"I'll give them a chance that they didn't give me. They will get a legal trial in a legal courtroom. They will have a legal judge and a legal defense. They will get a legal sentence and a legal death."

"Brent Briscoe - Bum / The Stranger / Visitor"

"Matthew Maher - Deputy Jeff Plummer"

"Liam Aiken - Johnnie Pappas"

"Bill Pullman - Billy Boy Walker"

"Tom Bower - Sheriff Bob Maples"

"Elias Koteas - Joe Rothman"

"Ned Beatty - Chester Conway"

"Simon Baker - Howard Hendricks"

"Jay R. Ferguson - Elmer Conway"

"A weed is a plant out of place. I find a hollyhock in my cornfield, and it's a weed. I find it in my yard, and it's a flower. You're in my yard."

"Casey Affleck - Deputy Lou Ford"

"It's always lightest just before the dark."

"Kate Hudson - Amy Stanton"

"I got a foot on both sides of the fence. They were put there early, and they stayed put. I can't move. I can't jump. All I can do is wait until I split, right down the middle."

"Nothing relieves tension like a good spanking!"

"Striking at people that way is almost as good as the other, the real way. The way I'd fought to forget—and had almost forgot—until I met her."

"Jessica Alba - Joyce Lakeland"

"[voiceover] Out here you say yes ma'am an no ma'am to anything with a skirt on. Out here if you catch a man with his pants down you apologize, even if you have to arrest him afterwards. Out here you're a man and a gentleman or you aren't anything at all. And god help you if you're not."

"Gwyneth Paltrow - Clementine"

"John C. Reilly - John Finnegan"

"Samuel L. Jackson - Jimmy"

"If you stay in the game long enough, you'll see everything, win everything, and lose everything."

"Philip Baker Hall - Sydney Brown"

"Philip Seymour Hoffman - Craps player"

"When good luck is a long shot, you have to hedge your bets."

"Never ignore a man's courtesy."

"I will fuck you up if you fuck with me, OK? I know three kinds of Karate: Jujitsu, Aikido, and regular Karate."

"Robert Ridgely - Keno Manager"

"Melora Walters - Jimmy's Girl"

"The murder of Carolyn Polhemus remains unsolved. It is a practical impossibility to try two people for the same crime. Even if it wasn't, I couldn't take his mother from my son. I am a prosecutor. I have spent my life in the assignment of blame. With all deliberation and intent, I reached for Carolyn. I cannot pretend it was an accident. I reached for Carolyn, and set off that insane mix of rage and lunacy that led one human being to kill another. There was a crime. There was a victim. And there is punishment."

"You understand what happened had to happen. It couldn't have turned out any other way. A woman's depressed - with herself, with life. With her husband, who had made life possible for her, until he was bewitched by another woman. A destroyer. Abandoned. Like someone left for dead. She plans her suicide, until the dream begins. In the dream, the destroyer is destroyed. That's a dream worth living for. Now, with such simplicity, such clarity, everything falls into place. It must be a crime that her husband can declare unsolved and be believed by all the world. She must make it look like a rape, but she must leave her husband the clues. Once he discovers who it was, he'll put the case into the file of unsolved murders. Another break-in by some sex-crazed man. But all his life, he'll know that it was her. She remembers a set of glasses she bought for the woman some time before - a housewarming gift from her husband and his office. She buys another set. Her husband has a beer one night - doesn't even comment on the glass. Now she has his fingerprints. Then on a few mornings, she saves the fluid that comes out when she removes her diaphragm. Puts it in a plastic bag. Puts the bag in the basement freezer, and waits. She calls the woman and asks to see her. Stops first at the U and logs into the computer. Now she has her alibi."

"There are one hundred and fifty lawyers down there. Couldn't they find someone who didn't fuck her to handle the case?"

"Faye Dunaway - Evelyn Mulwray (voice)"

"Perry Lopez - Capt. Lou Escobar"

"Tracey Walter - Tyrone Otley"

"Joe Mantell - Lawrence Walsh"

"James Hong - Khan"

"Sometimes it's dangerous to presume."

"Rubén Blades - Michael "Mickey Nice" Weisskopf"

"Frederic Forrest - Chuck Newty"

"Eli Wallach - Cotton Weinberger"

"Harvey Keitel - Julius "Jake" Berman"

"Jack Nicholson - Jake "J. J." Gittes"

"Meg Tilly - Kitty Berman"

"Madeleine Stowe - Lillian Bodine"

"David Keith - Det. Lt. Loach"

"Without my oil, you got no automobiles. Without automobiles, you got no road construction, no sidewalks, no city lights, no gas stations, no automotive service, and no Berman subdivision stuck out in the tules, because nobody can get there. Then Mr. Berman's out of business, before he even gets in business. The name of the game is oil, John."

"Time changes things like the fruit stand that turns into a filling station. But the footprints and signs from the past are everywhere. They've been fighting over this land since the first Spanish missionaries showed the Indians the benefits of religion, horses, and a few years of forced labor. The Indians had it right all along. They respected ghosts. You can't forget the past any more than you can change it. Hearing Katherine Mulwray's name started me thinking about old secrets, family, property, and a guy doin' his partner dirt. Memories are like that - as unpredictable as nitro, and you never know what's gonna set one off. Like the clues that keep you on the right track are never where you look for them. They fall out of the pocket of somebody else's suit you pick up at the cleaners. They're in the tune you can't stop humming, that you never heard in your life. They're at the other end of the wrong number you dial in the middle of the night. The signs are in those old familiar places you only think you've never been before. But you get used to seeing them out of the corner of your eye, and you end up tripping over the ones that are right in front of you..."

"David Wohl - Morrie Dickerman"