Jonathan E. Quotes in Rollerball (1975)

Jonathan E.: I've been thinking, Ella. Thinking a lot... and watching. It's like people had a choice a long time ago between having all them nice things or freedom. Of course, they chose comfort.

Ella: But comfort is freedom. It always has been. The whole history of civilization is a struggle against poverty and need.

Jonathan E.: No! No... that's not it. That's never been it! Them privileges just buy us off.

[deep sigh]

Jonathan E.: Look, they want me to quit, Ella.

Ella: Then quit.

Jonathan E.: Just like that, huh?

Ella: But you've got to do it now. You've got to before it's too late, whether you want to or not. Look, Johnny... the next game there won't be any substitutions allowed... and no time limit. You'll die, Johnny. Everybody will die.

Jonathan E.: No time limit. They tell you that?

Ella: Yes.

Jonathan E.: They tell you to convince me to quit?

Ella: Yes, but that isn't why I came here. You have to get out for your own sake. Oh, please Johnny, please.

Jonathan E.: They tell you to stay if... ah... I did quit?

[Ella is silent with a plea in her eyes]

Jonathan E.: You my big reward?

[Jonathan walks away from her as melodramatic violin music starts to play]

Jonathan E.: Does he... ah... Does he dream?

Japanese Doctor: No. There is no brain wave at all. No sort of consciousness. Just a deep coma. A vegetable. No dreams. Nothing.

Jonathan E.: But even, uh, a plant... uh, feels something.

Japanese Doctor: Who can say? Please.

[hands Jonathan the release form]

Jonathan E.: It, uh, senses life. I mean, uh, it turns towards the sun. It's alive, isn't it?

Japanese Doctor: [stressing] You must sign.

Jonathan E.: You, uh, you just leave him the way he is. Just leave him the way he is.

Japanese Doctor: Someone will have to sign. There is no other way.

Jonathan E.: Arrangements will be made.

Japanese Doctor: Please. There are hospital rules that have to be...

Jonathan E.: No, there aren't. There aren't any rules at all.

[turns and walks away]

Ella: You still don't understand why I came here?

Jonathan E.: You're the only person I ever wanted. I wanted you on my side, that's all.

Jonathan E.: What do you know about the corporate wars?

Cletus: Oh, they were naaaasty... Woooh.

Jonathan E.: If the rule changes stay the same, Mr. Bartholomew, I'm playing with my team.

Bartholomew: Too late. The rule changes are already scheduled and announced. There's no going back. You saw to that.

Jonathan E.: Then I'll see you in Tokyo.

Reporter: What about the rumors of no time limit for the championship?

Jonathan E.: I don't think it'll come to that... it's still a game.

Jonathan E.: Ears. Now, they're important, too.

Jonathan E.: Misplace some data?

Librarian: The whole of the thirteenth century.

Bartholomew: You can be made to quit, you know. You can be forced.

Jonathan E.: You can't make me quit.

Bartholomew: Don't tell me I can't. Don't EVER say that. I can. YOU can be stopped.

[as Jonathan E. leaves the room, he turns up the volume of a TV set, as thousands are cheering his name]

Jonathan E.: Don't try to frighten me, you don't know how. Now I am going to Tokyo and you are not.

Daphne: Hi. I'm Daphne.

Jonathan E.: Yeah, that figures.

Jonathan E.: I love this game Moonpie! I love it.

Librarian: We are confused again here today. This is embarrassing. It's embarrassing to misplace things.

Jonathan E.: Misplaced some data?

Librarian: Hmmm.

[Looks at a computer punch card]

Librarian: The whole of the 13th century. Misplaced the computers, several conventional computers. We can't find them. We're always moving things around, getting organized, my assistants and I. This - this is Zero's fault - Zero, he's the world's file cabinet. Pity, poor old 13th century.

[pause]

Librarian: Well, come along now, you want to get started, don't you?

Jonathan E.: Yes, sir.

Librarian: [Takes Jonathan's coat and hat and puts them aside before they go to the room with Zero in it] This way! Now, we've lost those computers with all of the 13th century in them. Not much in the century, just Dante and a few corrupt Popes, but it's so distracting and annoying!

Moonpie: So, we got two games left. Guess who we play first? Tokyo! Who'd a thought they'd make it to the playoffs?

Jonathan E.: They're good. They got the old Samurai spirit.

Moonpie: Yeah, but they're only about this tall.

Jonathan E.: Yeah, well, two or three little things make one big thing. They're liable to climb all over you and eat your lunch!

Moonpie: I can't get on a man-to-man basis with a pygmy or an Oriental.

Bartholomew: You've had an amazing career Jonathan. You know how proud we are of the Houston team and what we think of you - at Energy. Now, there are executives who want you out.

