50 Best Jodie Foster Quotes

Sarah: [Meg and Sarah are in the elevator trying to escape] What's going on?
Meg: People. In the house.

Sarah: Are you okay?
Meg: Yeah.
Sarah: Small space?
Meg: I'm okay.
Sarah: You can't wig out.
Meg: I know.
Sarah: I mean it.
Meg: I won't.
Sarah: You know, people never get buried alive anymore. I guess it used to happen all the time.
Meg: Really?
Sarah: Yeah, I read that.
Meg: And when did this happen all the time?
Sarah: 20, 30 years ago.
Meg: What are they doing now?
Sarah: I don't know.

Pilcher: What do you do when you're not detecting, Agent Starling?
Clarice: I try to be a student, Dr. Pilcher.
Pilcher: Ever go out for cheeseburgers and beer? The amusing house wine?
Clarice: Are you hitting on me, doctor?
Pilcher: Yes.

Meg: [on loudspeaker] Get out of my house!
Sarah: Say fuck!
Meg: [on loud speaker] FUCK!
Sarah: Mom! "Get the fuck out of my house"!
Meg: [on loudspeaker] Get the FUCK out of my house!

Hannibal: You know what you look like to me, with your good bag and your cheap shoes? You look like a rube. A well scrubbed, hustling rube with a little taste. Good nutrition's given you some length of bone, but you're not more than one generation from poor white trash, are you, Agent Starling? And that accent you've tried so desperately to shed: pure West Virginia. What is your father, dear? Is he a coal miner? Does he stink of the lamp? You know how quickly the boys found you... all those tedious sticky fumblings in the back seats of cars... while you could only dream of getting out... getting anywhere... getting all the way to the FBI.
Clarice: You see a lot, Doctor. But are you strong enough to point that high-powered perception at yourself? What about it? Why don't you - why don't you look at yourself and write down what you see? Or maybe you're afraid to.

Hannibal: [shouts] No!
[normal voice]
Hannibal: I will listen now. After your father's murder, you were orphaned. You were ten years old. You went to live with cousins on a sheep and horse ranch in Montana. And...?
Clarice: [tears begin forming in her eyes] And one morning, I just ran away.
Hannibal: No "just", Clarice. What set you off? You started at what time?
Clarice: Early, still dark.
Hannibal: Then something woke you, didn't it? Was it a dream? What was it?
Clarice: I heard a strange noise.
Hannibal: What was it?
Clarice: It was... screaming. Some kind of screaming, like a child's voice.
Hannibal: What did you do?
Clarice: I went downstairs, outside. I crept up into the barn. I was so scared to look inside, but I had to.
Hannibal: And what did you see, Clarice? What did you see?
Clarice: Lambs. The lambs were screaming.
Hannibal: They were slaughtering the spring lambs?
Clarice: And they were screaming.
Hannibal: And you ran away?
Clarice: No. First I tried to free them. I... I opened the gate to their pen, but they wouldn't run. They just stood there, confused. They wouldn't run.
Hannibal: But you could and you did, didn't you?
Clarice: Yes. I took one lamb, and I ran away as fast as I could.
Hannibal: Where were you going, Clarice?
Clarice: I don't know. I didn't have any food, any water and it was very cold, very cold. I thought, I thought if I could save just one, but... he was so heavy. So heavy. I didn't get more than a few miles when the sheriff's car picked me up. The rancher was so angry he sent me to live at the Lutheran orphanage in Bozeman. I never saw the ranch again.
Hannibal: What became of your lamb, Clarice?
Clarice: They killed him.

Hannibal: First principles, Clarice. Simplicity. Read Marcus Aurelius. Of each particular thing ask: what is it in itself? What is its nature? What does he do, this man you seek?
Clarice: He kills women...
Hannibal: No. That is incidental. What is the first and principal thing he does? What needs does he serve by killing?
Clarice: Anger, um, social acceptance, and, huh, sexual frustrations, sir...
Hannibal: No! He covets. That is his nature. And how do we begin to covet, Clarice? Do we seek out things to covet? Make an effort to answer now.
Clarice: No. We just...
Hannibal: No. We begin by coveting what we see every day. Don't you feel eyes moving over your body, Clarice? And don't your eyes seek out the things you want?

