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“As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster.”
“People are always asking me if I know Tyler Durden.”
”Rosebud.“
You may not have seen the films these opening lines are in, but chances are you’ve heard them many times before, so ingrained are they in cinematic lore.
Below is a list of the films that have the greatest opening lines in cinema history.
Click through the gallery to see what we included
Show all 73 1 /73The greatest opening lines in movie history The greatest opening lines in movie history Amélie (2001) "On September 3, 1973, 6:28pm and 32 seconds, a blue fly of the Calliphorides species, whose wings can flutter 14,670 times per minute landed in Saint-Vincent Street, Montmartre."
UGC-Fox Distribution
The greatest opening lines in movie history American Beauty (1999) “My name is Lester Burnham. This is my neighbourhood; this is my street; this is my life. I am 42-years-old. In less than a year I will be dead. Of course I don't know that yet and, in a way, I am dead already.”
DreamWorks Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history The Apartment (1960) "On November 1, 1959, the population of New York City was 8,042,783. If you laid all these people end to end, figuring an average height of five feet six and a half inches, they would reach from Times Square to the outskirts of Karachi, Pakistan."
United Artists
The greatest opening lines in movie history The Big Lebowski (1998) “Way out west, there was this fella I wanna tell ya about. Goes by the name of Jeff Lebowski. At least that was the handle his loving parents gave him, but he never had much use for it himself. See, this Lebowski, he called himself 'The Dude'.”
PolyGram Filmed Entertainment
The greatest opening lines in movie history Braveheart (1995) "I will tell you of William Wallace. Historians from England will say I am a liar. But, history is written by those who have hung heroes."
20th Century Fox
The greatest opening lines in movie history The Breakfast Club (1985) "Saturday March 24, 1984. Shermer High School, Shermer, Illinois, 60062. Dear Mr Vernon: We accept the fact that we had to sacrifice a whole Saturday in detention for whatever it was we did wrong."
Universal Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history Bridesmaids (2011) Annie: (while having sex) "So, so glad you called."
Universal Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history Bridget Jones's Diary (2001) "It all began on New Year's Day, in my 32nd year of being single. Once again, I found myself on my own – and going to my mother's annual turkey curry buffet."
Miramax Films
The greatest opening lines in movie history Casablanca (1942) "With the coming of the Second World War, many eyes in imprisoned Europe turned hopefully or desperately toward the freedom of the Americas. Lisbon became the great embarkation point. But not everybody could get to Lisbon directly."
Warner Bros Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history Chinatown (1974) “All right, Curly, enough's enough. You can't eat the venetian blinds. I just had 'em installed on Wednesday."
Paramount Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history Citizen Kane (1941) "Rosebud."
RKO Radio Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history Conan the Barbarian (1982) "Between the time when the oceans drank Atlantis and the rise of the sons of Aryas, there was an age undreamed of."
EMI Films
The greatest opening lines in movie history Dirty Dancing (1986) "It was the summer of 1963, when everybody called me Baby and it didn't occur to me to mind."
Vestron Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history Do the Right Thing (198() "Wake up! Wake up, wake up, wake up, up you wake, up you wake, up you wake, up you wake!"
Universal Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history Dr Strangelove (1964) "For more than a year, ominous rumours had been privately circulating among high-level western leaders that the Soviet Union had been at work on what was darkly hinted to be the Ultimate Weapon, a Doomsday Device.
Columbia Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history Easy A (2010) "The rumours of my promiscuity have been greatly exaggerated."
Screen Gems
The greatest opening lines in movie history Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) "Random thoughts for Valentine's Day, 2004. Today is a holiday invented by greeting card companies to make people feel like crap."
Focus Features
The greatest opening lines in movie history Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! (1965) "Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to violence, the word and the act. While violence cloaks itself in a plethora of disguises, its favourite mantle still remains: sex.
RM Films International
The greatest opening lines in movie history Field of Dreams (1989) “I’m 36-years-old, I love my family, I love baseball, and I’m about to become a farmer. But, until I heard the voice, I’d never done a crazy thing in my whole life."
Universal Studios
The greatest opening lines in movie history Fight Club (1999) "People are always asking me if I know Tyler Durden."
