# Best Opening Lines



## CrusaderFrank (Apr 26, 2010)

"The village of Holcomb stands on the high wheat plains of western Kansas, a lonesome area that other Kansans call "out there" -- In Cold Blood

"Behavioral Science, the FBI section that deals with serial murder, is on the bottom floor of the Academy building at Quantico, half-buried in the earth." -- The Silence of the Lambs

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For reasons I can't fathom, the first line of "In Cold Blood" has been playing back in my head the last 2 days. I thought I would exorcise it by starting a "Best Opening Line" Thread

What's your favorite?


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## boedicca (Apr 26, 2010)

"It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife."  -- Pride and Prejudice


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## boedicca (Apr 26, 2010)

And just to be a bit naughty:

"It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents, except at occasional intervals, when it was checked by a violent gust of wind which swept up the streets (for it is in London that our scene lies), rattling along the house-tops, and fiercely agitating the scanty flame of the lamps that struggled against the darkness."  -- Paul Clifford


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## tigerbob (Apr 26, 2010)

My name is Turkish.  Funny name for an Englishman, I know.  My parents were on the same plane when it crashed. That's how they met.  They named me after the plane.  Not many people are named after a plane crash.


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## California Girl (Apr 26, 2010)

boedicca said:


> And just to be a bit naughty:
> 
> "It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents, except at occasional intervals, when it was checked by a violent gust of wind which swept up the streets (for it is in London that our scene lies), rattling along the house-tops, and fiercely agitating the scanty flame of the lamps that struggled against the darkness."  -- Paul Clifford


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## xsited1 (Apr 26, 2010)

Come on, boys! The way you're lollygaggin' around here with them picks and them shovels, you'd think it was a hundert an' twenty degree. Can't be more than a hundert an' fourteen.


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## California Girl (Apr 26, 2010)

If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born and what my lousy childhood was like..


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## Luissa (Apr 26, 2010)

I was 12 going on 13 the first time I saw a dead human being. It happened in the summer of 1959-a long time ago, but only if you measure in terms of years. I was living in a small town in Oregon called Castle Rock. There were only twelve hundred and eighty-one people. But to me, it was the whole world.  - Stand by Me


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## Truthmatters (Apr 26, 2010)

Everything Is Illuminated Script - transcript from the screenplay and/or Liev Schreiber movie from the Jonathan Safran Foer novel


 I will be truthful and mention that before our rigid search...
             ...I had the opinion Jewish people were having shit between their brains.
             Primarily, this is because all I knew of Jewish people...
             ...was that they paid Father very much currency...
             ...in order to make vacations from America to Ukraine.
             I was of the opinion that the past is past...
             ...and like all that is not now, it should remain buried...
             ...along the side of our memories.
             But this was before the commencement of our very rigid search.
             Before I encountered the collector...
             ...Jonathan Safran Foer.


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## CurveLight (Apr 26, 2010)

"This is the Earth at a time when the dinosaurs roamed a lush and fertile planet.  A piece of rock just six miles wide changed all that.  It hit with the force of ten thousand nuclear weapons sending up a blanket of dust the sun was powerless to penetrate for a thousand years."

-Armageddon  (almost totally ruined by ben afleck)

(phone rings)
Cypher: Yeah.

Trinity: Is everything in place?

Cypher: You weren't supposed to relieve me.

Trinity: I know, but I felt like taking your shift.

Cypher: You like watching him, don't you? You like watching him.

Trinity: Don't be ridiculous.

Cypher: We're going to kill him, do you understand that?

Trinity: Morpheus believes he is the One.

Cypher: Do you?

Trinity: It doesn't matter what I believe.

Cypher: You don't, do you?

Trinity: Did you hear that?

Cypher: Hear what?

Trinity: Are you sure this line is clean?

Cypher: Yeah, 'course I'm sure.

Trinity: I better go.

-The Matrix  (who knew Reeves horrible acting actually found a niche?)


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## CurveLight (Apr 26, 2010)

xsited1 said:


> Come on, boys! The way you're lollygaggin' around here with them picks and them shovels, you'd think it was a hundert an' twenty degree. Can't be more than a hundert an' fourteen.




"Gosh sir!  You use your tongue prettier than a twenty dollar whore."


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## Luissa (Apr 26, 2010)

"The first rule of Zombieland: Cardio. When the zombie outbreak first hit, the first to go, for obvious reasons... were the fatties. "


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## manu1959 (Apr 26, 2010)

"Howard Roark laughed." - fountainhead - ayn rand


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## manu1959 (Apr 26, 2010)

"I am a sick man . . . I am a wicked man. An unattractive man, I think my liver hurts."

dostoevsky - notes from the underground


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## boedicca (Apr 26, 2010)

"When Gregor Samsa woke up one morning from unsettling dreams, he found himself changed in his bed into a monstrous vermin." -- The Metamorphosis


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## Luissa (Apr 26, 2010)

"It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen." 1984

"We were somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take hold. I remember saying something like 'I feel a bit lightheaded; maybe you should drive . . .' And suddenly there was a terrible roar all around us and the sky was full of what looked like huge bats, all swooping and screeching and diving around the car, which was going about a hundred miles an hour with the top down to Las Vegas. And a voice was screaming, 'Holy Jesus! What are these goddamn animals?'" Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas


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## boedicca (Apr 26, 2010)

"All this happened, more or less." -- Slaughterhouse Five


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## CrusaderFrank (Apr 26, 2010)

"Amerigo Bonasera sat in New York Criminal Court Number 3 and waited for justice; vengeance on the men who had so cruelly hurt his daughter, who had tried to dishonor her." -- The Godfather


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## LuckyDan (Apr 26, 2010)

Is it hot in here? Or is it just you?


