Long, Hot Summer

Ben:
All right then, run, lady, and you keep on running. Buy yourself a bus ticket and disappear. Change your name, dye your hair, get lost - and then maybe, just maybe, you're gonna be safe from me.

Ben:
Get out of character, lady. Come on, get way out.

Clara:
You're too much like my father to suit me, and I'm an authority on him.

Ben:
He's a wonderful old man.

Clara:
One wolf recognizes another.

Ben:
Tame us. Make pets out of us. You could.

Ben:
Miss Clara, you slam the door in a man's face before he even knocks on it.

Ben:
I respect him. I admire his manners and I admire the speeches he makes and I admire the big house he lives in. But if you're saving it all for him honey, you've got your account in the wrong bank.

Eula:
Why, you sound free as a bird. Don't he sound free as a bird?

Ben:
I live single.

Will Varner:
I got influence. I'll dog you, boy, wherever you go. I'll break you.

Ben:
No, you won't. You'll miss me.

Ben:
Life's very long and full of salesmanship, Miss Clara. You might buy something yet.

Clara:
I've spent my whole life around men who push and shove and shout and think they can make anything happen just by being aggressive. And I'm not anxious to have another one around the place.

Clara:
Well don't throw in the towel yet, Agnes, dear. Those tranquilizers may see us through yet.

Ben:
Well, that's all right. I'm a quiet-living man, myself.

Eula Varner:
Oh, I only know one reason for living quiet, that's if you're too old to live any other way.

Lucius:
Mister, you sure do leave your calling card.

Justice of the Peace:
A barn-burner's the meanest, lowest creature there is.

Eula Varner:
If I'm not mistaken, that's my master's voice.

Ben Quick:
What happens if a federal man comes by?

Ben:
Summertime, and the livin' is easy.

Will Varner:
I'm gonna crawl over them books like an old fly over flypaper.

Will Varner:
Do you know what Quick means in this county? Hellfire. Ashes and char. Flame follows that man around like a dog. He's a barn burner.

Ben:
If you're scared of me, mister, why don't you just come right out and say so?

Will Varner:
Sir, why should I be scared of you?

Ben:
'Cause I got a reputation for being a dangerous man.

Will Varner:
You're a young dangerous man. I'm an old one. I guess you don't know who I am. I better introduce myself. I'm the big landowner, chief moneylender in these parts. I'm commissioner of elections, veterinarian, own a store and a cotton gin and a grist mill and a blacksmith shop... and it's considered unlucky for a man to do his trading or gin his cotton or grind his meal or shoe his stock anywhere else. Now that's who I am.

Ben:
You talk a lot.

Will Varner:
Well, yes I do, sir. I'm done talking to you, except for passing you on this piece of information. I built me a new jail in my courthouse this year, and if during the course of your stay, something, anything at all should just happen to catch fire, I think you ought to know that in my jail, we never heard of the words habeas corpus. You rot.

Ben:
Yes or no, mister. Ain't no in between.

Minnie Littlejohn:
I made plans, Will, matrimonial plans.

Will Varner:
Now you ain't ever heard me say the word matrimony.

Minnie Littlejohn:
Well now, I'm willing to overlook that.

Minnie Littlejohn:
Look, honey. It's no good you trying to tell me you're too old. I happen to be in a position to deny it.

Will Varner:
The man that built this place, his name's forgotten. This was his dream and his pride. Now it's dust. Must be a moral there somewhere.

Will Varner:
I've been watching you. I like your push, yes. I like your style. I like your brass. It ain't too dissimilar from the way I operate.

Ben:
That's a long time to live in one place.

Alan Stewart:
You don't believe in living in one place, Mr. Quick?

Ben:
Well, my family moved. Not that they wanted to. They was encouraged by the local citizens.

Alan Stewart:
My people have stood off Indians, Yankees, carpetbaggers. The least they could expect of me is to stand up to a Varner.

Will Varner:
I was young myself once. I used to hide in the greenery and hoot and bellow.

Clara:
I'll bet you did. I'll bet you stayed longest and yelled loudest.

Will Varner:
Your mama listened.

Will Varner:
They don't have to see her. They can smell her.

Will Varner:
Thousands of acres out there. Millions of seeds put down in the ground, and every year the seeds come up again. Life goes on. Where's my crop, huh? What follows me? What happens when I'm dead?

Clara:
You'll probably have the biggest funeral in the state of Mississippi.

Will Varner:
That don't scare me none, just so long as there are plenty of Varners to mourn me.

Clara:
Jody and I'll be there.

Will Varner:
You and Jody and Jody's kids and yours and their kids, my descendants, sister, a line, a long line with my face stamped on 'em, my blood flowing in their veins.

Clara:
All of that from the two of us?

Will Varner:
Listen, I'm gonna get me some man in the Varner family, some good strong strappin' man Varners. That's what I want, Varners and more Varners. Yeah, more Varners still. Enough Varners to infest the countryside. I'm gonna see that happen, sister, before I die. I'm gonna accomplish that, yes ma'am, by means of that Quick, that big stud horse.

Will Varner:
Can't teach an old dog new tricks, but you sure can teach a young willing puppy just about anything.

Will Varner:
Give him time. A penny on the waters pays interest when the flood turns.

Ben:
The world belongs to the meat eaters, Miss Clara, and if you have to take it raw, take it raw.

Ben:
I can see my white shirt and my black tie and my Sunday manners didn't fool you for a minute. Well, that's right, ma'am, I'm a menace to the countryside. All a man's gotta do is just look at me sideways and his house goes up in fire. And here I am, living right here in the middle of your peaceable little town, right in your back yard, you might say. Guess that ought to keep you awake at night.

Ben:
Well, I'll be damned.

Will Varner:
More than probable, you will be. But first, you're going to church and get married, yeah, to my daughter.

Will Varner:
She has quality, quality. Which is as close as you and me will ever get to it.

Will Varner:
I put down a big footprint. I said: 'Here. Step here. Fill it.' You never did.

Clara:
He'll get his just deserts, all right.

Clara:
You are barking up the wrong girl, Mr. Quick.

Will Varner:
You got hellfire and damnation in you, Jody Varner, but you got redemption too. When I think of the hate that put me in there and locked the door and set fire to it, and when I think of the love that wouldn't let me go... I got me a son again. I got me a good right arm - and a left.

Ben:
I'm just not in a running mood.

Ben:
You look like two butterflies lit out on the grass.

Ben:
I'm gonna kiss you, Miss Clara. I'm gonna show you how simple it is.

Clara:
All right, you proved it. I'm human.

Ben:
Yes, ma'am. You human, all right.

Minnie Littlejohn:
Will Varner, I heard you was in that fire!

Will Varner:
Simmer down, Minnie. You ain't a rich widow yet.