The Professionals

Hans Ehrengard:
Nine more of their horses are still left. You gonna shoot them, too?

Rico:
I guess we'll have to. We can't spare the food and water.

Hans Ehrengard:
We could cut them loose.

[Dolworth laughs]

Hans Ehrengard:
What's so funny?

Bill Dolworth:
People. We just killed ten men, nobody bats an eye. But when it comes to one of God's most stupid animals...

Hans Ehrengard:
But harmless.

Bill Dolworth:
Nothing's harmless in this desert unless it's dead.

Bill Dolworth:
Maybe there's only one revolution, since the beginning, the good guys against the bad guys. Question is, who are the good guys?

[Bill Dolworth admires Maria Grant's cleavage]

Maria Grant:
Yes?

Bill Dolworth:
Just wondering... what makes you worth a hundred thousand dollars.

Maria Grant:
Go to hell.

Bill Dolworth:
Yes ma'am. I'm on my way.

[last lines]

J.W. Grant:
You bastard.

Rico:
Yes, Sir. In my case an accident of birth. But you, Sir, you're a self-made man.

Rico:
So what else is on your mind besides hundred-proof women, 'n' ninety-proof whiskey, 'n' fourteen-carat gold?

Bill Dolworth:
Amigo, you just wrote my epitaph!

J.W. Grant:
Captain Jesus Raza. Jesus, what a name for the bloodiest cutthroat in Mexico!

Bill Dolworth:
The cemetery of nameless men. We buried some fine friends there.

Rico:
And some fine enemies.

Bill Dolworth:
That was one hell of a fine battle. Out-numbered and out-gunned and still we held that pass.

Rico:
Yeah, but who cares now... or even remembers?

Bill Dolworth:
Rico, buddy. I don't deserve you.

Rico:
I agree. I can understand you getting in a crap game and losing $700 you didn't have, but how'd you lose your pants?

Bill Dolworth:
In a ladies bedroom, trying to raise the cash. Almost had it made, too. Do you realize that people are the only animals that make love face to face?

Bill Dolworth:
Do they know who took the woman?

Rico:
Raza.

Bill Dolworth:
Our Raza? A kidnapper?

Rico:
Grant's got the ransom note to prove it.

Bill Dolworth:
Well I'll be damned.

Rico:
Most of us are.

Rico:
It takes getting used to.

Hans Ehrengard:
Broiling by day. Freezing by night. Alkali dust choking every hole in your body. How in the name of God does anybody live here long enough to get used to it.

Rico:
Men tempered like steel. Tough breed. Men who learn how to endure.

Hans Ehrengard:
Like you and Dolworth.

Rico:
Oh, no. Men like Raza.

Jake Sharp:
We could all do with a rest.

Hans Ehrengard:
A shave would be a relief, too.

Jake Sharp:
So would a bath.

Bill Dolworth:
Might as well throw in a woman. Any size, any age, any color. Any woman.

Jake Sharp:
Mr. D, whatever got a loving man like you in the dynamite business?

Bill Dolworth:
Well, I'll tell you. I was born with a powerful passion to create. I can't write, can't paint, can't make up a song...

Hans Ehrengard:
So you explode things.

Bill Dolworth:
Well that's how the world was born. Biggest damn explosion you ever saw.

Bill Dolworth:
That Chiquita. She can lick a whole regiment, but she can't dance worth a lick.

Maria Grant:
Raza says you and he were good friends.

Bill Dolworth:
That's right.

Maria Grant:
And yet you would have killed him.

Bill Dolworth:
That's right.

Maria Grant:
For money.

Bill Dolworth:
That's right.

Jesus Raza:
How do you come to this dirty business.

Bill Dolworth:
The usual. Money.

Jesus Raza:
Everything is as usual. I need guns and bullets, as usual. The war goes badly, as usual. Only you, you are not as usual.

Bill Dolworth:
What's the proposition?

Rico:
You won't lose your pants. Your life maybe but, what's that?

Bill Dolworth:
Hardly anything at all.

Bill Dolworth:
What's the proposition?

Rico:
You won't lose your pants. Your life maybe... but what's that?

Bill Dolworth:
$100,000 for a wife? She must be a lot of woman!

Rico:
Certain women have a way of changing boys into men and some men back into boys.

Rico:
You're gonna have to get over this nasty habit of always losing your pants. It's not dignified.

Bill Dolworth:
It's drafty, too.

Hans Ehrengard:
Dynamite in the hands of a fool means death.

Bill Dolworth:
In this case, it could mean life. Ours. If we're lucky enough to get back to this rat trap, it might be touch and go. All you gotta do is light this fuse. You got ten seconds to run like hell. Then dynamite, not faith, will move that mountain into this pass. Peace, brother.

Jesus Raza:
Where did the bullet bite you?

Bill Dolworth:
In the ass. You?

Jesus Raza:
[looking at the bullet wound in his thigh] Oh, another two inches, mamacita!

