Spartan (film)

Spartan is a 2004 film about the investigation into a kidnapping of the daughter of a high-ranking US government official.
 * Directed and written by David Mamet.

She's missing.

Master Gunnery Sergeant Robert Scott

 * It's all in the mind, sergeant. That's where the battle's won.


 * You wanted to go through the looking glass. How was it? Was it more fun than miniature golf?


 * Honey, you got all the slack in the world until I leave this room. Then I'm gonna zero you out.


 * There was a king, and he had a daughter, and she was abducted. The king, he swore to protect her, but while he was indulging himself shamefully, she was abducted. Now, the king's advisors, they knew that if she came home, she would reveal the king's shame to the country. So they told the king that she was dead.

Curtis

 * There's an Army depending on us for the truth. You can lie to anyone else. Never lie to a Ranger.

Other

 * Agent Jones: Do you wanna gossip or do you wanna shoot somebody?

Dialogue

 * Curtis: My name's Curtis.
 * Scott: Do I need to know that? If I want camaraderie, I'll join the Masons.


 * Scott: What they gotcha teachin' here, young sergeant?
 * Jackie Black: Edged weapons, sir. Knife fighting.
 * Scott: Don't you teach 'em knife fighting. Teach 'em to kill. That way, they meet some sonofabitch who studied knife fighting, they send his soul to hell.


 * Scott: In the city always a reflection, in the woods always a sound.
 * Curtis: What about the desert?
 * Scott: You don't wanna go in the desert.


 * Curtis: I fucked up. I tried to help.
 * Scott: That's usually when people fuck up.


 * Curtis: I saw the sign. [draws the Picasso symbol on the hood of a car] Sir.
 * Scott: You saw the sign? You were up for a week. You coulda seen Jack Ruby. You don't know what you saw your first time out.
 * Curtis: Sir, I know what I saw.
 * Scott: You didn't see no sign baby, 'cause she wasn't there. The hardest thing, y'know what it is? It isn't going in the door, it's coming out. You ever come down offa drugs? The most powerful drug in the world is adrenaline. I told you everything I know. Stand down.


 * Curtis: They sending you in?
 * Scott: We'll leave that to our betters.
 * Curtis: Why don't you ask them?
 * Scott: Why would I want to know? I ain't a planner, I ain't a thinker. I never wanted to be. You got to set your motherfucker to receive. Listen to me. They don't go through the door, we don't ask why. That's not a cost, it's benefit. Because we get to travel light. They tell me where to go. Tell me what to do when I get there.


 * Grace: Nice knife.
 * Scott: Yeah. Got it off an East German fella.
 * Grace: He give it to ya for a gift?
 * Scott: No. As I recall, he was... rather reluctant to part with it.


 * Burch: What about if we had to go off the meter? I need a man, a man who can unquestioningly follow orders.
 * Scott: The door is closed sir.
 * Burch: I need to ask you to do something.
 * Scott: I am here to get the girl back, sir. And there is nothing I will not do to get the girl back.


 * Burch: She dyed her hair. They see that red hair, what do they do, her hair grows out, when they see that red hair? Somebody recognizes her? What do they do when they realize who they took?
 * Scott: They kill her.
 * Burch: You're fuckin'-A right, they kill her.


 * Laura Newton: Did my father send you?
 * Scott: That's right.
 * Laura Newton: Why? Why? He wants me dead.
 * Scott: He sent me.
 * Laura Newton: One man.
 * Scott: "One riot, one Ranger." You ever heard that?
 * Laura Newton: Leonidas, King of Sparta... when a neighboring state would plead for military aid, would send one man.
 * Scott: Well, there you go.
 * Laura Newton: You ever hear that?
 * Scott: No. I think we went to different schools.


 * Laura Newton: Fuck it. I don't want to go home. Nobody there cares about me. I'm just a whore. I'm just a little whore.
 * Scott: Yeah, how'd you get like that?
 * Laura Newton: I was raised by wolves. I don't wanna go home.
 * Scott: Look, you go home some wave their hats, some turn their backs. It's all the same. None of them know where you've been.


 * Avi: There are some people in this house...
 * Scott: Avi...
 * Avi: That if you were go, while you were there, if you said hello to them for me, it would cut your price.
 * Scott: Avi, what do you think I am?
 * Avi: I don't know what you are. You ain't a planner. You're a shooter. I don't know what you're doing here, and I think you've gone off the reservation.


 * Laura Newton: Thank you.
 * Scott: For what?
 * Laura Newton: For coming for me.
 * Scott: Ah, what the hell.


 * Grace: Yeah, I always knew you Marines were a weepy buncha motherfuckers.
 * Scott: I got something in my eye.


 * Jackie Black: We got the girl back.
 * Scott: Yeah. She just took the long way home.

Cast

 * Val Kilmer - Master Gunnery Sergeant John / Bobby Scott
 * Derek Luke - Curtis
 * Tia Texada - Sergeant Jacqueline Black
 * Kristen Bell - First Daughter Laura Newton
 * Lionel Mark Smith - Colonel Blane
 * Johnny Messner - Sergeant Grace
 * Ed O'Neill - Robert Burch
 * William H. Macy - Stoddard
 * Saïd Taghmaoui - Tariq Asani


 * Clark Gregg - Agent Miller
 * Natalia Nogulich - Nadya Tellich
 * Moshe Ivgy - Avi
 * Kick Gurry - Agent Jones
 * Geoff Pierson - Agent Pearce
 * Vincent Guastaferro - Agent Naylor
 * Andy Davoli - Jerry Zimmer
 * Aaron Stanford - Michael Blake
 * Margot Farley - Young Prostitute