Edward Scissorhands (1990)
Screenwriter(s): Caroline Thompson

Scissorhands Is Still Alive

The fanciful conclusion and closing monologue by an older Kim Boggs (Winona Ryder), when she told her grand-daughter (Gina Gallagher) how she knew that Edward Scissorhands (Johnny Depp) was still alive, creating ice sculptures in the castle/mansion above the town, and causing snow showers, with a concluding flashback of a younger Kim dancing in the snowflakes:

I don't know. Not for sure. But I believe he is. You see, before he came down here, it never snowed. And afterwards, it did. If he weren't up there now, I don't think it would be snowing. Sometimes... you can still catch me dancing in it.

The Exorcist III (1990) (aka Exorcist III: Legion)
Screenwriter(s): William Peter Blatty

A Fish Story

The humorous, deadpan story that Lieutenant Detective William F. "Bill" Kinderman (George C. Scott) told friend Father Joseph Dyer (Bill Flanders) about a fish his mother-in-law had bought for dinner:

I can't go home...The carp...My wife's mother, she's visiting, Father. And Tuesday night, she's cooking us a carp. It's a tasty fish, I-I have nothing against it. But because it's supposedly filled with impurities, she buys it live. And for three days it's been swimming up and down in my bathtub. Up and down. And I hate it. I can't stand the sight of it moving its gills. Now, you're standing very close to me, Father. Have you noticed? Yes. I haven't had a bath for three days. I can't go home until the carp is asleep because if I see it swimming, I'll kill it.

The Exorcist III (1990) (aka Exorcist III: Legion)
Screenwriter(s): William Peter Blatty

Decapitation Without Spilling Blood

In Cell 11, The Gemini Killer (Brad Dourif), claiming to be a vicious serial killer, gave a horrific description to Lieutenant Detective Bill Kinderman (George C. Scott), boasting about how he had decapitated victim Father Dyer:

I like plays. The good ones. Shakespeare... I like Titus Andronicus the best - it's sweet. Incidentally, did you know that you are talking to an artist? I sometimes do special things to my victims: things that are creative. Of course, it takes knowledge, pride in your work. For example, a decapitated head can continue to see for approximately twenty seconds. So when I have one that's gawking, I always hold it up so that it can see its body. It's a little extra I throw in for no added charge. I must admit it makes me chuckle every time. Life is fun. It's a wonderful life, in fact, for some. It's too bad about poor Father Dyer. I killed him, you know. An interesting problem, but finally, it worked! First, a bit of the old succinylcholine to permit one to work without, ah, annoying distractions. Then, a three foot catheter threaded directly into the inferior vena cava -- or, superior vena cava. It's a matter of taste, I think, don't you? Then the tube moves through the vein, under the crease of the arm, into the vein that leads directly into the heart, and then, you just hold up the legs, and you squeeze the blood manually into the tube from the arms and the legs. There's a little shaking and pounding at the end for the dregs - it isn't perfect. There's a little blood left, I'm afraid. But, regardless, the overall effect is astonishing! And isn't that really what counts in the end? Yes, of course, Good Show Biz, Lieutenant, the EFFECT! And then, off comes the head without spilling one single drop of blood. Now I call that SHOWMANSHIP, Lieutenant!

The Exorcist III (1990) (aka Exorcist III: Legion)
Screenwriter(s): William Peter Blatty

"Was I Raving?"

The Gemini Killer (Brad Dourif) told Lieutenant Detective Bill Kinderman (George C. Scott) that after he was electrocuted fifteen years earlier, his soul entered Father Karras' dying body, fullfilling the revenge of angered demon Pazuzu ("The Master") for being exorcised out of the body of Regan (in the original film). The soul of the Gemini Killer was able to leave Karras' body, possess elderly senile dementia patients in the mental institution, to use them as an instrument to kill:

Well, there I was so awfully dead in that electric chair. I didn't like it. Would you? It's upsetting. There was still so much killing to do, and there I was, in the void, without a body. But then along came, well, you know, my friend. One of them. Those others over there. The cruel ones, the Master. And he thought that my work should continue. But in this body, in this body in particular, in fact. Ooh, let's call it revenge. A certain matter of an exorcism, I think, in which your friend Father Karras expelled certain parties from the body of a child. Certain parties were not pleased, to say the least. To say the very least. And so, my friend, the Master, devised this pretty little scheme as a way of getting back, of creating a stumbling block, a scandal, a horror to the eyes of all men who seek faith, using the body of this saintly priest as an instrument of, well, you know - my work. But, the main thing is the torment of your friend Father Karras as he watches while I rip and cut and mutilate the innocent, his friends, and again, and again, and on and on! He is inside with us! He will never get away! His pain won't end! Oh, gracious me. Was I raving? Please forgive me. I'm mad...

