You can't handle the truth ... Jack Nicholson in A Few Good Men.

You can't handle ...

LET US begin with a few quotes. If you don’t recognise a single one of them, there may not be much point in continuing to read this column, which is about new research from Cornell University on what makes a movie line memorable.

a) That’ll do, pig, that’ll do
b) There’s a smell in here that will outlast religion
c) That’s not a knife. That’s a knife
d) Let’s get them no good cheeky bull in the big bloody metal ship!
e) Tell ‘im ‘e’s dreamin
f) I’m paid to make men believe what they want to believe
g) What makes you think the girl wants a skinny yank like you when us real blokes are here? (Answer: "I bathe.")
h) You’re terrible, Muriel.

Those are probably the best known lines from some of Australia’s most popular movies. But the boffins at Cornell’s Department of Computer Science would say most of them do not meet the criteria for memorability revealed in a project they plan to present to a conference on computational linguistics in South Korea in July. The boffins claim that these sorts of lines have a lot more going for them in the memorability race …

Here's looking at you ... Hugo Weaving in <em>The Matrix</em>.

Never send a human ...

i) May the force be with you
j) You had me at hello
k) May the odds be ever in your favour
l) You can’t handle the truth
m) Love means never having to say you’re sorry
n) You’re gonna need a bigger boat
o) The Code is more what you’d call ‘guidelines’ than actual rules
p) So bright, so beautiful, ah Precious
q) Never send a human to do a machine’s job
r) After all... tomorrow is another day.

The research team, led by the wonderfully named Cristian Danescu-Niculescu-Mizil set themselves the task of discovering what kind of sentence is most likely to be “retained in the public consciousness” or “take hold on people’s minds”.

They used the internet movie database (imdb) to build a list of what are generally agreed to be “memorable quotes” from films. Then they had to find a way to separate the message from its context.

James Cromwell in <i>Babe</i>.

That'll do ...

“Highly cited quotes tend to have been delivered under compelling circumstances or fit an existing social, cultural or political narrative," they write, "and potentially what appeals to us about the quote is really just its invocation of these extra-linguistic contexts. Is the form of the language adding an effect beyond or independent of these (obviously very crucial) factors?”

They paired each classic line with a sentence of similar length spoken by the same character in a similar context, and got their supercomputer to isolate unique characteristics of the memorable quotes. Here’s how a great movie line compares with the kind of sentence you or I might use in everyday conversation:

1. It makes sense to someone who knows nothing of the context (ie has not seen the movie); 2. It uses standard grammar but contains unusual words or word combinations; 3. It is more likely to contain a second person pronoun (you) than a first person (I, we) or a third person (he, she they); 4. It is more likely to use the indefinite article (a) than the definite (the); 5. It is more likely to be in the present tense than the past tense; 6. It contains more front vowel sounds (ee or eh) than back vowel sounds (u or o), Apparently front vowels sound more lively and cheerful than back vowels.

Nicole Kidman wears a Stefano Canturi piece in the role of Satine in <i>Moulin Rouge</i>.

I'm paid to make men believe ...

The authors say this research has useful implications for the creation of political propaganda and advertising messages. New Scientist magazine suggests: “It means computers might one day help writers test their latest catchy lines.”

I find both notions disturbing. Movies are formularised enough without producers getting computers to filter screenplays for definite articles, past tenses, personal pronouns and back vowels. Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn.

Go to Comments to tell us your most memorables. To read the research, go to Cornell and then click on "PDF".

Geoffrey Rush as Barbossa.

More guidelines ...

You have just read the Who We Are column, by David Dale. It appears in printed form every Sunday in The Sun-Herald, and also as a blog on this website, where it welcomes your comments. David Dale teaches communications at UTS, Sydney. He is the author of The Little Book of Australia -- A snapshot of who we are (Allen and Unwin). For daily updates on Australian attitudes, bookmark The Tribal Mind.

THE SOURCES

a) Farmer Hoggett (James Cromwell), Babe.
b) Kenny (Shane Jacobson).
c) Mick Dundee (Paul Hogan), Crocodile Dundee.
d) Nullah (Brandon Walters), Australia.
e) Darryl Kerrigan (Michael Caton), The Castle.
f) Satine (Nicole Kidman), Moulin Rouge!
g) Peeto (John Batchelor), Red Dog.
h) Joanie Heslop (Gabby Millgate), Muriel’s Wedding.
i) Han Solo (Harrison Ford) and others, Star Wars.
j) Dorothy (Renée Zellweger), Jerry Maguire.
k) Caesar Flickerman (Stanley Tucci), The Hunger Games.
l) Col. Jessup (Jack Nicholson), A Few Good Men.
m) Jennifer (Ali McGraw) and Oliver (Ryan O’Neal), Love Story.
n) Brody (Roy Scheider), Jaws.
o) Captain Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush), Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl.
p) Gollum (Andy Serkis), The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers.
q) Agent Smith (Hugo Weaving), The Matrix.
r) Scarlett (Vivien Leigh), Gone with the Wind.