Michael O'Hara: When I start out to make a fool of myself there's very little can stop me.


--Orson Welles (as Michael O'Hara) in The Lady from Shanghai

Narrator: And this is what the legend says - a flower, known nowhere else, grows from out of the desperate crags where Pearl vanished. Pearl - who was herself a wild flower sprung from the hard clay, quick to blossom and early to die.


--Orson Welles (as Narrator) in Duel in the Sun

Narrator: George Amberson-Minafer walked home through the strange streets of what seemed to be a strange city. For the town was growing... changing... it was heaving up in the middle, incredibly; it was spreading incredibly. And as it heaved and spread, it befouled itself and darkened its skies. This was the last walk home he was ever to take up National Avenue, to Amberson Edition, and the big old house at the foot of Amberson Boulevard. Tommorow they were to move out. Tomorrow everything would be gone.


--Orson Welles (as Narrator) in The Magnificent Ambersons

Narrator: Something had happened. A thing which, years ago, had been the eagerest hope of many, many good citizens of the town, and now it had come at last; George Amberson Mainafer had got his comeuppance. He got it three times filled, and running over. But those who had so longed for it were not there to see it, and they never knew it. Those who were still living had forgotten all about it and all about him.


--Orson Welles (as Narrator) in The Magnificent Ambersons

Professor Charles Rankin: Murder can be a chain, Mary, one link leading to another until it circles your neck. Red was digging at the grave of the man I killed. Yes, your little man.
Mary Longstreet: You killed him?
Professor Charles Rankin: With these hands. The same hands that have held you close to me.


--Orson Welles (as ) in The Stranger

Professor Charles Rankin: The German sees himself as the innocent victim of world hatred and conspired against and put upon by inferior people, inferior nations. He cannot admit to error, much less to wrongdoing, not the German. We chose to ignore Ethiopia and Spain, but we learned from our own casualty list the price of looking the other way. Men of truth everwhere have come to know for whom the bell tolled, but not the German. No! He still follows his warrior gods marching to Wagnerian strains, his eyes still fixed upon the firey sword of Siegfried, and he knows subterranean meeting places that you don't believe in. The German's unbroken dream world comes alive, and he takes his place in shining armor beneath the banners of the Yeutonic knights. Mankind is waiting for the Messiah, but for the German, the Messiah is not the Prince of Peace. He's... another Barbarossa... another Hitler.


--Orson Welles (as ) in The Stranger

Professor Charles Rankin: Who would think to look for the notorious Franz Kindler in the sacred precincts of the Harper School, surrounded by the sons of America's first families? And I'll stay hidden... till the day when we strike again.
Konrad Meinike: Franz! There will be another war?
Professor Charles Rankin: Of course.


--Orson Welles (as ) in The Stranger

Will Varner: Can't teach an old dog new tricks, but you sure can teach a young willing puppy just about anything.


--Orson Welles (as Will Varner) in The Long, Hot Summer

Will Varner: Do you know what Quick means in this county? Hellfire. Ashes and char. Flame follows that man around like a dog. He's a barn burner.


--Orson Welles (as Will Varner) in The Long, Hot Summer

Will Varner: Give him time. A penny on the waters pays interest when the flood turns.


--Orson Welles (as Will Varner) in The Long, Hot Summer