Seven Important Social Commentary Fictional Speeches in American Cinema
The Great Dictator (1940) starring Charles Chaplin
A little Jewish Barber ‘I’m sorry, but I don’t want to be an emperor. That’s not my business. I don’t want to rule or conquer anyone. I should like to help everyone - if possible - Jew, Gentile - black man - white. We all want to help one another. Human beings are like that. We want to live by each other’s happiness - not by each other’s misery. We don’t want to hate and despise one another. In this world there is room for everyone. And the good earth is rich and can provide for everyone. The way of life can be free and beautiful, but we have lost the way.
Greed has poisoned men’s souls, has barricaded the world with hate, has goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed. We have developed speed, but we have shut ourselves in. Machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical. Our cleverness, hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little. More than machinery we need humanity. More than cleverness we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost…
The aeroplane and the radio have brought us closer together. The very nature of these inventions cries out for the goodness in men - cries out for universal brotherhood - for the unity of us all. Even now my voice is reaching millions throughout the world - millions of despairing men, women, and little children - victims of a system that makes men torture and imprison innocent people.
To those who can hear me, I say - do not despair. The misery that is now upon us is but the passing of greed - the bitterness of men who fear the way of human progress. The hate of men will pass, and dictators die, and the power they took from the people will return to the people. And so long as men die, liberty will never perish…
Soldiers! don’t give yourselves to brutes - men who despise you - enslave you - who regiment your lives - tell you what to do - what to think and what to feel! Who drill you - diet you - treat you like cattle, use you as cannon fodder. Don’t give yourselves to these unnatural men - machine men with machine minds and machine hearts! You are not machines! You are not cattle! You are men! You have the love of humanity in your hearts! You don’t hate! Only the unloved hate - the unloved and the unnatural! Soldiers! Don’t fight for slavery! Fight for liberty!
In the 17th Chapter of St Luke it is written: “the Kingdom of God is within man” - not one man nor a group of men, but in all men! In you! You, the people have the power - the power to create machines. The power to create happiness! You, the people, have the power to make this life free and beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure.
Then - in the name of democracy - let us use that power - let us all unite. Let us fight for a new world - a decent world that will give men a chance to work - that will give youth a future and old age a security. By the promise of these things, brutes have risen to power. But they lie! They do not fulfil that promise. They never will!
Dictators free themselves but they enslave the people! Now let us fight to fulfil that promise! Let us fight to free the world - to do away with national barriers - to do away with greed, with hate and intolerance. Let us fight for a world of reason, a world where science and progress will lead to all men’s happiness. Soldiers! in the name of democracy, let us all unite!’
Final speech from The Great Dictator Copyright © Roy Export S.A.S. All rights reserved
Mister Smith Goes to Washington (1939) starring Jimmy Stewart
Jefferson Smith ‘Just get up off the ground, that's all I ask. Get up there with that lady that's up on top of this Capitol dome, that lady that stands for liberty. Take a look at this country through her eyes if you really want to see something. And you won't just see scenery; you'll see the whole parade of what Man's carved out for himself, after centuries of fighting. Fighting for something better than just jungle law, fighting so's he can stand on his own two feet, free and decent, like he was created, no matter what his race, color, or creed. That's what you'd see. There's no place out there for graft, or greed, or lies, or compromise with human liberties. And, uh, if that's what the grownups have done with this world that was given to them, then we'd better get those boys' camps started fast and see what the kids can do. And it's not too late, because this country is bigger than the Taylors, or you, or me, or anything else. Great principles don't get lost once they come to light. They're right here; you just have to see them again!’
Billy Jack (1971) starring Tom Laughlin
Jean ‘We'll go someplace else, someplace where it doesn't have to be like this.’
Billy ‘Oh, really? Tell me, where is that place? Where is it? In what remote corner of this country, no, entire goddamn planet is there a place were men really care about one another and really love each other? Now, you tell me where such a place is, and I promise you that I'll never hurt another human being as long as I live.’
Little Big Man (1970) starring Dustin Hoffman, Chief Dan George
Jack Crabb ‘Do you hate them? Do you hate the White man now?’
Old Lodge Skins (holding up scalp) ‘Do you see this fine thing? Do you admire the humanity of it? Because the Human Beings, my son, they believe everything is alive. Not only man and animals, but also water, earth, stone, and also the things from them... like that hair. The man from whom this hair came, he's bald on the other side, because I now own his scalp! That is the way things are. But the white man, they believe EVERYTHING is dead. Stone, earth, animals. And people! Even their own people! If things keep trying to live, white man will rub them out. That is the difference.’