Delacourt: I'm not interested in your little ideas. I'm interested in something much larger. This habitat is dying. There is a political sickness inside of it. A tumor that needs to be removed. You and your company are in need of revenue... that is dying up. So... you built the torus. Can you override the servers and place a new president in power?
John: A coup?... Are you suggesting a coup?
Delacourt: Is it possible?
John: I could write a reboot sequence and shut down the entire system. And at that point... you could encode a new president, yes.
Delacourt: Then that is what you will do. And you will have your contract secured for the next 200 years. Missile defense batteries, droids. Everything we need to protect our liberty. All guaranteed, of course, by your new president.
[walks away]

Meg: Hey. Enough. Mind the pizza?
Sarah: What do you mean?
Meg: Our first night. I should've thought of something special.
Sarah: I like pizza.
Sarah: Fuck him.
Meg: Don't.
Sarah: Fuck her, too.
Meg: I agree. But don't.

[Meg grabs a lighter as the panic room beings to fill up with gas]
Sarah: Mom
Meg: Just a sec
Sarah: MOM
Meg: Get under this
[Meg throws a fire blanket to Sarah]
Sarah: OH MY GOD

Iris: I don't like what I'm doing, Sport.
Sport: Ah, baby, I don't want you to like what you're doing. If you like what you're doing, then you won't be my woman.

Clarice: Where are you, Dr. Lecter?
Hannibal: I've no plans to call on you, Clarice. The world is more interesting with you in it.

Meg: [Meg gives a goodnight kiss to Sarah] It's disgusting how much I love you.
Sarah: Tell me about it.

Clarice: Hester Mofet. It's an anagram, isn't it, Doctor? Hester Mofet, "The rest of me". "Miss the rest of me," meaning that you rented that garage?

Nancy: Well, when I defended someone charged with rape, nobody called me a rapist. When I defended someone charged with murder, nobody dug around my backyard. But when someone is accused of terrorism, people like you seem to think that that's different. It's not. When I stand by my client and I insist that he get a fair hearing, I'm not just defending him, I'm defending you and me. The constitution doesn't have an asterisk at the end that says : "Terms and conditions apply."

Dr. Frasier Crane: Well, we've got about thirty seconds, I think we've got time for one quick call. Hello, Marlene. I'm listening.
Marlene: Oh my God! I'm really on?
Dr. Frasier Crane: Yes, your problem, please...
[sound of dog barking]
Marlene: Lucky, Lucky, get down! George, get the dog! Oh my god, this is so exciting!
[sound of baby crying]
Marlene: Honey, honey, get the baby. George, get your son! Okay, okay, here it is, Dr. Crane. If my husband and I don't find some time to have sex soon, I think I'm gonna burst. I may even have to go to a department store and pick up a stranger.
[sound of man calling "Hello!"]
Marlene: Oh, kids! Look who's here without calling first, Nana and Pop Pop!
[sighs]
Marlene: I'll call you back.
[hangs up]
Dr. Frasier Crane: Well, to all you Marlenes out there, let me just say that sex with a stranger is not the answer. Why don't you just pack the kids off with Nana and Pop Pop, lock Lucky downstairs in the basement, grab your husband, take him to the sturdiest kitchen table you have, and let the postman ring twice!

Nancy: Didn't get your name.
Kent: Kent.
Nancy: Kent, what?
Kent: Kent .. tell you any more than that.

Clarice: But I thought the "yourself" reference was too hokey for Lecter, so I figured he's from Baltimore, and I looked in the phone book, and there's a "Your Self Storage" facility, right outside of downtown Baltimore, sir.

Meg: He'll do something.
Sarah: No he won't.
Meg: He'll call the police.
Sarah: You don't know her, mom. She won't let him.
Meg: No, he knows there is trouble. He heard me. He's right across the park. That's why we got houses so close to each other. Just in case we needed each other. He'll help us!
Sarah: He won't.
Meg: [yells] Yes he will!
[pauses]
Meg: I'm sorry.
Sarah: No, I'm sorry. I was trying not to tell you.
Meg: What?
Sarah: I'm dizzy and hungry.

Clarice: [to Hannibal Lecter] Your anagrams are showing, Doctor. Louis Friend? Iron sulfide, also known as fool's gold.

Clarice: I graduated from UVa, Captain; it's not exactly a charm school.

