peace from the barber who has been mistaken for Hynkel. Many people criticized the speech, and thought it was superfluous to the film. Others found it uplifting. Regrettably Chaplin’s words are as relevant today as they were in 1940.
Sam's speech at the end of The Two Towers is beautiful.
I killed ‘im with a lawn mowa blade. Mmmm hmmm.
“I believe In America” (The Godfather)
Best opening line ever. Talk about a thesis statement.
Great list. I’d add Robert Shaw in Jaws and Ellen Burstyn in Requiem for a Dream.
“We're more of the love, blood, and rhetoric school. Well, we can do you blood and love without the rhetoric, and we can do you blood and rhetoric without the love, and we can do you all three concurrent or consecutive. But we can't give you love and rhetoric without the blood. Blood is compulsory. They're all blood, you see.” ― Tom Stoppard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead
My money is on Quint’s *Indianapolis* speech from **JAWS**. Why? Because *just watch the thing*. It’s a goddamned masterclass.
I know it’s in a summer blockbuster. But the presidents speech in Independence Day is pretty good.
ellen burstyn in requiem
Terence Stamp and Bill Duke in “The Limey” takes the cake. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=JsdQYWs3nM4&t=16s
Morpheus. Zion City.
You can't handle the truth... Jack Nicholson was brilliant in A few good men.
The Glengarry Glen Ross monologue.
I really wish someone would list these monologues so I could go watch them on YouTube later. I know some but not most of these
Network I'm as mad as hell Blade runner tears in the rain Apocalypse now horror! Third man ferris wheel scene Nomadland swankie monologue To kill a mockingbird closing argument Pulp fiction has two, watch and diner scene monologue No country for old men monologue 25th hour "fuck you" scene There are more but these ten were on top of my pen!!
So he hid it, in the one place he knew he could hide something: HIS ASS!!!
Charlie Chaplin in the Great Dictator
Brad Pitt monologue at end of Killing Them Softly. Says it all and nails delivery. America is not a country it’s a business. Those words have resonated with me ever since I heard them.
The “Great Wave” speech from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. Perfectly explains the concept of the fall of the American dream and the counterculture movement.
What, no "greed is good" Gordon Gekko monolog?
Don't know if this could be considered a monologue,but I always loved AL Pacino's entire opening statement from "AND JUSTICE FOR ALL"... Here's a part of it.... THE PROSECUTION...IS NOT GONNA GET THAT MAN TODAY....NO...BECAUSE I'M GONNA GET 'IM!!!!! "THAT MAN IS A SLIME! HE IS A SLIME...IF HE'S ALLOWED TO GO FREE...THAN SOMETHING REALLY WRONG IS GOING ON HERE!!" "YOU'RE OUT OF ORDER...THEY'RE OUT OF ORDER...THE WHOLE TRIAL IS OUT OF ORDER!!!" "HEY FRANK..YOU WANNA MAKE A DEAL? I GOT AN INSANE JUDGE ..WHO LIKES TO BEAT THE S**T OUT OF WOMEN...WHATTA YOU WANNA GIVE ME FRANK....THREE WEEKS PROBATION?!!!!!" I loved this!!!
The Chaplin one in the great dictator.
Charlie Chaplin in The Great Dictator.
I loved Mia Goth's monologue at the end of Pearl