Seven Movie Lines That Will Improve Your Life

Many people can quote their favorite movie lines—-”You want the truth? You can’t handle the truth!” or “What we have here is a failure to communicate.” But I’ve found that many have important life lessons in them, and that, actually, if you apply them to your life you will be better off for it.

1. “Well . . . . bye.” One of my favorite all-time movies is “Tombstone.” Kurt Russell was as good as he has ever been, Sam Elliot and Bill Paxon were perfect as the Earp brothers, and Val Kilmer was cheated out of a Best Supporting Oscar for his unmatched role as Doc Holliday. While Doc had many scene-stealing lines, the one that stays with me is Powers Boothe as “Curly Bill” as the defeated Earps are leaving town. Wyatt says he is finished. It’s over. They are leaving Tombstone, whereupon Bill says merely, “Well . . . bye.”

I found this is actually a pretty good way to dismiss someone without saying something incendiary. It is my stock farewell to any DemoKKKrat or DemoKKKrat lite who passes. There is no need to praise someone for a “lifetime of service.” There is likewise no need to concoct phony emotions. A simple, “well . . . bye” will do—-especially for breakups that are clearly at the final stage.

2. “Sometimes these are precisely the battles that must be fought.” In “Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King,” Gandalf and Pippin, standing on the walls of Minas Tirath, gaze upon the massive orc army. They have no chance. They are so outnumbered that the end is already written. Pippin turns to Gandalf and soberly says, “We can’t win, can we?” Gandalf answers, “No. But sometimes these are precisely the battles that must be fought.” There will come times in our lives where we can’t win, whether it’s in a clash with the government, a large corporation, or even a disease. Yet these are the times we must fight. Certainly the first snowflake does not cause the avalanche. Even when a medical condition is hopeless, only God knows the end of days and the appointment of man. Until He decides, fight on.

3. “Shitter’s full.” Randy Quaid, as the loveable “Cousin Eddie,” always had a different way of looking at life in the “Vacation” series. In “Christmas Vacation,” Clark Griswold (Chevy Chase) looks out his front window to see Cousin Eddit emptying his septic tank from the RV into the sewer. “What are you doing?” asks Clark. “Shitter’s full” yells back Cousin Eddie.

Our national history has many moments when the public says, “Shitter’s full.” Even Thomas Jefferson said that men would suffer, as long as evils were sufferable, rather than right wrongs. By that he meant, it took a great deal to get Americans to make radical changes in their lives. But by 1776, the shitter was full. Same in 1860 when the slave states decided to jettison the Union. Enough, Americans said. In 2016, Americans had another of those moments, and I believe an even greater such moment is coming in 2024.

4. “Act as if you had faith.” Paul Newman, in probably his best role ever as Francis Galvin, Attorney at Law in “The Verdict,” has seen a corrupt court and devious attorneys for the doctors he is suing use illegal and unfair tactics every step of the way. He manages to get into testimony the key information that the doctors had made the admitting nurse falsify the time the patient ate on the admission form, leading to the patient’s comatose condition. But it now has been thrown out. Frank is down to pleading with the jury to do the right thing. He tells them, “In my religion it is said ‘Act as if ye have faith.’” And that’s what he asks the jury to do.

In fact, acting on what you believe is the very definition of faith. Faith without works is dead, because without works there is no faith—-only belief. A more crass way of putting it is “fake it til you make it,” but it is a message repeated by generals such as George Patton, who insisted his men clean up and wear their uniforms correctly, for when they started looking like soldiers they’d start acting like soldiers. That’s why when you are recovering from an illness it is critical to do anything: get up and make your bed; take a shower and shave; walk your dog; go to the store, if only for a couple of items. Because when you act as if you’re well, you will soon begin feeling better.

5. “We’re gonna need a bigger boat.” Probably the best remembered line in all of Steven Spielberg’s “Jaws” is delivered by Sheriff Martin Brody, Roy Schneider, who, cigarette in mouth, is throwing chum in the water aft while both Mr. Hooper (Richard Dreyfus) and Quint (Robert Shaw) are more forward in the vessel. Up to that moment none of them have actually seen the shark up close. As Brody complains about chumming, suddenly the massive fish rises out of the water within feet of Brody. Without even dropping the cigarette from his mouth, he slowly backs into the cabin—-while continuing to stare at the place where the shark came up, and said, “We’re gonna need a bigger boat.”

There are times in life where we find we need a bigger boat: a job we took on is out of our league and we need help. A journey we planned will be too cramped in the vehicle we expected to use. Even a house we had considered perfect is now just too small. It is important at those times to not be Quints, thinking what you have will be right because it’s what you have. Get the bigger boat, or postpone your project. To so otherwise might not just risk failure, but even death.

6. “Begone! You have no power here.” Dorothy, in the “Wonderful Wizard of Oz,” is helpless at times, but she’s a quick learner. And when the Wicked Witch comes to threaten her, Dorothy looks to her protector, Glinda the Good Witch who says “Begone! You have no power here.” How many of these agitators and professional aggrieved people do you see on television every day being encouraged or deferred to by our side. The proper response to an AOC or Maxine Waters is “Begone! You have no power here.” Think of Glinda’s words when you assess a pain-in-the-butt associate who really can do nothing to you. You don’t need to be mean, or start a fight. Just realize they need to begone, because they have no power over you.

7. “Mike Eruzione . . . I play for the United States of America.” In the movie Miracle, the coach Herb Brooks (played again by Kurt Russell) is pushing his players, who have arrived as college all-stars still seeing themselves as individual college stars. When he asks who they play for, they shout out “University of Minnesota” or “University of Massachusetts.” Brooks’s goal is to turn them into a team, who put playing for the USA first. After a brutal workout, in which Brooks sends them on mind-numbing drills again and again, Mike Eruzione finally gets it. “Mike Eruzione,” he shouts. “Who do you play for?” Brooks shouts back. “I play for the United States of America.”

We have far, far too many people in elected office today who play for the ChiComs, or the World Economic Forum, or Google. We need to all be playing for the United States of America.

Larry Schweikart

Rock drummer

Film maker

NYTimes #1 bestselling author

Political pundit

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