Teri: Fuck... he fucking confessed.
Nancy: To what?
Teri: To everything. To financing 911, to hijacking the planes, he fucking ordered spreadsheets, inner workings of Al Qu'aida. Why didn't he tell us that he confessed?
Nancy: That's not the first time in history that a client's lied to his lawyers.
Teri: Look at this, look at his one - he admits to acquiring explosives to blow up LAFs. The millennium plot?
Nancy: What's your point?
Teri: He's guilty! He's fucking guilty!
Nancy: [shrugs] Maybe he is. He still has a right to counsel.
Teri: I'm not saying he doesn't, I'm saying that he helped to kill 3000 civilians and we're doing everything we can to get him out.
Nancy: We're doing our job.
Teri: I did bake sales for his legal fund! That's not a part of my job. My dad told me I'm not welcome home for thanksgiving, that's not a part of my job.
Nancy: Get out.
Teri: What?
Nancy: You want turkey and pumpkin pie with mom and dad and uncle Joe? Go on, get out. Go home. You can't win a case if you don't believe your own shit.
Teri: I'm not trying to...
Nancy: [interrups] Stop fucking wasting my time! Get out.

Iris: I think that... that Cancers make the best lovers.

[after Meg set the propane gas on fire scene]
Meg: [to Sarah] Are you okay?
Sarah: [nods]
Meg: [scolding] Promise me you will never do *ANYTHING* like that.
Sarah: [nods] I won't.

Ardelia: Is this Lecter's handwriting? "Clarice, doesn't this random scattering of sites seem desperately random - like the elaborations of a bad liar? Ta, Hannibal Lecter."
Clarice: "Desperately random." What does he mean?
Ardelia: Not random at all, maybe. Like there's some pattern here...?
Clarice: But there is no pattern or the computers would've nailed it. They're even found in random order.
Ardelia: Random because of the one girl. The one he weighted down.
Clarice: Oh, Fredrica Bimmel, from... Belvedere, Ohio. First girl taken, third body found. Why?
Ardelia: 'Cause she didn't drift. He weighted her down.
Clarice: What did Lecter say about... first principles?
Ardelia: Simplicity...
Clarice: What does this guy do, he "covets". How do we first start to covet?
Ardelia: "We covet what we see -"
Clarice: " - every day."
Ardelia: Hot damn, Clarice.
Clarice: He knew her.

Meg: [Sarah is riding her scooter alongside her mother] Sarah, do you have to ride that here?
Sarah: Mom, we're in the street.

Nancy: It doesn't matter what we believe. What matters is what we can prove.

Dr. Frederick Chilton: Crawford is very clever, isn't he, using you?
Clarice: What do you mean, sir?
Dr. Frederick Chilton: A pretty young woman to turn him on. I don't believe Lecter's even seen a woman in eight years. And oh, are you ever his taste. So to speak.

Hannibal: Jack Crawford is helping your career isn't he? Apparently he likes you and you like him too.
Clarice: I never thought about it.
Hannibal: Do you think that Jack Crawford wants you sexually? True, he is much older but do you think he visualizes scenarios, exchanges, fucking you?
Clarice: That doesn't interest me Doctor and frankly, it's, it's the sort of thing that Miggs would say.
Hannibal: Not anymore.

Hannibal: Why do you think he removes their skins, Agent Starling?
[sarcastically]
Hannibal: Enthrall me with your acumen.
Clarice: It excites him. Most serial killers keep some sort of trophies from their victims.
Hannibal: I didn't.
Clarice: No. No, you ate yours.
Hannibal: You can pass that through, now...

Hannibal: Now then, tell me. What did Miggs say to you? Multiple Miggs in the next cell. He hissed at you. What did he say?
Clarice: He said, "I can smell your cunt."
Hannibal: I see. I myself cannot. You use Evyan skin cream, and sometimes you wear L'Air du Temps, but not today.

Iris: God, you're square.
Travis: Hey, I'm not square, you're the one that's square. You're full of shit, man. What are you talking about? You walk out with those fuckin' creeps and low-lifes and degenerates out on the streets and you sell your little pussy for peanuts? For some low-life pimp who stands in the hall? And I'm square? You're the one that's square, man. I don't go screwing fuck with a bunch of killers and junkies like you do. You call that bein' hip? What world are you from?

[after being told about panic room]
Meg: This whole thing makes me nervous.
Lydia: Why?
Meg: Ever read any Poe?
Lydia: No, but I loved her last album!