Jonathan E.: Sir?

Bartholomew: For 10 years in this game, Jonathan. Longer than anyone, ever.

Jonathan E.: Retire? How could I do that?

Bartholomew: Jonathan, let's think this through together. You know, how the game serves us. Its a definite social purpose. Nations are bankrupt. Gone. None of that tribal warfare anymore. Even the Corporate Wars are a thing of the past.

Jonathan E.: I know that, I just...

Bartholomew: Now, we have the majors and their executives. Transport. Food. Communication. Housing. Luxury. Energy. A few of us making decisions on a global basis for a common good.

Jonathan E.: The team is a unit that plays with certain rhythms.

Bartholomew: So does an executive team, Jonathan. Now, everyone, has all the comforts. You know that. No poverty. No sickness. No needs and many luxuries - which you enjoy - just as if you were in the executive class. Corporate society takes care of everything. And all it asks of anyone, all its ever asked of anyone, ever, is not to interfere with management decisions.

Jonathan E.: I don't mean to resist. I'm just tryin' to understand.

Bartholomew: Its for your own benefit. You must know that, Jonathan. All decisions concerning you are.

Jonathan E.: I lost Ella. The corporation took my wife away because an executive wanted her.

Bartholomew: I'm not going to review all that again. It was before I took over here and I had nothing to do with it. From what I hear your wife wanted to leave her self.

Cletus: I forget what corporation is running what city. Chicago's still a food city. But, what about Indianapolis? Whatever happened to that town?

Mackie: Whatever happened to Mackie?

Cletus: Things were much simpler when I was a kid. We still had three nations. That was before the Corporate Wars and even before Rollerball. Before everything. Do you believe in kicks? I remember somebody telling me about the National Football League and the World Cup.

Jonathan E.: [Mackie gets up to leave] Where are you going?

Mackie: Indianapolis.

Jonathan E.: There's something going on with the game. I don't know what it is. I don't think I'm supposed to know.

Cletus: What's that?

Jonathan E.: They want me to quit.

Cletus: Why - would they want you to do that?

Jonathan E.: I don't know. That's what I'd like you to find out.

Girl in Library: There must be some mistake. The books you've ordered are classified and have been transcribed and summarized.

Jonathan E.: Who summarizes them?

Girl in Library: I suppose the computer summarizes them.

Moonpie: What do you need books for?

Jonathan E.: I just want to study up on some things.

Girl in Library: You could go to the Computer Center where the real librarians transcribe the books. But, we have all the edited versions in our catalog. Anything I think you'd want.

Jonathan E.: Well, I see that this is not a library and you are really not a Librarian.

Girl in Library: I'm only a clerk. That's right. I'm sorry about it, really.

Jonathan E.: And the books are really in Computer Banks being summarized. Where is that?

Girl in Library: Well, there is a Computer Bank in Washington. The biggest is in Geneva. That's a nice place to visit. I guess that's were all the books are now.

Daphne: I found this tunic. Is it alright?

Jonathan E.: Its the uniform of the house

Daphne: What sort of a pill did you give me?

Jonathan E.: Pure aphrodisiac, Daph. Enjoy yourself, dear.

Daphne: Can't we finish up there and go home?

Daphne: Listen, Jonathan, I really want to go with you. I do, really. You'll need me.

Jonathan E.: Get yourself another assignment, will ya, Daph.

Daphne: Everybody is an assignment. Life's an assignment!

Daphne: You better do as you're told, Jonathan. That's all I have to say.

Jonathan E.: Are you threatening me?

Jonathan E.: Could you tell me something about the Corporate Wars?

Librarian: Wars, wars! Oh, yes, of course, we have them all here. Punic War. Prussian War. Pelopanesian War. Crimean War. Wars of the Roses. Wonderful, perhaps, to call them in sequence. But, eh, Corporate Wars?

Jonathan E.: How are you?

Ella: Nervous.

Jonathan E.: I've seen your house.

Ella: You have?

Jonathan E.: Well, yeah, Iook, when we played in Rome, I stood a block away and watched your front gate for a couple of hours. I was just standing there wondering what your furniture looked like. What you said to each other in the morning. What's he like? What's he do?

Ella: He's a City Engineer. We have a jetcopter, a son, two cats and a place in the Alps. Well, you don't really want to hear all of this.

Jonathan E.: A son?

Ella: Yeah. We have a lot of friends. And he has a lover. We have furniture a lot like yours.

Jonathan E.: The same taste in furniture, how about that.

Jonathan E.: I wanted you here. I mean, this might sound all wrong, but, maybe I was just trying to remember myself then. Maybe it was the love I wanted to try to remember.