20th Century Fox
The greatest opening lines in movie history The Fly (1986) "What am I working on? Uh, I'm working on something that'll change the world and human life as we know it."
20th Century Fox
The greatest opening lines in movie history Forrest Gump (1994) "Hello, my name's Forrest. Forrest Gump. You want a chocolate? I could eat about a million and a half of these. My momma always said, 'Life was like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're gonna get'."
Paramount Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998) "We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold."
Universal Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994) "Oh, f***! Fuck!"
Rank Film Distributors
The greatest opening lines in movie history Full Metal Jacket (1987) "I am Gunnery Sergeant Hartman, your senior drill instructor. From now on, you will speak only when spoken to, and the first and last words out of your filthy sewers will be 'Sir!' Do you maggots understand that?"
Columbia-Cannon-Warner
The greatest opening lines in movie history The Godfather (1972) "I believe in America. America has made my fortune."
Paramount Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history Gone Girl (2014) "When I think of my wife, I always think of her head. I picture cracking her lovely skull. Unspooling her brains. Trying to get answers. The primal questions of any marriage: 'What are you thinking?' 'How are you feeling?' 'What have we done to each other?'"
20th Century Fox
The greatest opening lines in movie history Goodfellas (1990) "As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster."
Warner Bros
The greatest opening lines in movie history The Haunting (1963) "An evil old house, the kind some people call haunted, is like an undiscovered country waiting to be explored."
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
The greatest opening lines in movie history High Fidelity (2000) "What came first, the music or the misery?
Buena Vista Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history In Bruges (2008) "After I killed them, I dropped the gun in the Thames, washed the residue off my hands in the bathroom of a Burger King and walked home to await instructions."
Universal Studios
The greatest opening lines in movie history Inside Man (2006) "My name is Dalton Russell. Pay strict attention to what I say because I choose my words carefully and I never repeat myself."
Universal Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history It's a Wonderful Life (1946) "I owe everything to George Bailey. Help him, Dear Father."
RKO Radio Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history The Jerk (1979) "I am not a bum. I’m a jerk. I once had wealth, power, and the love of a beautiful woman. Now. I only have two things: my friends and, uh, my thermos.”
Universal Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history Jerry Maguire (1996) "All right, so this is the world and there are five billion people on it. When I was a kid, there were three. It's hard to keep up."
Sony Pictures Releasing
The greatest opening lines in movie history Kick-Ass (2010) “I always wondered why no one did it before me. I mean, all those comic books, movies, TV shows – you think that one eccentric loner would’ve made himself a costume.”
Universal Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history Kill Bill Vol 1 (2003) "Do you find me sadistic?"
Miramax
The greatest opening lines in movie history Kubo and the Two Strings (2016) "If you must blink, do it now."
Focus Features
The greatest opening lines in movie history Lawrence of Arabia (1962) "He was the most extraordinary man I ever knew."
Columbia Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history Lord of War (2005) "There are over 550 million firearms in worldwide circulation. That's one firearm for every twelve people on the planet. The only question is: How do we arm the other eleven?"
Lionsgate Films
The greatest opening lines in movie history Love Actually (2003) "Whenever I get gloomy with the state of the world, I think about the arrivals gate at Heathrow airport."
Universal Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history A Matter of Life and Death (1946) "This is the universe. Big, isn't it?"
Eagle-Lion Films
The greatest opening lines in movie history Million Dollar Baby (2004) "Only ever met one man I wouldn’t wanna fight.”
Warner Bros Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history My Dinner with Andre (1981) "The life of a playwright is tough."
New Yorker Films
The greatest opening lines in movie history My Favourite Year (1982) "1954. You don't get years like that anymore."
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
The greatest opening lines in movie history Oliver! (1968) "Please, sir, can I have some more?"
Columbia Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history Patton (197) "Now, I want you to remember that no bastard ever won a war by dying for his country."
20th Century Fox
The greatest opening lines in movie history The Piano (1993) "The voice you hear is not my speaking voice, but my mind's voice. I have not spoken since I was six years old. No one knows why, not even me. My father says it is a dark talent and the day I take it into my head to stop breathing will be my last."
Entertainment Film Distributors
The greatest opening lines in movie history The Prestige (2006) "Are you watching closely?"
Warner Bros
The greatest opening lines in movie history Pretty Woman (1990) "No matter what they say, it's all about money."