Lydia: [First Lines] I wrote it all down: 4,200 square feet, four floors. Perfect. Courtyard in back, south-facing garden. Perfect.
Meg: Shouldn't we just wait for the car service?
Lydia: No, we'll sit in traffic forever.
Meg: Is that the listing sheet?
Lydia: There is no listing sheet. I heard about it this morning. It'll be gone by this afternoon.
Meg: Well, how many more after this one.
Lydia: None. You know how tight the market is.

Hannibal: You still wake up sometimes, don't you? You wake up in the dark and hear the screaming of the lambs.
Clarice: Yes.
Hannibal: And you think if you save poor Catherine, you could make them stop, don't you? You think if Catherine lives, you won't wake up in the dark ever again to that awful screaming of the lambs.
Clarice: I don't know. I don't know.
Hannibal: Thank you, Clarice. Thank you.
Clarice: Tell me his name, Doctor.
Hannibal: Dr. Chilton, I presume. I think you know each other.
Dr. Frederick Chilton: Okay. Let's go.
Clarice: It's your turn, Doctor.
Dr. Frederick Chilton: Out!
Clarice: Tell me his name!
Boyle: I'm sorry, ma'am. We've got orders. We have to put you on a plane. Come on, now.
[Chilton and the guards start leading Clarice out]
Hannibal: Brave Clarice. You will let me know when those lambs stop screaming, won't you?
Clarice: Tell me his name, Doctor!
Hannibal: Clarice, your case file. Goodbye, Clarice.

Sarah: What is it?
Meg: It's bad!

Nancy: I wanna know who's name I should cite when I contact the National Security desk at the New York Times. You tell your C.O., I don't wanna see my client in shackles ever again.

Clarice: [Hannibal Lecter has escaped] He won't come after me.
Ardelia: Oh really?
Clarice: He won't. I can't explain it... He - he would consider that rude.

Nancy: You can't win a case if you don't believe your own shit.

Delacourt: Kruger, do you read me?
Kruger: Ah, Ms. Delacourt. How lovely to hear your voice.
Delacourt: There's a citizen carrying sensitive brain data out of the city right now. Some thieves are trying to hijack it.
Kruger: What's in it?
Delacourt: That's classified.
Kruger: You don't call a recently deactivated agent to retrieve classified fucking information! The government doesn't know about this, do they? I can ask for whatever I want, can't I?

Meg: If we stay calm everything will be fine, okay? Just stay calm.
Sarah: You're making me nervous.
Meg: I'm sorry.

[Meg to Stephen's girlfriend]
Meg: Put him on the phone, bitch!

Murray: Is it true what they're sayin'?
Clarice: [looks up from her notepad] Huh?
Murray: He's some kinda vampire?
Clarice: They don't have a name for what he is.

Meg: Open the door so I can give her the shot.
Burnham: If we open the door you'll shoot us!
Meg: So give her the shot yourself!

Hannibal: "Plum Island Animal Disease Research Center." Sounds charming.
Clarice: That's only a part of the island. There's a very, very nice beach. Terns nest there. There's beautiful...
Hannibal: [cuts her off] Terns? Mmh. If I help you, Clarice, it will be "turns" with us too. Quid pro quo. I tell you things, you tell me things. Not about this case, though. About yourself. Quid pro quo. Yes or no?
[pause]
Hannibal: Yes or no, Clarice? Poor little Catherine is waiting.
Clarice: Go, doctor.

Clarice: Did you do all these drawings, Doctor?
Hannibal: Ah. That is the Duomo seen from the Belvedere. Do you know Florence?
Clarice: All that detail just from memory, sir?
Hannibal: Memory, Agent Starling, is what I have instead of a view.

[last lines]
Hannibal: [on telephone] I do wish we could chat longer, but... I'm having an old friend for dinner. Bye.
Clarice: Dr. Lecter?... Dr. Lecter?... Dr. Lecter?... Dr. Lecter?...

Meg: Is that Morse Code?
Sarah: No, SOS.
Meg: Where did you learn that?
Sarah: Titanic!

Delacourt: The data is intact, yes?
Technician: Data looks intact. We can still pull the data out of him... which will kill him.
Delacourt: Okay, that's fine. How long before you can download and turn the system online?
Technician: Not long, ma'am.

Stephen: Meg, why are we doing this?
Meg: Because that's what its going to come to.