Paul Kemp Quotes in The Rum Diary (2011)
Paul Kemp Quotes:
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Paul Kemp: Oscar Wilde once said, "Nowadays, people know the price of everything, and the value of nothing."
-- Paul Kemp -
Paul Kemp: [Kemp and Sala are wandering down a pier late at night, high on hallucinogens] I thought I was losing grip in there. What did we take?
Sala: I don't know.
Paul Kemp: We need to get some more.
[Kemp stops to stare at a tank full of lobsters]
Paul Kemp: [quietly] That explains it... doesn't it?
Sala: Explains what?
Paul Kemp: The world... and us.
[he stares deep into the eyes of one particular lobster]
Paul Kemp: [voiceover] I wonder what it is you might think about our different worlds. He looked at me kinda sideways and said, "Human beings are the only creatures on Earth who claim a God, and the only living thing that behaves like it hasn't got one. Does the world belong to no one but you?" And when he said it, I was taken aback. Not because of who was doing the talking. Because I finally understood the connection between children scavenging for food, and shiny brass plates on the front doors of banks.
-- Paul Kemp -
Paul Kemp: I thought you said you had a TV.
Sala: No, the guy across the alley has a TV. I have binoculars.
-- Paul Kemp -
Paul Kemp: I tend to avoid alcohol.
[pause]
Paul Kemp: [takes a bottle of alcohol] When I can.
-- Paul Kemp -
Paul Kemp: So many hotels you can't see the sea.
Lotterman: You can see the sea by checking into the hotels.
Paul Kemp: Pay to see the sea?
Lotterman: What's the matter with that? You're paying to be in the dream...
-- Paul Kemp -
Moburg: Maybe I can interest you gentlemen in something else.
Paul Kemp: Like what? Death?
Moburg: Like the most powerful drug in the history of narcotics. I'm not at liberty to discuss or disclose; all I can tell you is: this stuff is so powerful, they give it to communists.
Paul Kemp: Who does?
Moburg: The FBI.
Sala: Why would the FBI get communists high?
Moburg: That I can't help you with.
-- Paul Kemp -
Paul Kemp: Why did she have to happen? Just when I was doing so good without her.
-- Paul Kemp -
Paul Kemp: Your tongue is like an accusatory giblet!
-- Paul Kemp -
Paul Kemp: Beasts of obesity. Asses that wouldn't feel an arrow. The great whites. Probably the most dangerous creatures on earth.
-- Paul Kemp -
Paul Kemp: The only upside with Nixon is he ain't gonna win.
Sala: He's got the grin.
Paul Kemp: He ain't gonna win. Irish guy's gonna win. But don't ever let him live.
Sala: Well how do you know that?
Paul Kemp: I do horoscopes.
-- Paul Kemp -
Moburg: [being examined] Is it Clap?
Paul Kemp: [grimacing] A standing ovation.
-- Paul Kemp -
Lotterman: What do you know about horoscopes?
Paul Kemp: Nothing.
Lotterman: Ah, well, if I can write one, you can. So it's every day with a special "Star's Star" featured Saturday with Betty Grable and Neil Sedaka, things like that. So here, everything you need is right there. It's called "Madam La Zonga Predicts."
Paul Kemp: What happened to Madam La Zonga?
Sala: He got canceled.
Paul Kemp: What do you mean, fired?
Lotterman: They raped him to death.
Paul Kemp: They raped him to death?
Sala: There are very few places on this island I decline to visit, but the toilets frequented by sailors on the west side of Candado Pier is one.
Paul Kemp: They raped him to death?
-- Paul Kemp -
[from trailer]
Paul Kemp: I thought maybe you were a mermaid.
Chenault: I'm from Connecticut.
-- Paul Kemp -
Lotterman: How does anyone drink 161 miniatures?
Paul Kemp: Are they not complimentary?
-- Paul Kemp -
Lotterman: [after mentioning that the former writer, male, of the horoscopes was raped to death in a public toilet] Say, you're not .uuh. artistic, are you Kemp?
Paul Kemp: Oh no
Lotterman: Y'might wanna rethink those menthol cigarettes
-- Paul Kemp -
Paul Kemp: Practically every major corporation hides its money offshore. And that is good news for us, because *we* are the the shore.
-- Paul Kemp -
Paul Kemp: Do you smell it? It's the smell of bastards. It's also the smell of truth.
-- Paul Kemp -
Paul Kemp: What's your name?
Chenault: Let's keep that a secret.
Paul Kemp: But I don't even know it.
Chenault: Then you'll keep it even better.
-- Paul Kemp -
Paul Kemp: You know what I think? I think we're drinking too much rum.
Sala: There's no other way.
Paul Kemp: I'm getting double ashtray, and double salt pot.
Sala: You gotta a Moberg bifocal.
-- Paul Kemp -
Chenault: Where are you going?
Paul Kemp: Her friend's playing in a band. We're gonna go check it out.
Chenault: Oh, we wanna come.
Sanderson: I'll rephrase that: We don't wanna come.
-- Paul Kemp -
[from trailer]
Paul Kemp: We'll nail this bastard to his own front door.
-- Paul Kemp -
Paul Kemp: (About Nixon in the debate with JFK) How long can this blizzard of shame go on?
Paul Kemp: Look at this ingrate besotted with his own righteousness.
-- Paul Kemp -
Paul Kemp: I've got a tongue
[trying to lick his lips]
Paul Kemp: like a towel.
-- Paul Kemp
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