Buena Vista Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history Raging Bull (1980) "I remember those cheers. They still ring in my ears."
United Artists
The greatest opening lines in movie history Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) "The Hovitos are near. The poison is still fresh – three days. They're following us. If they knew we were here, they would have killed us already."
Paramount Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history Rebecca (1940) "Last night, I dreamt I went to Manderley again."
United Artists
The greatest opening lines in movie history Reservoir Dogs (1992) "Let me tell ya what 'Like a Virgin' is about."
Miramax Films
The greatest opening lines in movie history Rounders (1998) "Listen, here's the thing – if you can't spot the sucker in your first half hour at the table, then you are the sucker."
Miramax Films
The greatest opening lines in movie history Seven (1995) Detective Taylor: "Neighbours heard them screaming at each other, like for two hours, it was nothing new. Then they heard the gun go off, both barrels. Crime of passion.
William Somerset: "Yeah, just look at all the passion on that wall."
New Line Cinema
The greatest opening lines in movie history The Seventh Seal (1957) "Who are you?"
"I am Death."
AB Svensk Filmindustri
The greatest opening lines in movie history Sin City (2005) "She shivers in the wind like the last leaf on a dying tree."
Miramax
The greatest opening lines in movie history Snatch (2000) "My name is Turkish. Funny name for an Englishman, I know.
Columbia Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history The Social Network (2010) "Did you know that there are more people with genius IQ's living in China than there are people of any kind living in the United States?"
Sony Pictures Releasing
The greatest opening lines in movie history The Sound of Music (1965) "The hills are alive with the sound of music."
Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation
The greatest opening lines in movie history Stand by Me (1986) "I was 12 going on 13 the first time I saw a dead human being."
Columbia Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history Sunset Boulevard (1950) "Yes, this is Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles, California. It's about five o'clock in the morning – that's the homicide squad, complete with detectives and newspaper men. A murder has been reported from one of those great big houses in the 10,000 block. You'll read about it in the late editions, I'm sure."
Paramount Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history Superman (1978) "In the decade of the 1930s, even the great city of Metropolis was not spared the ravages of the worldwide depression."
Columbia-EMI-Warner
The greatest opening lines in movie history Terminator 2: Judgement Day (1991) "Three billion human lives ended on August 29, 1997."
TriStar Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history The Tingler (1959) "I am William Castle, the director of the motion picture you are about to see. I feel obligated to warn you that some of the sensations, some of the physical reactions, which the actors on the screen will feel, will also be experienced for the first time in motion picture history by certain members of this audience."
Columbia Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history To Kill a Mockingbird (1962) "Maycomb was a tired old town, even in 1932 when I first knew it. Somehow, it was hotter then."
Universal Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history Trainspotting (1996) "Choose life. Choose a job. Choose a career. Choose a family."
PolyGram Filmed Entertainment
The greatest opening lines in movie history True Grit (2010) "People do not give it credence that a young girl could leave home and go off in the wintertime to avenge her father’s blood, but it did happen."
Paramount Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history True Romance (1993) "In Jailhouse Rock, Elvis was everything rockabilly's about – living fast, dying young and leaving a good-looking corpse."
Warner Bros
The greatest opening lines in movie history The Truman Show (1998) "We've become bored with watching actors give us phoney emotions. We're tired of pyrotechnics and special effects. While the world he inhabits is, in some respects, counterfeit, there's nothing fake about Truman himself. No scripts, no cue cards. It isn't always Shakespeare, but it's genuine. It's a life."
Paramount Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history When Harry Met Sally... (1989) "I was sitting with my friend Arthur Cornrom in a restaurant. It was a cafeteria and this beautiful girl walked in and I turned to Arthur and I said, 'Arthur, you see that girl? I'm going to marry her.' And two weeks later we were married and it's over fifty years later and we are still married."
Columbia Pictures
The greatest opening lines in movie history The White Ribbon (2009) I don't know if the story that I want to tell you reflects the truth in every detail. Much of it I only know by hearsay, and a lot of it remains obscure to me even today, and I must leave it in darkness. Many of these questions remain without answer. But I believe I must tell of the strange events that occurred in our village, because they may cast a new light on some of the goings-on in this country."
X Verleih AG
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