[from trailer]

Paul Kemp: We'll nail this bastard to his own front door.
[from trailer]

Paul Kemp: I thought maybe you were a mermaid.

Chenault: I'm from Connecticut.
Paul Kemp: Oscar Wilde once said, "Nowadays, people know the price of everything, and the value of nothing."
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.
Lotterman: How does anyone drink 161 miniatures?

Paul Kemp: Are they not complimentary?
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: 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: Why did she have to happen? Just when I was doing so good without her.
Moburg: [to Lotterman] Why don't you go die a slow and agonizingly painful death?
Paul Kemp: Your tongue is like an accusatory giblet!
Mr. Zimburger: There's no such thing as a liberal. A liberal is a commie with a college education thinking negro thoughts.
Sala: Do not confuse love with lust, nor drunkenness with judgment.
Paul Kemp: I tend to avoid alcohol.

[pause]

Paul Kemp: [takes a bottle of alcohol] When I can.
Sala: [while hallucinating] I have fear! You're giving me fear!
Paul Kemp: Beasts of obesity. Asses that wouldn't feel an arrow. The great whites. Probably the most dangerous creatures on earth.
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.
Moburg: This country was built on genocide and slavery. We killed all the black guys over here and then we shipped in new black guys of our own. And then we brought in Jesus like a bar of soap.
Sala: You're high, you fool! Drink some rum.
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
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: (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.
Moburg: You can't fire me, you owe me money, and you better pay it or I'll go to the roof and turn this place into an insurance claim.
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: I've got a tongue

[trying to lick his lips]

Paul Kemp: like a towel.
Paul Kemp: Practically every major corporation hides its money offshore. And that is good news for us, because *we* are the the shore.
Moburg: [being examined] Is it Clap?

Paul Kemp: [grimacing] A standing ovation.
Paul Kemp: Do you smell it? It's the smell of bastards. It's also the smell of truth.
[last lines]

Sala: Ride yourself a trade wind...
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...
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.
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?
Lotterman: How much do you drink?

Paul Kemp: I suppose at the upper end of social.
Moburg: Two of the best scoops you ever had came out of my brain and you'd better moderate your language or I'll go elsewhere.

Lotterman: Elsewhere where? You couldn't get work as a fly repellent. You're worthless, Moburg. The last onion in the jar.
Lotterman: The average guy don't rock the boat 'cause he wants to climb aboard it. And our readership is vividly average. They don't care who the losers are. They wanna know who won. Who won the bowls, who won the races, who won the pot at the slot machines. /... / And this is the American Dream.
Lotterman: You're paying to be in the dream. There's a thin veneer, Kemp, between the dream and the reality. You wake them up and people might start asking for their money back.

The Rum Diary Quotes

Extended Reading

The Rum Diary short comments

Melvin 2022-04-20 09:01:43

It's another movie that celebrates buddies. Slightly boring ~ look at Amber Heard for refreshment.
Brenda 2022-04-22 07:01:31

unintelligible movie