Daniel Day-Lewis Monologues

No! You stay alive! If they don't kill you, they'll take you north up to the Huron lands. Submit, do you hear? You're strong! You survive! You stay alive, no matter what occurs! I will find you! No matter how long it takes, no matter how far. I will find you!

In case your aim's any better than your judgment.

My father's people say that at the birth of the sun and of his brother the moon, their mother died. So the sun gave to the earth her body, from which was to spring all life. And he drew forth from her breast the stars, and the stars he threw into the night sky to remind him of her soul. So there's the Cameron's monument. My folks' too, I guess.

Yes, and, "do not try to make them understand you. That is because they are a breed apart and make no sense".

After seven years indentured service in Virginia, they headed out here 'cause the frontier's the only land available to poor people. Out here, they're beholden to none. Not living by another's leave.

The cabin was attacked by a war party fighting with the French. They're sweeping south along the frontier attacking farms and Mohawk villages, all the men are stuck here.

Your judgment is not more important than their right under agreement with Webb to defend their farms and families. Major Hayward was there, he was at John Cameron's, he saw what it was.

If English law cannot be trusted maybe these people would do better making their own peace with the French.

Someday I think you and I are going to have a serious disagreement.

I'm Nathaniel of the Yengeese. Hawkeye, adopted son of Chingachgook of the Mohican people. Let the children of the dead Munro and the Yengeese officer go free. This belt which is the record of the days of my father's people speaks for my truth.

Out the northern sally port. Strike for the east side of the swamp till you clear the French picket line. Head north over the ridge, then come about southeast. Fork left in Little Meadow and you're free of the outpost and skirmishes.

Would the Huron make his Algonquin brothers foolish with brandy and steal his lands to sell them for gold to the white man? Would Huron have greed for more land than a man can use? Would Huron fool Seneca into taking all the furs of all the animals of the forest for beads and strong whiskey?

Because it is my name! Because I cannot have another in my life! Because I lie and sign myself to lies! Because I am not worth the dust on the feet of them you have hanged! How may I live without my name? I have given you my soul; leave me my name!

Elizabeth, your justice would freeze beer.

It is not on a boat we'll meet again Abigail, but in hell.

I say- I say- God is dead!

Thou shalt not steal, thou shalt not covet thy neighbors goods, nor covet thy neighbors wives, thou shalt have no other Gods before me, thou shalt not use the Lord's name in vain, thou shalt keep holy the sabbath day, thou shalt honor thy mother and father, thou shalt not bare to false witness... thou shalt not covet thy neighbors wives.

Hell and Heaven grapple on our backs, and all our old pretenses ripped away. God's icy wind will blow.

We will not meet again, Abigail, in this World or the next.

I lusted! I lusted again and again! But the fault is not mine. It was the she-devil. The she-devil tempted me!

There she is. There she is.

Ladies and gentlemen... I've traveled over half our state to be here tonight. I couldn't get away sooner because my new well was coming in at Coyote Hills and I had to see about it. That well is now flowing at two thousand barrels and it's paying me an income of five thousand dollars a week. I have two others drilling and I have sixteen producing at Antelope; so, ladies and gentlemen, if I say I'm an oil man, you will agree. Now, you have a great chance here, but bear in mind, you can lose it all if you're not careful. Out of all men that beg for a chance to drill your lots, maybe one in twenty will be oilmen; the rest will be speculators - that's men trying to get between you and the oilmen - to get some of the money that ought by rights come to you. Even if you find one that has money and means to drill, he'll maybe know nothing about drilling and he'll have to hire the job out on contract, and then you're depending on a contractor who'll rush the job through so he can get another contract just as quick as he can. This is... the way that this works.

I do my own drilling, and the men that work for me work for me. and they're men I know. I make it my business to be there and to see their work. I don't lose my tools in the hole and spend months fishing for them; I don't botch the cementing off and let water in the hole and ruin the whole lease. I'm a family man. I run a family business. This is my son and my partner, H.W. Plainview.

We offer you the bond of family that very few oilmen can understand. I'm fixed like no other company in this field and that's because my Coyote Hills well has just come in. I have a string of tools all ready to put to work. I can load a rig onto trucks and have them here in a week. I have business connections so I can get the lumber for the derrick - such things go by friendship in a rush like this - and this is why I can guarantee to start drilling and to put up the cash to back my word. I assure you, ladies and gentlemen, no matter what the others promise to do, when it comes to the showdown, they won't be there.

