Thursday, September 22, 2005

Yeh sambhaal mera faulaadi mukka!

Which are the film lines that you think are keepers? There are just too many of them. From Arnie's 'haste la vista, baby' to Bachchan's 'Mein aaj bhi pheke hue paise nahin uthata'. A funny thing one notices is that almost all of the unforgettable lines in cinema have been uttered by men. Coincidence I'm sure, but intriguing. One can remember a Hema Malini rattling off a 'yun to bak bak karne ki aadat hai nahin' from Sholay and a Srivedi going 'Balmaaa' from Chaalbaaz or an Ingrid Bergman wistfully saying, 'Play it Sam, for old time's sake', but nothing else really stands out (my memory stinks, so the statement is open to argument) .

Anyway, this isn't about gender bias. Here are some of my favorite quotes, film or otherwise, in no particular order:

1. Super Commando Dhruv Comics: I used to enjoy these comics tremendously when I used to visit my grandparents in Kanpur. Every kid in the locality had a ton of 'Nagraj' and 'Super Commando Dhruv' comics. I was hooked after a little while. Whenever our hero got into the final showdown with the villain at the end of a story, he went "Yeh sambhaal, mera faulaadi mukka!". Freakin' hilarious!

2. Terminator 2: Arnie made this part all his own. Playing a mindless robotic killer has been the most convincing thing he's done to date. The line I like the most from the movie is "I'll be back". Menacing.

3. Sholay: This movie gave us tonnes of classics. But Gabbar was the true hero of the film and his line "Kitne aadmi the?" is my favorite. When batchmates in college and in university used to return, disheveled and hassled, from panel interviews, this was a sure shot way to get them to beat you up.

4. The Godfather: "I'm going to make him an offer he can't refuse". Haven't had one of those in a long time.

5. Jerry Maguire: "Show me the money!". Show me the money.

6. Wall Street/Ivan Boesky: "Greed, for lack of a better word, is good." The decade of the 80s on Wall Street was characterized by multi million dollar deals, corporate raiders, obscenely rich I-Bankers and insider trading. Ivan Boesky, the biggest arbitrager of them all, uttered these lines in guest lectures at the Harvards and the Whartons. He subsequently was fined millions of dollars and was sentenced to jail. Michael Douglas does an Oscar winning reprise of Boesky in Wall Street.

7. Anand: "Babu Moshai, zindagi aur maut upar wale ke haath mein hai. Hum sab rangmanch ki kathputliyan hai, jinki dor upar wale ki haath mein hai. Kaun kab kaise uthega, yeh koi nahin bata sakta." Only hindi film to have made me cry.

8. Mr. India: "Mogambo khush hua!" Best baddie dialogue after Gabbar's many verbal pearls.

9. Frankenstein: "It's alive! Its alive". Exactly what I said when the forecasting model I'm working on at my current internship started working.

10. Star Wars: "May the force be with you." Before a date, an exam or a drinking session. A phrase for many occasions.

There are many more unforgettable lines that linger in memory, but can't include them all here, much as I would like. Feel free to key in your favorites.

Cheers!
Abhishek.

2 comments:

Cogito said...

Good one !

Some more :

1. Casablanca : Here's looking at you, kid.

2. On the Waterfront (Brando) : I could've been a contender.

3. Sunset Boulevard : I am big. It's the pictures that got small

4. Some like it hot : Well, nobody's perfect

5.Dr.Strangelove : "Gentlemen, you can't fight in here! This is the War Room!"

6. Forrest Gump : Life is like a box of choclates

7. Deewar : Mere paas Maa hai !

Abhishek Chatterjee said...

It's amazing that some movies give us loads of unforgettable line. Casablanca and Sholay were such films. No modern films have yet reached that level.