My Name is Nobody (1973) starring Henry Fonda
Jack Beauregard ‘Dear Nobody, dying is not the worst thing that can happen to a man. Look at me... I've been dead for three days now, and have finally found my peace. You used to say that my life was hanging by a thread. Maybe so, but I'm afraid it's your life that's hanging by a thread now. And there's quite a few people who'd like to cut that thread. Yeah, I guess it's your way of feeling alive. See, there's a whole difference between you and me: I always try to steer away from trouble, while you seem to be looking for it all the time. But I must admit, you've been able to solve your share, even if you like others to take the credit. This way, you can remain a "nobody." You got it all nicely figured out. But you gambled too big this time, and there's too many people who know you're "somebody" after all. And you won't have much time left for playing your funny games. They'll make life harder and harder for you, until you too will meet somebody who wants to put you down in history. And so you'll find out that the only way to become a nobody again is to die. Anyhow, from now on, you'll be walking in my boots, and maybe you won't be laughing so loud anymore. But you can still do one thing: you can preserve a little of that illusion that made my generation tick. Maybe you'll do it in your own funny way, but you'll be grateful just the same. I guess looking back, it seems we were all a bunch of romantic fools. We still believed that a good pistol and a quick showdown could solve everything. But then, the West used to be wide-open spaces with lots of elbow room, and you never ran into the same person twice. By the time you came along, it was changed. It got smaller and crowded, and I kept bumping into the same people all the time. But if you're able to run around in the West peacefully catching flies, it's only 'cause fellows like me were there first. Yeah, the same fellow you want to see written up in history books, 'cause people need something to believe in, like you say. But you won't be able to have it your own way much longer, 'cause the country ain't the same anymore, and I'm already feeling a stranger myself. But, what's worse, violence has changed, too. It's grown, and got organized, and a good pistol don't mean a damn thing anymore. But I guess you must know all this, 'cause it's your kind of time, not mine. And I also figured out the moral to your grandpa's story, the one about the cow that covered the little bird in cowpie to keep it warm, and then the coyote hauled it out and ate it. It's the moral of these new times of yours: Folks that throw dirt on you aren't always trying to hurt you, and folks who pull you out of a jam aren't always trying to help you. But the main point is, when you're up to your nose in shit, keep your mouth shut. This is why people like me gotta' go, and this is why you faked that gunfight to get me out of the West clean. Anyhow, I was getting to be one more old-timer, and the years don't make wisdom, they just make old age. One can be young in years and old in hours, like you. I guess I'm talking like a damn preacher, but it's your fault; what can you expect of a national monument? Well, keep your mind and your heart open, and if you ever meet one of those men you almost never meet, you can keep each other company, and it won't be so lonely for you. They say distance makes friendship grow stronger. Maybe so, 'cause after three days without you dogging my tracks, I kinda' miss you. I really gotta' sign off now, so even if you've been a stinkin' nosy troublemaker all the time, thanks for everything just the same. P.S.: Just one more piece of advice from an old-timer: When you're getting a shave and a cut, be sure the right man's wearing a jacket!’
Three Days of the Condor (1975) starring Robert Redford, Cliff Robertson
Higgins ‘It's simple economics. Today it's oil, right? In ten or fifteen years, food. Plutonium. Maybe even sooner. Now, what do you think the people are gonna want us to do then?’
Joe Turner ‘Ask them?’
Higgins ‘Not now - then! Ask 'em when they're running out. Ask 'em when there's no heat in their homes and they're cold. Ask 'em when their engines stop. Ask 'em when people who have never known hunger start going hungry. You wanna know something? They won't want us to ask 'em. They'll just want us to get it for 'em!’
Network (1976) starring Peter Finch
Howard Beale ‘At the bottom of all of our terrified souls, we know, that democracy is a dying giant, a sick, sick, dying, decaying political concept, riling in its final pain. I don't mean that the United States is finished as a world power. The United States is the richest, the most powerful, the most advanced country in the world, light years ahead of any other country. And I don't mean the Communist are gonna take over the world; because, the Communists are deader than we are. What is finished... is the idea that this great country is dedicated to the freedom and flourishing of every individual in it. It's the individual that's finished. It's the single, solitary human being that's finished. It's every single one of you out there that's finished, because this is no longer a nation of independent individuals. It's a nation of some 200-odd million transistorized, deodorized, whiter-that-white, steel-belted bodies, totally unnecessary as human beings, and as replaceable as piston rods... Well, the time has come to say, is dehumanization such a bad word. Because good or bad, that's what is so. The whole world is becoming humanoid - creatures that look human but aren't. The whole world not just us. We're just the most advanced country, so we're getting there first. The whole world's people are becoming mass-produced, programmed, numbered, insensate things...’
