I’m a fan of Jeopardy and compiled my own list of 30 famous movie quotes.
“We’re going to need a bigger boat.”
“Here’s looking at you, kid.”
“Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn.”
“As God is my witness, I will never be hungry again.”
“You can’t handle the truth.”
“I’m mad as hell, and I’m not going to take it anymore!”
“We’ll always have Paris.”
“You talking to me?”
“I think he got the point.”
“Mrs. Robinson, you’re trying to seduce me, aren’t you?”
“I coulda been a contender.”
“Alright, Mr. Demille, I’m ready for my closeup.”
“Stella!”
“I’ve always depended on the kindness of strangers.”
“I’ll get you, my Pretty, and your little dog, too!”
“There’s no place like home.”
“You’re a very bad man!” “Oh no, my dear. I’m a very good man, but I’m just a very bad wizard.”
“I’m expecting you to die” and “shocking, absolutely shocking!”
“You already got bone structure. When I was your age, I didn’t have no bone structure. You gotta have bone structure.”
“My momma always said life is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you’re going to get.”
“May the force be with you.”
“Phone home.”
“I’ll be back” and “Hasta la vista, Baby.”
“I’m gonna make him an offer he can’t refuse.”
“You is kind. You is smart. You is important.”
“I wish I knew how to quit you.”
“I’m the king of the world” and “I’ll never let go, Jack.”
“They may take our lives, but they’ll never take our freedom.”
“I’m having an old friend for dinner.”
“Houston, we have a problem.”
I realize my list is biased toward Baby Boomers and GenXers. My millennial and Gen Z sons do not know movie quotes from the 1930s, 1940s, or 1950s. They may know a few movie quotes from the 1960s and 1970s, but don’t score well until quizzed on movie quotes from films made in the 1980s or more recently. In turn, on my list I have only a few quotes from 21st-century films. I may not be culturally literate or tuned into the media culture that GenZ consumes.
This got me to thinking: what constitutes cultural literacy these days? An increasingly fragmented media means that there are fewer things we all share.
See how you do on the quiz. Reply with your responses. I’ll post the answers on Wednesday.
Can you add some famous movie quotes? Don’t identify the film — let us guess! Post the famous quotes in the comments.
Movie History
What’s most striking is that movies were not invented according to a grand vision of cinema. They emerged accidentally in the late 19th century and early 20th century from photography, scientific motion studies, optical toys, recorded entertainment, and projection.
Their inventors saw the machines. But no one in the early days envisioned a new art form, a hugely profitable industry that would dominate world cultures. Nor did they grasp that those machines would create a shared imaginative world or a shared global culture.
I suspect we are at the beginning of a similar cultural transformation with the widespread adoption of artificial intelligence.
The first attempt to create a mass market movie was The Great Train Robbery in 1903.
Drill Deeper:
Crash Course Film History: 16 episodes, about 10 minutes each, created in 2017, with transcripts.
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