GoodFellas (1990)
Screenwriter(s): Nicholas Pileggi, Martin Scorsese

"I Always Wanted to Be a Gangster"

Play clip (excerpt):

Gangster Henry Hill's (Ray Liotta) monologue in the film's opening, as a teenaged boy in East New York (Brooklyn) 1955 - he intensely watched his idols - the 'gangsters' who used the nearby taxi stand as their front, across the street from his family's tenement apartment. Fascinated, he longed to "be a part of them" and the glamour:

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. Even before I first wandered into the cabstand for an after-school job, I knew I wanted to be a part of them. It was there that I knew that I belonged. To me, it meant being somebody in a neighborhood that was full of nobodies. They weren't like anybody else. I mean, they did whatever they wanted. They double-parked in front of a hydrant and nobody ever gave them a ticket. In the summer when they played cards all night, nobody ever called the cops.

GoodFellas (1990)
Screenwriter(s): Nicholas Pileggi, Martin Scorsese

Intoxicated With Drugs Before Being Busted

The famous "drug bust" sequence in which Henry narrated a paranoid, hyperactive monologue while heavily intoxicated with drugs as he had to sell guns and ammunition, plan a drug courier trip with his kids' babysitter Lois (Welker White), and prepare a large Italian dinner for his family while being surveyed overhead by an FBI helicopter in the space of a caption-timed 16 frantic hours. In the kitchen of his house, family members were recruited to help chop ingredients for the lavish dinner, as Henry obsessively watched the clock:

...I had to start braising the beef, pork butt and veal shanks for the tomato sauce. It was Michael's favorite. I was making ziti with the meat gravy and I'm planning to roast some peppers over the flames and I was gonna put on some string beans with some olive oil and garlic, and I had some beautiful cutlets that were cut just right, that I was going to fry up before dinner just as an appetizer. So I was home for about an hour. Now my plan was to start the dinner early so Karen and I could unload the guns that Jimmy didn't want, and then get the package for Lois to take to Atlanta for her trip later that night...

The monologue ended when Henry was busted by the DEA when a gun was held to his head, and he coolly said with relief (in voice-over):

For a second, I thought I was dead, but when I heard all the noise I knew they were cops. Only cops talk that way. If they had been wiseguys, I wouldn't have heard a thing. I would've been dead.

GoodFellas (1990)
Screenwriter(s): Nicholas Pileggi, Martin Scorsese

Living Like a Schnook

Play clip (excerpt):

Henry's closing monologue while testifying in court, in voice-over, about his criminal life before it all came to an end. He reflected, somewhat regretfully, on how crime as a goodfella did pay - for a while:

See, the hardest thing for me was leaving the life. I still love the life. And we were treated like movie stars with muscle. We had it all, just for the asking. Our wives, mothers, kids, everybody rode along. I had paper bags filled with jewelry stashed in the kitchen. I had a sugar bowl full of coke next to the bed...Anything I wanted was a phone call away. Free cars. The keys to a dozen hideout flats all over the city. I'd bet twenty, thirty grand over a weekend and then I'd either blow the winnings in a week or go to the sharks to pay back the bookies. Didn't matter. It didn't mean anything. When I was broke I would go out and rob some more. We ran everything. We paid off cops. We paid off lawyers. We paid off judges. Everybody had their hands out. Everything was for the taking. And now it's all over. And that's the hardest part.

He finished his monologue at his witness-protected suburban doorstep:

Today, everything is different. There's no action. I have to wait around like everyone else. Can't even get decent food. Right after I got here I ordered some spaghetti with marinara sauce and I got egg noodles and ketchup. I'm an average nobody. I get to live the rest of my life like a schnook.