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## LuckyDan (Apr 26, 2010)

Oh! We're talking lit.

I like, "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times..."


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## jillian (Apr 26, 2010)

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair. - Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities 

The Miss Lonelyhearts of the New York Post-Dispatch (Are you in trouble?&#151;Do-you-need-advice?&#151;Write-to-Miss-Lonelyhearts-and-she-will-help-you) sat at his desk and stared at a piece of white cardboard. - Nathanael West, Miss Lonelyhearts

It was a queer, sultry summer, the summer they electrocuted the Rosenbergs, and I didn't know what I was doing in New York. - Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar


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## LuckyDan (Apr 26, 2010)

jillian said:


> It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair. - Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities
> 
> The Miss Lonelyhearts of the New York Post-Dispatch (Are you in trouble?Do-you-need-advice?Write-to-Miss-Lonelyhearts-and-she-will-help-you) sat at his desk and stared at a piece of white cardboard. - Nathanael West, Miss Lonelyhearts
> 
> It was a queer, sultry summer, the summer they electrocuted the Rosenbergs, and I didn't know what I was doing in New York. - Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar


 
"The Rosenbergs had it coming."
- LuckyDan, Love it or Leave It (2012)


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## jillian (Apr 26, 2010)

LuckyDan said:


> jillian said:
> 
> 
> > It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair. - Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities
> ...



On Memorial Day in 1967 Daniel Lewin thumbed his way from New York to Worcester, Mass ... With him was his young wife, Phyllis, and their eight-month-old son, Paul ... The day was hot and overcast ... and the traffic was wondering - I mean the early morning traffic was light, but not many drivers could pass them without wondering who they were and where they were going ... This is a Tinline felt-tip marker, black. This is Composition Notebook 79c made in USA by Long Island Paper Products, Inc. This is Daniel trying one of the dark coves of the Browsing room ... Daniel, a tall young man of twenty-five ...

The Book of Daniel. EL. Doctorow


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## boedicca (Apr 26, 2010)

"Miss Brooke had that kind of beauty which seems to be thrown into relief by poor dress." -- Middlemarch


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## Oddball (Apr 26, 2010)

The several minutes at the beginning of *Once Upon a Time in the West* that have no lines whatsoever.

Sometimes, less really is more.


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## American Horse (Apr 27, 2010)

In the second century of the Christian Era, the Empire of Rome comprehended the fairest part of the Earth, and the most civilized portion of mankind.  The frontiers of that extensive monarchy were guarded by ancient renown and discplined valor.  The gentle but powerful influence of laws and manners had gradually cemented the union of the provinces.  Their peaceful inhabitants enjoyed and abused the advantages of wealth and luxury.  The image of a free constitution was preserved with decent reverence; the Roman Senate appeared to possess the sovereign authority, and devolved on the emperors all the executive powers of government.

The Decline & Fall of the Roman Empire Volume I by Edward Gibbon


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## QUENTIN (May 3, 2010)

"All persons, places, and events in this book are real. Certain speeches and thoughts are necessarily constructions by the author. No names have been changed to protect the innocent, since God Almighty protects the innocent as a matter of Heavenly routine."

--Vonnegut, The Sirens of Titan

"Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." 

--Tolstoy, Anna Karenina

"The towers of Zenith aspired above the morning mist; austere towers of steel and cement and limestone, sturdy as cliffs and delicate as silver rods."

-- Lewis, Babbitt

"If they move, kill 'em"

--The Wild Bunch

"&#8220;I believe in America."

--The Godfather

"As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster. To me, being a gangster was better than being President of the United States."

--GoodFellas


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## xsited1 (May 3, 2010)

Dude said:


> The several minutes at the beginning of *Once Upon a Time in the West* that have no lines whatsoever.
> 
> Sometimes, less really is more.



That's not what she said...


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## Modbert (May 3, 2010)

"The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed." - _The Gunslinger, The Dark Tower Volume I_ by Stephen King.

Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much. They were the last people youd expect to be involved in anything strange or mysterious, because they just didnt hold with such nonsense. - _Harry Potter and the Sorcerers Stone_ by J. K. Rowling.


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## midcan5 (May 5, 2010)

"The sun shone, having no alternative, on the nothing new." Murphy, Samuel Beckett


"Mother died today.  Or, maybe, yesterday; I can't be sure.  A telegram from the home says: your mother passed away, funeral tomorrow, deep sympathy.  Which leaves the matter doubtful; it could have been yesterday." The Stranger, Albert Camus


"Estragon: Nothing to be done.