Bill Dolworth:
Hey Chiquita! How's your love life!

Chiquita:
Terrific! You want some?

Bill Dolworth:
Don't you ever say no?

Chiquita:
Never!

Bill Dolworth:
Anybody?

Chiquita:
Everybody!

J.W. Grant:
Your hair was darker then.

Rico:
My heart was lighter then.

Bill Dolworth:
Men on that train are Colorados. Expert marksmen. Also expert at torture. Couple o' years ago they burned and looted a town of three thousand people. When they finished, forty were left. Fardan's wife was one o' the lucky forty. "Why're you a revolutionary?" they asked her. "To rid the world of scum like you," she said. They stripped her naked, ran 'er through the cactus 'til her flesh was - The other thirty-nine rebels watched her die, and - did nothing. Just watched.

J.W. Grant:
Any objections to working with a Negro?

Rico:
Interesting pass.

Bill Dolworth:
It's a beaut. You should see it from upside down.

Hans Ehrengard:
Could be anybody. Even friendly.

Hans Ehrengard:
God almighty, I've known heat before, but this is... I hate the desert. It's got no... pity. [passes out]

J.W. Grant:
I'm afraid you'll have to make them do.

Hans Ehrengard:
Mister Grant, I can make them go, but I can't make 'em do.

Hans Ehrengard:
Rico! All clear. By the way, I forgot to bring your wooden cross. Your *upside-down* cross. [gun battle erupts]

Bill Dolworth:
[examining an arrow] Makes you wonder how we ever beat the Indians.

Rico:
Before you blow a gasket, think you can blow the water tower?

Bill Dolworth:
How do you want it?

Rico:
Like it was hit by a French 75. Blow it to hell and gone.

Bill Dolworth:
Relax. The stuff you're handling is safe. These beaded sticks are the tricky ones. It's the heat. Makes 'em sweat. Nitro. When they're dry and cool, they're safe and obedient. We'll leave these sweaty ones behind. Ventilate 'em. Cool 'em. Then maybe they'll behave.

Jake Sharp:
Right now, I don't know if it's me or the dynamite that doin' all that sweatin'.

Fierro:
Eh-smoking is bad for de health.

Jake Sharp:
A cloud o' dust! Could be Mister Raza.

Hans Ehrengard:
Could be most anything. Even a whirling dervish.

Rico:
That, gentlemen, is the whirlingest dervish of them all.

Bill Dolworth:
Nothing is for always. Except death. Ask Fierro. Ask Francisco. Ask those in the cemetery of nameless men.

Jesus Raza:
You know, of course, one of us must die.

Bill Dolworth:
Maybe both of us.

Jesus Raza:
To die for money... is foolish.

Bill Dolworth:
To die for a woman is *more* foolish. Any woman. Even her.

Bill Dolworth:
The revolution? When the shooting stops, and the dead are buried, and the politicians take over, it all adds up to one thing: a lost cause.

Jesus Raza:
La Revoluci?n is like a great love affair. In the beginning, she is a goddess. A holy cause. But... every love affair has a terrible enemy: time. We see her as she is. La Revoluci?n is not a goddess but a whore. She was never pure, never saintly, never perfect. And we run away, find another lover, another cause. Quick, sordid affairs. Lust, but no love. Passion, but no compassion. Without love, without a cause, we are... *nothing*! We stay because we believe. We leave because we are disillusioned. We come back because we are lost. We die because we are committed.

Rico:
What's that supposed to mean?

Bill Dolworth:
Rico, buddy. This will come as a shock to both of us. I'm a born sucker for love.

Rico:
That bullet must've knocked some of your brains out.

Bill Dolworth:
Or let some in.

Rico:
Well what happened back there? What changed your mind?

Bill Dolworth:
I found out what makes a woman worth a hundred thousand dollars.

Bill Dolworth:
That's a lot of woman there. Beautiful, classy, and guts. Hard enough to kill ya and soft enough to change ya.

Rico:
Win or lose, here and now. Final neck like this, one of us might be able to hold 'em off long enough.

Bill Dolworth:
Yeah, one of us.

Rico:
If he plays it cool. Hit and run, 'n' stall and retreat.

Hans Ehrengard:
Draw your pay, mister.

Horseman:
Well you wanted him broken, didn't ya?

Hans Ehrengard:
Yeah. But not ruined. Now get outa here.

Rico:
[to a badly sputtering Model T] Yeah, me too, Lizzy.

Bill Dolworth:
We've been had, amigo.

Bill Dolworth:
That Chiquita can lick a whole regiment, but can't dance a lick.

Maria Grant:
[unbuttons and removes her top] Do you want me?

Bill Dolworth:
I might say "yes" now, and "no" later.

Maria Grant:
My price is high.

Bill Dolworth:
What's the price?

Maria Grant:
Freedom.

J.W. Grant:
You bastard.

Rico:
Yes sir. In my case an accident of birth. But you, you're a self-made man.