Bad Day at Black Rock quotes

View Quote Coley Trimble: Well, if it's not Macreedy, the world's champion roadhog...You ought to be more careful, man - all that one-arm driving...It's a threat to life and limb...You could get yourself killed that way, nosin' all over the countryside.

View Quote Mr. Hastings: Nobody told me the train was stopping...It's the first time the Streamliner has stopped here in four years.

View Quote Pete Wirth: [to Liz, on the phone] I might as well be dead. Yeah, I told him everything...I'm asking you because I need your help. You'd be saving two lives, Liz: Macreedy's and mine, if that means anything to you.

View Quote Pete Wirth: You're mighty quick to kill - and he's not an animal.

View Quote Coley: I think Macreedy's a nothin', a nobody...So there's nothin' to worry about...What can he find out? That Komoko...Suppose he finds out.
Smith: A nobody like Macreedy can raise a pretty big stink. The point is - who'd miss a nobody like Macreedy if he just, uh, say, disappeared? Who, Coley?...
Pete: Why don't we wait?...I mean, maybe he won't find anything. Maybe he'll just go away.
Smith: Not Macreedy. I know those maimed guys. Their minds get twisted. They put on hair-shirts and act like martyrs. All of 'em are do-gooders, freaks, troublemakers.
Pete: Let's wait and see. There's no danger yet.
Smith: No danger, he says. This guy's like a carrier of small pox. Since he's arrived, this town has a fever, an infection, and it's spreading.

View Quote Coley: I'm half-hoss, half-alligator. You mess with me and I'll kick a lung outta ya. Whaddya think of that?
Macreedy: No comment.
Coley: You know, talkin' to you is like pullin' teeth. You wear me out. You're a yellow-bellied Jap lover. Am I right or wrong?
Macreedy: You're not only wrong - you're wrong at the top of your voice.
Coley: You don't like my voice?
Macreedy: [To Smith] I think your friend is trying to start trouble.
Smith: Why ever would he want to do that?
Macreedy: Well, I don't know. Maybe he thinks that if he needles me enough, I might crack. I might even fight back. And then either he or your other ape sittin' over there could beat me to death and cop a plea of self-defense.
Smith: I don't think that'll be necessary. You're so scared now you'll probably drown in your own sweat.
Coley: No, before that happens, couldn't I pick a fight with you if I tied one hand behind me...?

View Quote Conductor: Man, they look woebegone and far away.
Macreedy: Oh, I'll only be here twenty-four hours.
Conductor: In a place like this, it could be a lifetime.

View Quote Conductor: What's all the excitement? What happened?
Macreedy: A shooting.
Conductor: Thought it was something. First time the Streamliner's stopped here in four years.
Macreedy: Second time.

View Quote Doc: He's no salesman, that's for sure. Unless he's peddlin' dynamite.
Sam: Maybe he's a cop or somethin'.
Doc: Ever see a cop with a stiff arm?
Sam: Maybe his arm's all right. Maybe he's just hangin' onto something tight in his pocket.
Doc: Like what? A pistol? A stick of TNT so he can blow up the whole mangy, miserable town?

View Quote Doc: Maybe we need it [the medal]. It would give us something to build on. This town's wrecked, just as though it was bombed out. Maybe it can come back.
Macreedy: Some towns do and some towns don't. It depends on the people.
Doc: That medal would help.

View Quote Doc: Smith owned Adobe Flat. He leased it to Komoko. He figured he had cheated him because you gotta have water to raise anything. There never was any water on Adobe Flat. Komoko dug a well. He must have gone down sixty feet.
Pete: He got plenty of water. That made Smith pretty sore. He didn't like Japs anyway. The day after Pearl Harbor, Smith went to Sand City.
Macreedy: Yeah, he got turned down, trying to enlist.
Pete: Well, when he got back, he was pretty sore. Around ten o'clock, we all started drinking.
Macreedy: Ten in the morning.
Pete: Yeah. Smith, Coley, Sam, Hector, and me - we were all drunk. Patriotic drunk. We wanted to go out to scare the Jap a little and have a little fun. Well, when we got there, he heard us comin' and he locked the door. And then Smith started a fire. And the Jap - he came running out. His clothes were all burning. And then Smith shot him. I didn't even know he had a gun.
Macreedy: Then you got scared and buried him, and kept your mouths shut, hmm?
Pete: Yeah.
Macreedy: Well, go ahead and have your drink now. You're gonna need it.

View Quote Doc: They're gonna kill you with no hard feelings.
Macreedy: And you're gonna sit there and let 'em do it.
Doc: I try to live right. I drink my milk every day. But mostly, I try to mind my own business - which is something I'd advise you to do.

View Quote Liz: Things change.
Macreedy: Sure do. And Smith is the kid who changes 'em, isn't he?...What's wrong with this town of yours, Miss Wirth?...
Liz: I don't want to get involved.
Macreedy: Involved in what?
Liz: Whatever you're up to. Whatever happens, I've got to go on living in this town. These people are my neighbors, my friends.
Macreedy: All of 'em?
Liz: This is my town, Mr. Macreedy, like it or not.
Macreedy: Well, if you don't like it, why do you stick around?
Liz: My brother Pete, he'd never leave.
Macreedy: Didn't it ever occur to you that you might leave without him? You look like a pretty independent young lady. Your brother seems to me...
Liz: Weak. Yeah, I know. That's why I couldn't leave him.
Macreedy: What did your brother do?
Liz: What do you care? What do you care about Black Rock?
Macreedy: I don't care anything about Black Rock. Only it just seems to me that there aren't many towns like this in America. But one town like it is enough and because I think somethin' kind of bad happened here, Miss Wirth, somethin' I can't quite seem to find the handle to.
Liz: You don't know what you're talking about.
Macreedy: Well, I know this much. The rule of law has left here and the gorillas have taken over.

View Quote Macreedy: Are you afraid, Mr. Hastings?
Hastings: Mr. Macreedy, I'm just a good neighbor.
Macreedy: To Smith you are. What about to Komoko?
Hastings: I never seen Komoko in my life, honest.
Macreedy: All right. Then you'll send that message and give me the answer, won't you?
Hastings: Yes sir.

View Quote Macreedy: I was looking for a man named Komoko.
Smith: Komoko, sure, I remember him, Japanese farmer. Never had a chance.
Macreedy: Oh?
Smith: He got here in '41, just before Pearl Harbor. Three months later, they shipped him off to a relocation center. Tough.
Macreedy: You don't happen to remember which one they sent him to, do you?
Smith: Who knows? Why don't you try writing him? I'd be glad to help you out.
Macreedy: No, I'm afraid you'd be wasting your time. I've already written him but they don't forward my letters. They keep sending them back.