AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movie Quotes

Part of the AFI 100 Years... series, AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movie Quotes is a list of the top 100 movie quotations in American cinema. The American Film Institute revealed the list in 2005 in a three-hour television program on CBS. The program was hosted by actor Pierce Brosnan and had commentary from many Hollywood actors and filmmakers.

A jury consisting of 1,500 film artists, critics, and historians selected "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn," spoken by Clark Gable in the Civil War epic "Gone with the Wind" as the most memorable American movie quotation of all time.

"Casablanca" has the most quotes of any movie on the list, with six. "Gone with the Wind" and "The Wizard of Oz" are next, with three each. Fourteen different actors, ten men and four women, each have two or more quotations attributed to them. Leading this select ensemble is Humphrey Bogart, who has five, four of them from "Casablanca". Bette Davis and Vivien Leigh are tied for the most quotations by an actress, with three. Marlon Brando, Tom Hanks, and Al Pacino also have three apiece. James Cagney, Sean Connery, Clint Eastwood, Charlton Heston, Judy Garland, Jack Nicholson, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Dustin Hoffman, Tom Cruise and Gloria Swanson each have two.

About

One actor has four quotes playing the same character in the same movie: Humphrey Bogart in "Casablanca" (#5, #20, #43 and #67). Three actresses have two quotes playing the same character in the same movie: Vivien Leigh in "Gone with the Wind" (#31 and #59), Gloria Swanson in Sunset Boulevard (#7 and #24) and Judy Garland in "The Wizard of Oz" (#4 and #23).

Two actors have quotes playing the same character in different movies: Clint Eastwood as Harry Callahan in "Sudden Impact" (#6) and "Dirty Harry" (#51) and Sean Connery as James Bond in "Dr. No" (#22) and "Goldfinger" (#90).

Four of the quotations on the list consist of one word, or a single word repeated: "Rosebud," from "Citizen Kane", "Plastics," from "The Graduate", "Attica! Attica!" from "Dog Day Afternoon", and "Toga! Toga!" from "Animal House". The longest is Katharine Hepburn's quote from "On Golden Pond" ("Listen to me, mister. You're my knight in shining armor...") at 40 words.

Three of the quotations were taken from actual events:

* Lou Gehrig's farewell speech ("The Luckiest Man on the Face of the Earth") from "The Pride of the Yankees" (#38)
* "Apollo 13"'s distress call ("Houston, we have a problem") (#50)
* George Cohan's signature line ("My mother thanks you,...") from "Yankee Doodle Dandy" (#97)

In addition, Jack Nicholson's "Here's Johnny" line from "The Shining" (#68) was Johnny Carson's introduction on The Tonight Show.

Criteria

Jurors were asked to consider the following criteria in making their selections:

* "Movie Quotation": A statement, phrase or brief exchange of dialogue spoken in an American film. [AFI defines an American film as an English language motion picture with significant creative and/or financial production elements from the United States. Additionally, only quotations from feature-length American films released before January 1, 2004, were considered. AFI defines a feature-length film as a motion picture of narrative format that is typically over 60 minutes in length.] Lyrics from songs are not eligible.
* "Cultural Impact": Movie quotations that viewers use in their own lives and situations; circulating through popular culture, they become part of the national lexicon.
* "Legacy": Movie quotations that viewers use to evoke the memory of a treasured film, thus ensuring and enlivening its historical legacy.

The list

Footnotes

External links

* [http://www.afi.com/tvevents/100years/quotes.aspx#list AFI List of Quotes]
* [http://www.afi.com/Docs/tvevents/pdf/quotes400.pdf List of the 400 Nominees]
* [http://www.best-quote.com Movie Quote Database]
* [http://www.themoviequotes.com The Movie Quote Database]
* [http://www.movie-quotes-db.com The Movie Quotes Database]