Vladimir: I'm beginning to come round to that opinion.  All my life I've tried to put it from me, saying, Vladimir, be reasonable, you haven't yet tried everything.  And I resumed a struggle.  So there you are again.

estragon: Am I?  "

Samuel Beckett, Waiting For Godot

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WoC9Kx5QvK0]YouTube - Beckett On Film: Waiting for Godot Act I 2001[/ame]


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## dilloduck (May 5, 2010)

"Hey baby--What's your sign ?"


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## Jon (May 5, 2010)

"In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit." -J.R.R. Tolkien, _The Hobbit_


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## tigerbob (May 5, 2010)

QUENTIN said:


> "All persons, places, and events in this book are real. Certain speeches and thoughts are necessarily constructions by the author. No names have been changed to protect the innocent, since God Almighty protects the innocent as a matter of Heavenly routine."
> 
> --Vonnegut, The Sirens of Titan
> 
> ...



Actually, that's not the first line.

The first line, appropriately enough, is "What the fuck is that?"


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## California Girl (May 5, 2010)

Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the western spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small, unregarded yellow sun. Orbiting this at a distance of roughly ninety-eight million miles is an utterly insignificant little blue-green planet whose ape-descended life forms are so amazingly primitive that they still think digital watches are a pretty neat idea.

Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. 

But..... one of the best lines from the book is "Humans are not proud of their ancestors, and rarely invite them round to dinner." Always makes me laugh.


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## tigerbob (May 5, 2010)

California Girl said:


> Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the western spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small, unregarded yellow sun. Orbiting this at a distance of roughly ninety-eight million miles is an utterly insignificant little blue-green planet whose ape-descended life forms are so amazingly primitive that they still think digital watches are a pretty neat idea.
> 
> Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.
> 
> But..... one of the best lines from the book is "Humans are not proud of their ancestors, and rarely invite them round to dinner." Always makes me laugh.



OMG!  I was watching the old BBC TV series of that on YouTube yesterday.  

I love it when Vogon Jeltz lectures humankind on the fact that if they were unaware that earth is scheduled for destruction in 2 minutes they should have visited the planning office on Alpha Centauri (where the plans had been available to the last 50 earth yers) and registered a complaint, and that if humans can't take an interest in local affairs they've got only themselves to blame.


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## California Girl (May 5, 2010)

tigerbob said:


> California Girl said:
> 
> 
> > Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the western spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small, unregarded yellow sun. Orbiting this at a distance of roughly ninety-eight million miles is an utterly insignificant little blue-green planet whose ape-descended life forms are so amazingly primitive that they still think digital watches are a pretty neat idea.
> ...



The books are brilliant!! I love that trilogy - all 5 of them.


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## AquaAthena (May 7, 2010)

CrusaderFrank said:


> "The village of Holcomb stands on the high wheat plains of western Kansas, a lonesome area that other Kansans call "out there" -- In Cold Blood
> 
> "Behavioral Science, the FBI section that deals with serial murder, is on the bottom floor of the Academy building at Quantico, half-buried in the earth." -- The Silence of the Lambs
> 
> ...



I totally agree with your opinion, Crusader Frank. It was a bone chilling, suspenseful statement and captured one's imagination, immediately. It was also such a fantastic and absorbing movie, with Philip Seymore Hoffman playing his role to precision, making me decide to buy it. I seldom can watch a film over once or twice, but this one, continues to interest me. The acting was superb and Chris Cooper is one of my all time faves and did a fabulous job with his character. The film, In Cold Blood is on my top 5 all time favorites.


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## Nate (May 8, 2010)

"Man," said Terl, "is an endangered species."

Battlefield Earth by L. Ron Hubbard(not that damn movie that had the poor bastard rolling in his grave)

"Come on, you apes! You wanna live forever?"

Starship Troopers by Robert A. Heinlein(again book, not movie. Though the movie wasn't too bad)


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## CrusaderFrank (Aug 11, 2010)

"One minute it was Ohio winter, with doors closed, windows locked, the panes blind with frost, icicles fringing every roof, children skiing on the slopes, housewives lumbering like great black bears in their furs along the icy streets" -- The Martian Chronicles by Ray Brabury.


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## rdean (Aug 11, 2010)

Be right out Sergeant

Yes sir

So begins the opening line of a movie that terrified young mothers in the 1950s

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CF_tQAHJPJ0&feature=related]YouTube - &#x202a;The Bad Seed (1956) pt.9/13&#x202c;&lrm;[/ame]

At 2:48 in begins one of the most chilling scenes involving a child in movies.  Rhoda Penmark scored scarier than every child monster from a poll I saw about a year ago.  Even scarier than the Exorcist.

The scenes where she tells her mother about the murders she commits are nightmarish.


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## hjmick (Aug 11, 2010)

"In the laid back California town of sunny San Raphael..." -_The Smoke Off_, Shel Silverstein


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