The Maltese Falcon Quotes

[last lines]

Detective Tom Polhaus: [picks up the falcon] Heavy. What is it?

Sam Spade: The, uh, stuff that dreams are made of.

Detective Tom Polhaus: Huh?

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[to Spade]

Joel Cairo: No, no. Our private conversations have not been such that I am anxious to continue them. Forgive me for speaking so bluntly, but it is the truth.

Movie: The Maltese Falcon
[first lines]

Sam Spade: Yes, sweetheart?

Effie Perine: There's a girl wants to see you. Her name's Wonderly.

Sam Spade: A customer?

Effie Perine: I guess so. You'll want to see her anyway. She's a knockout.

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[repeated line]

Dr. Joel Cairo: You will please clasp your hands together at the back of your neck.

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[to Spade]

Joel Cairo: No, no. Our private conversations have not been such that I am anxious to continue them. Forgive me for speaking so bluntly, but it is the truth.

Movie: The Maltese Falcon
Brigid O'Shaughnessy: Help me.

Sam Spade: You won't need much of anybody's help. You're good. Chiefly your eyes, I think, and that throb you get in your voice when you say things like 'Be generous, Mr. Spade.'

Brigid O'Shaughnessy: I deserve that. But the lie was in the way I said it, not at all in what I said. It's my own fault if you can't believe me now.

Sam Spade: Ah, now you are dangerous.

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Brigid O'Shaughnessy: I do know he always went heavily armed, and that he never went to sleep without covering the floor around his bed with crumpled newspapers, so that nobody could come silently into his room.

Sam Spade: You picked a nice sort of a playmate.

Brigid O'Shaughnessy: Only that sort could have helped me, if he'd been loyal.

Movie: The Maltese Falcon
Brigid O'Shaughnessy: I do know he always went heavily armed, and that he never went to sleep without covering the floor around his bed with crumpled newspapers, so that nobody could come silently into his room.

Sam Spade: You picked a nice sort of a playmate.

Brigid O'Shaughnessy: Only that sort could have helped me, if he'd been loyal.

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Brigid O'Shaughnessy: Mr. Archer was so alive yesterday, so solid and hearty...

Sam Spade: Stop it. He knew what he was doing. Those are the chances we take.

Brigid O'Shaughnessy: Was he married?

Sam Spade: Yeah, with ten thousand insurance, no children, and a wife that didn't like him.

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Bryan: Who killed Thursby?

Sam Spade: I don't know.

Bryan: Perhaps you don't, but you could make an excellent guess.

Sam Spade: My guess might be excellent or it might be crummy, but Mrs. Spade didn't raise any children dippy enough to make guesses in front of a district attorney, and an assistant district attorney and a stenographer.

Bryan: Why shouldn't you, if you have nothing to conceal?

Sam Spade: Everybody has something to conceal.

Bryan: I'm a sworn officer of the law, 24 hours a day, and neither formality nor informality justifies you withholding evidence of crime from me. Except, of course, on constitutional grounds.

Sam Spade: [ranting] Now, both you and the police have as much as accused me of being mixed up in the other night's murders. Well, I've had trouble with both of you before. And as far as I can see my best chance of clearing myself of the trouble you're trying to make for me, is by bringing in the murderers all tied up. And the only chance I've got of catching them, and tying them up, and bringing them in, is by staying as far away as possible from you and the police, because you'd only gum up the works.
[turns to stenographer]

Sam Spade: You getting this alright, son, or am i goin' too fast for ya?

Stenographer: No sir, I'm getting it alright.

Sam Spade: Good work.

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Casper Gutman: I am a man who likes talking to a man who likes to talk.

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Effie Perine: Look at me, Sam. You worry me. You always think you know what you're doing, but you're too slick for your own good. Some day you're going to find it out.

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Joel Cairo: I am prepared to pay five thousand dollars for the figure's return. Do you have it?

Sam Spade: No.

Joel Cairo: But if it isn't here, why did you risk serious injury to prevent my searching for it?

Sam Spade: Why should I sit around here and let people come in and stick me up?

Joel Cairo: But certainly it is only natural that I try to save the owner such a considerable expense if possible.

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Joel Cairo: Look what you did to my shirt.

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Joel Cairo: Might I remind you Mr. Spade that you may have the falcon, but we certainly have you.

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Kasper Gutman: I couldn't be fonder of you if you were my own son. But, well, if you lose a son, it's possible to get another. There's only one Maltese Falcon.

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Kasper Gutman: I distrust a man who says "when." If he's got to be careful not to drink too much, it's because he's not to be trusted when he does.

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Kasper Gutman: These are facts, historical facts, not schoolbook history, not Mr. Well's history, but history nevertheless.

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Kasper Gutman: Well, sir, what do you suggest? We stand here and shed tears and call each other names... or shall we go to Istanbul?

Joel Cairo: Are you going?

Kasper Gutman: Seventeen years I've wanted that little item and I've been trying to get it. If we must spend another year on the quest... well, sir, it will be an additional expenditure in time of only... five and fifteen seventeenths percent.

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Ruth Wonderly: I know I haven't any right to ask you to help me blindly. But I do ask it. Oh, be generous, Mr. Spade.

Sam Spade: You won't need much of anybody's help. You're pretty good. As a matter of fact, you're very good. It's chiefly your eyes, I think, and the throb you get in your voice when you say, "Oh, be generous, Mr. Spade."

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Sam Spade: [after disarming Wilmer] This'll put you in solid with your boss.

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Sam Spade: [Asking operator for telephone exchange] Berkeley double o seven.

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Sam Spade: [impatiently] Now, let's *talk* about the black bird.

Kasper Gutman: Let's. Mr. Spade, have you any conception of how much money can be got for that black bird?

Sam Spade: No.

Kasper Gutman: Well, sir, if I told you... If I told you *half*... you'd call me a liar.

Sam Spade: No, not even if I thought so.

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Sam Spade: [Asking operator for telephone exchange] Berkeley double o seven.

Movie: The Maltese Falcon
Sam Spade: [impatiently] Now, let's *talk* about the black bird.

Kasper Gutman: Let's. Mr. Spade, have you any conception of how much money can be got for that black bird?

Sam Spade: No.

Kasper Gutman: Well, sir, if I told you... If I told you *half*... you'd call me a liar.

Sam Spade: No, not even if I thought so.

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Sam Spade: All we've got is that maybe you love me and maybe I love you.

Brigid O'Shaughnessy: You know whether you love me or not.

Sam Spade: Maybe I do. I'll have some rotten nights after I've sent you over, but that'll pass.

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Sam Spade: Come on in, precious.

Police Lt. Dundy: [walking in] Who were you expecting, darling?

Sam Spade: You, sweetheart.

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Sam Spade: Don't be too sure I'm as crooked as I'm supposed to be.

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Sam Spade: Haven't you anything better to do than to keep popping in here early every morning and asking a lot of fool questions?

Lt. Dundy: And gettin' a lot of lyin' answers!

Sam Spade: Take it easy.

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Sam Spade: Haven't you tried to buy my loyalty with money and nothing else?

Brigid O'Shaughnessy: What else is there I can buy you with?

Movie: The Maltese Falcon