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Everyone loves a good monologue. They can steal the whole show, whether on stage or onscreen. But they can also spectacularly crash and burn, undermined by overwriting, a poor performance, lazy direction, and more. While I have many I adore, my favorite has pretty much remained unchanged for many, many years now: Charlie Chaplin’s closing speech from THE GREAT DICTATOR (1940). It’s one I honestly think should be part of all formal education.
Tell me: What’s your favorite movie monologue and why?
And I have such a soft spot for Billy Crystal's at the end of When Harry Met Sally - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9JSVGS4dHU Funny and poignant and truthful - just perfect. Romcom lines don't get any greater than "When you realise you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible". Sigh.
Indeed! I almost wrote 'it's the kind of line I aspire to write in my romcoms' but then I realised that applied to the whole script :D
Brassed Off is SUCH a great film - properly funny and properly moving (and also a great romcom in its own right!) - yet is overlooked, I think? The Full Monty came out around six months later and became the big hit out of those two; and while I completely adore TFM also, Brassed Off absolutely deserved the plaudits too.
I haven't seen BRASSED OFF since it was released. I think I'm going to have to revisit it in the new year (November and December are pretty much all awards films and Christmas films for me).
This one would be in the running for my number one spot if it weren't for the fact that Chaplin's makes me cry, while this one makes me want to go burn a billionaire's house down. I'm sentimental, I guess.
“Sorry, boys, all the stitches in the world can’t sew me together again... Lay down. Lay down. Gonna stretch me out in Fernandez Funeral Home on 109th street... Always knew I’d make a stop there, but a lot later than a whole gang of people thought. Last of the Mo-Rican’s. Well, maybe not the last. Gail’s gonna be a good mom. New, improved Carlito Brigante. Hope she uses the money to get out. No room in this city for big hearts like hers... Sorry, baby, I tried the best I could. Honest. Can’t come with me on this trip, though... Gettin’ the shakes now. Last call for drinks. Bar’s closin’ down. Sun’s out. Where we goin’ for breakfast? Don’t wanna go far... Rough night. Tired, baby... Tired...”
The first one I thought of on reading your essay was Roy Batty's tears in the rain in Blade Runner. That Rutger Hauer wrote it himself makes it all the more poignant. I tried to think of others but really, that one scene burned so brightly that every other monologue feels bleached out of my memory and I couldn't honestly think of any, except maybe Tyler Durden's "entire generation pumping gas" monologue in Fight Club.
This is definitely in my Top 5 favorite movie monologues! I've been meaning to rewatch FIGHT CLUB (it's been close to a decade), so I'm going to put that on my list for the new year - thanks. Also, thank you for being a paid subscriber!
You can thank Ed Brubaker for that. He hipped me to your Substack and it intersects a lot of my interests and professional ambitions (or dreams as they are currently).
In the interim between this comment and the previous comment, I remembered a great recent monologue, "my mind a sunless space" by Luthien in Ep. 10 of Andor. I found it to refresh my memory and honestly it still gives me goosebumps and I remember that scene clear as day although I watched it several months ago.
“Calm. Kindness. Kinship. Love. I’ve given up all chance at inner peace. I’ve made my mind a sunless space. I share my dreams with ghosts. I wake up every day to an equation I wrote 15 years ago from which there’s only one conclusion, I’m damned for what I do. My anger, my ego, my unwillingness to yield, my eagerness to fight, they’ve set me on a path from which there is no escape. I yearned to be a savior against injustice without contemplating the cost and by the time I looked down there was no longer any ground beneath my feet.
What is my sacrifice?
I’m condemned to use the tools of my enemy to defeat them. I burn my decency for someone else’s future. I burn my life to make a sunrise that I know I’ll never see. And the ego that started this fight will never have a mirror or an audience or the light of gratitude.