Ladies and gentlemen? Ladies and gentlemen. Thank you so much for visiting with us this evening. Now, I've traveled across half our state to be here and to see about this land. Now, I daresay some of you might have heard some of the more extravagant rumors about what my plans are; I just thought you'd like to hear it from me. This is the face. There's no great mystery. I'm an oilman, ladies and gentlemen. I have numerous concerns spread across this state. I have many wells flowing at many thousand barrels per day. I like to think of myself as an oilman. As an oilman, I hope that you'll forgive just good old-fashioned plain speaking. Now, this work that we do is very much a family enterprise; I work side by side with my wonderful son, H.W. - I think one or two of you might have met him already - and, uh, I encourage my men to bring their families, as well. Of course, it makes for an ever so much more rewarding life for them. Family means children; children means education; so, wherever we set up camp, education is a necessity, and we're just so happy to take care of that. So let's build a wonderful school in Little Boston. These children are the future that we strive for and so they should have the very best of things. Now something else, uh... and please don't be insulted if I speak about this - bread. Let's talk about bread. Now to my mind, uh, it's an abomination to consider that any man, woman or child in this magnificent country of ours should have to look upon a loaf of bread as a luxury. We're gonna dig water wells here and, uh, water wells means irrigation. Irrigation means cultivation. We're gonna raise crops here where before it just simply wasn't impossible. You're going to have more grain than you know what to do with. Bread will be coming right out of your ears, ma'am. New roads, agriculture, employment, education - these are just a few of the things we can offer you, and I assure you, ladies and gentlemen, that if we do find oil here - and I think there's a very good chance that we will - this community of yours will not only survive, it will flourish.

I thank you all so much for visiting with us at this time. I've had the pleasure of meeting some of you, and I hope, very much in the months to come, I'll be able to visit with each and every one of you. Ah... I'm better at digging holes in the ground than making speeches, so let's forget the speech for this evening, just make it a simple blessing. You see, one man doesn't prospect from the ground. It takes a whole community of good people, such as yourselves... and, uh, this is good. We stay together. We pray together, we work together and, if the good Lord smiles kindly on our endeavor, we share in the wealth together. Now before we spud in Mary's Well number one - named for the lovely Miss Mary Sunday here by my side, a proud daughter of these hills - I'd just like to say God bless these honest labors of ours; and, of course, God bless you all. Amen.

Mr. Bankside, I'm not going to waste your time; I'd certainly appreciate it if you didn't waste mine. Now, if you wish to sign with me, we can have a well drilling within ten days, but your lot is further north from the discovery well up here, and so... Well, that means we'll probably have to dig deeper. And if there's as much oil here as I think there is, it'll be harder to reach, but once we find it, we can take it right out. You have to act quickly, because very soon these fields will be dry. Now... I need you to know what you want to do. Now, because of the distance from the discovery well, I'll pay you a smaller royalty than you'd get down there, but I'm prepared to give you a thousand dollar bonus on your lot.

I'm finished.

I'm forty-seven. Forty-seven years old. You know how I stayed alive this long? All these years? Fear. The spectacle of fearsome acts. Somebody steals from me, I cut off his hands. He offends me, I cut out his tongue. He rises against me, I cut off his head, stick it on a pike, raise it high up so all on the streets can see. That's what preserves the order of things. Fear.

At my challenge, by the ancient laws of combat, we have met at this chosen ground, to settle for good and all who holds sway over the Five Points: us natives, born right wise to this fine land, or the foreign hordes defiling it.

Here's the thing. I don't give a tuppenny fuck about your moral conundrum, you meat-headed shit-sack. That's more or less the thing. And I want you to go out there... You, nobody else. None of your little minions. I want you to go out there. And I want you to punish the person who's responsible for murdering this poor little rabbit. Is that understood?

I know your works. You are neither cold nor hot. So because you are lukewarm, I will spew you out of my mouth. You can build your filthy world without me. I took the father. Now I'll take the son. You tell young Vallon I'm gonna paint Paradise Square with his blood. Two coats. I'll festoon my bedchamber with his guts. As for you, Mr. Tammany-fucking-Hall, you come down to the Points again, and you'll be dispatched by my own hand. Get back to your celebration and let me eat in peace.

The Priest and me, we lived by the same principles. It was only faith divided us. He gave me this, you know? That was the finest beating I ever took. My face was pulp. My guts was pierced, my ribs was all mashed up. And when he came to finish me, I couldn't look him in the eye. He spared me, because he wanted me to live in shame. This was a great man. A great man. So I out out the eye that looked away, I sent it to him wrapped in blue paper. I would've cut them both out if I could have fought him blind. And I rose back up again with a full heart… and buried him in his own blood. He was the only man I ever killed worth remembering.

My father gave his life, making this country what it is. Murdered by the British with all of his men on the twenty fifth of July, anno domini, 1814. Do you think I'm going to help you befoul his legacy, by giving this country over to them, what's had no hand in the fighting for it? Why, because they come off a boat crawling with lice and begging you for soup.

Everything you see belongs to me, to one degree or another. The beggars and newsboys and quick thieves here in Paradise, the sailor dives and gin mills and blind tigers on the waterfront, the anglers and amusers, the she-hes and the Chinks. Everybody owes, everybody pays. Because that's how you stand up against the rising of the tide.

We hold in our hearts the memory of our fallen brothers whose blood stains the very streets we walk today. Also on this night we pay tribute to the leader of our enemies, an honorable man, who crossed over bravely, fighting for what he believed in. To defeat my enemy, I extinguish his life, and consume him as I consume these flames. In honor of Priest Vallon.

He ain't earned a death! He ain't a death at my hands! No, he'll walk amongst you marked with shame, a freak worthy of Barnum's Museum of Wonders. God's only man, spared by the Butcher.

Ears and noses will be the trophies of the day. But no hand shall touch him. NO hand shall touch him! He'll cross over whole. With honor.