"Joe Wenteworth: Okay, you grabbed her boobs, and you pulled her into the manger. Big deal. It could've happened to anybody. Well, maybe not anybody."

"Winter left its icy chill behind and soon it was spring, then summer again. Grandmother passed away that June following a stroke. And because Hilde was always so content to just follow her lead...she had a stroke of her own and died in July. We buried them side by side. It's the way they would've wanted it. Ben Goodrich legally adopted me just two days before my thirteenth birthday. Not a day goes by that I don't thank God for bringing him into my life. With Simon's help, I had finally found my real father."

"Time is a monster that cannot be reasoned with. It responds like a snail to our impatience...then it races like a gazelle when you can't catch your breath."

"When someone you love dies, you don't lose them all at once. You lose them in pieces over time, like how the mail stops coming. What I remember most to this day was my mother's scent and how I hated it when it began to disappear. First from her closets and drawers, then from her dresses that she had sewed herself and finally, from her bedsheets and pillowcases."

"Simon's father owned the Birch Granite Company. Mr. Birch was a big believer in the rock and just about everything in their house was made from granite, including Mr. Birch."

"[Visiting Simon's grave.] I am doomed to remember a boy with a wrecked voice, not because of his voice or because he was the smallest person I ever knew, or even because he was the instrument of my mother's death but because he is the reason I believe in God. What faith I have, I owe it to Simon Birch, a boy I grew up with in Gravestown, Maine. It is Simon who had me a believer."

"[At the birth scene of Simon Birch.] Simon Birch was the smallest delivery ever recorded in the history of Gravestown Memorial Hospital."

"[After a stoned Martin Hannett tries to set fire to him] I am not a lump of hash. I'm in charge of Factory Records. I think."

"Rob Brydon - Ryan Letts"

"John Thomson - Charles"

"Paul Popplewell - Paul Ryder"

"Danny Cunningham - Shaun Ryder"

"Ralf Little - Peter Hook"

"Dave Gorman - John"

"John Simm - Bernard Sumner"

"Mark Windows - Johnny Rotten"

"Chris Coghill - Bez"

"Martin Hancock - Howard DeVoto"

"Andy Serkis - Martin Hannett"

"Paddy Considine - Rob Gretton"

"Shirley Henderson - Lindsay Wilson"

"Lennie James - Alan Erasmus"

"Steve Coogan - Tony Wilson"

"[Over images of Ian Curtis, Shaun Ryder and Tony Wilson respectively:] Genius. Poet. Twat."

"The unbelievably true story of one man, one movement, the music and madness that was Manchester."

"[From film poster:] Share the Ecstasy."

"Roger Ames [reading Factory Records contract, written in Tony Wilson's blood]: The artists own all their work. The label owns nothing. Our bands have the freedom ... to fuck off."

"Shaun Ryder [explaining his stay in Barbados]]: I was stranded on a desert island with no shelter nor companionship. Every day, I kept watch for rescue, but no-one came. My only distraction was to write lyrics for my forthcoming album, but then I thought... "Why the fuck should I?!""

"Boethius: It's my belief that history is a wheel. "Inconstancy is my very essence" -says the wheel- "Rise up on my spokes if you like, but don't complain when you are cast back down into the depths. Good times pass away, but then so do the bad. Mutability is our tragedy, but it is also our hope. The worst of times, like the best, are always passing away"."