Pete Postlethwaite's stirring speech in Brassed Off is an absolute corker (especially for those of us who hate the Tories ;)) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lKx3MUqzCcQ
And I have such a soft spot for Billy Crystal's at the end of When Harry Met Sally - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9JSVGS4dHU Funny and poignant and truthful - just perfect. Romcom lines don't get any greater than "When you realise you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible". Sigh.
I'd forgotten about the BRASSED OFF speech, but I am now crying (I hate the Tories, too).
As for the Crystal speech at the end of WHEN HARRY MET SALLY, it really is a little piece of rom-com magic. That whole script is!
Indeed! I almost wrote 'it's the kind of line I aspire to write in my romcoms' but then I realised that applied to the whole script :D
Brassed Off is SUCH a great film - properly funny and properly moving (and also a great romcom in its own right!) - yet is overlooked, I think? The Full Monty came out around six months later and became the big hit out of those two; and while I completely adore TFM also, Brassed Off absolutely deserved the plaudits too.
I haven't seen BRASSED OFF since it was released. I think I'm going to have to revisit it in the new year (November and December are pretty much all awards films and Christmas films for me).
"I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore!!" From Network.
https://youtu.be/ZwMVMbmQBug?si=tQwllFMROfoEBOLs
This one would be in the running for my number one spot if it weren't for the fact that Chaplin's makes me cry, while this one makes me want to go burn a billionaire's house down. I'm sentimental, I guess.
Carlito’s Way final monologue.
“Sorry, boys, all the stitches in the world can’t sew me together again... Lay down. Lay down. Gonna stretch me out in Fernandez Funeral Home on 109th street... Always knew I’d make a stop there, but a lot later than a whole gang of people thought. Last of the Mo-Rican’s. Well, maybe not the last. Gail’s gonna be a good mom. New, improved Carlito Brigante. Hope she uses the money to get out. No room in this city for big hearts like hers... Sorry, baby, I tried the best I could. Honest. Can’t come with me on this trip, though... Gettin’ the shakes now. Last call for drinks. Bar’s closin’ down. Sun’s out. Where we goin’ for breakfast? Don’t wanna go far... Rough night. Tired, baby... Tired...”
You've inspired me to rewatch the film!
The first one I thought of on reading your essay was Roy Batty's tears in the rain in Blade Runner. That Rutger Hauer wrote it himself makes it all the more poignant. I tried to think of others but really, that one scene burned so brightly that every other monologue feels bleached out of my memory and I couldn't honestly think of any, except maybe Tyler Durden's "entire generation pumping gas" monologue in Fight Club.
This is definitely in my Top 5 favorite movie monologues! I've been meaning to rewatch FIGHT CLUB (it's been close to a decade), so I'm going to put that on my list for the new year - thanks. Also, thank you for being a paid subscriber!
You can thank Ed Brubaker for that. He hipped me to your Substack and it intersects a lot of my interests and professional ambitions (or dreams as they are currently).
In the interim between this comment and the previous comment, I remembered a great recent monologue, "my mind a sunless space" by Luthien in Ep. 10 of Andor. I found it to refresh my memory and honestly it still gives me goosebumps and I remember that scene clear as day although I watched it several months ago.
“Calm. Kindness. Kinship. Love. I’ve given up all chance at inner peace. I’ve made my mind a sunless space. I share my dreams with ghosts. I wake up every day to an equation I wrote 15 years ago from which there’s only one conclusion, I’m damned for what I do. My anger, my ego, my unwillingness to yield, my eagerness to fight, they’ve set me on a path from which there is no escape. I yearned to be a savior against injustice without contemplating the cost and by the time I looked down there was no longer any ground beneath my feet.
What is my sacrifice?
I’m condemned to use the tools of my enemy to defeat them. I burn my decency for someone else’s future. I burn my life to make a sunrise that I know I’ll never see. And the ego that started this fight will never have a mirror or an audience or the light of gratitude.
So what do I sacrifice?
Everything!”