The Bridge on the River Kwai Quotes

I'm getting worse, you know. Sometimes I think I'm Admiral Halsey.

Let me remind you of General Yamashita's motto: be happy in your work.

I hate the British! You are defeated but you have no shame. You are stubborn but you have no pride. You endure but you have no courage. I hate the British!

You give me powders, pills, baths, injections, enemas when all I need is love.

Maj. Warden: You'll go on without me. That's an order. You're in command now, Shears.
Commander Shears: You make me sick with your heroics! There's a stench of death about you. You carry it in your pack like the plague. Explosives and L-pills - they go well together, don't they? And with you it's just one thing or the other: destroy a bridge or destroy yourself. This is just a game, this war! You and Colonel Nicholson, you're two of a kind, crazy with courage. For what? How to die like a gentleman, how to die by the rules - when the only important thing is how to live like a human being!... I'm not going to leave you here to die, Warden, because I don't care about your bridge and I don't care about your rules. If we go on, we go on together.

Colonel Saito: English prisoners... let us ask the question... "Why does the bridge not progress?" You know why. Because your officers are lazy! They think themselves too good to share your burdens! This is not just. Therefore, you are not happy in your work. Therefore, the bridge does not progress. But there is another cause. I do not hide the truth. With deep shame and regret, I admit to you the failure of a member of the Japanese staff. I refer to Lieutenant Mioura.
Colonel Saito: He is a bad engineer! He is unworthy of command!
Colonel Saito: Therefore, I have removed him from his post. Tomorrow we begin again. I shall be in personal command. Today we rest. All work and no play make Jack a dull boy. As token of regard for your efforts in the future... I give presents to you all!
Colonel Saito: Let us be happy in our work. Company, dismissed.

I am Colonel Saito. In the name of His Imperial Majesty, I welcome you. I am the commanding officer of this camp, which is Camp 16 along the great railroad which will soon connect Bangkok with Rangoon. You British prisoners have been chosen to build a bridge across the River Kwai. It will be pleasant work, requiring skill, and officers will work as well as men. The Japanese Army cannot have idle mouths to feed. If you work hard, you will be treated well, but if you do not work hard, you will be punished!

A word to you about escape. There is no barbed wire. No stockade. No watchtower. They are not necessary. We are an island in the jungle. Escape is impossible. You would die.

Attention, English prisoners! Notice I do not say "English soldiers". From the moment you surrendered, you ceased to be soldiers. You will finish the bridge by the twelfth day of May. You will work under the direction of a Japanese engineer, Lieutenant Mioura. Time is short. All men will work. Your officers will work beside you. This is only just. For it is they who betray you by surrender. Your shame is their dishonor. It is they who told you: "Better to live like a coolie than die like a hero." It is they who brought you here, not I. Therefore, they will join you in useful labor. That is all.

All work and no play make Jack a dull boy.

Do not speak to me of rules. This is war! This is not a game of cricket!

Maj. Warden: Kill him... Kill him!
Major Shears: KILL HIM! KILL HIM!

Maj. Warden: I belong to a rather rum group called Force 316. Our headquarters is up in the botanical gardens.
Commander Shears: Protecting rare plants from the enemy?

Maj. Warden: Sir, it's most annoying. They say, in view of the time element, they don't think a few practice jumps would be worthwhile.
Major Shears: No?
Maj. Warden: No, they say if you make one jump, you've only got 50% chance of injury, two jumps, 80%, and three jumps, you're bound to catch a packet. The consensus of opinion is that the most sensible thing for Major Shears to do is to go ahead and jump, and hope for the best.
Major Shears: With or without a parachute?

Queer bird... even for an American.

I tell you, gentlemen, we have a problem on our hands.

I realize how difficult it's going to be in this god-forsaken place where you can't find what you need, but there's the challenge.

One day the war will be over. And I hope that the people that use this bridge in years to come will remember how it was built and who built it. Not a gang of slaves, but soldiers, British soldiers, Clipton, even in captivity.

We can teach these barbarians a lesson in Western methods and efficiency that will put them to shame. We'll show them what the British soldier is capable of doing.

It is quite understandable; it's a very natural reaction. But one day - in a week, a month, a year - on that day when, God willing, we all return to our homes again, you're going to feel very proud of what you have achieved here in the face of great adversity. What you have done should be, and I think will be, an example to all our countrymen, soldier and civilian alike. You have survived with honor - that, and more - here in the wilderness. You have turned defeat into victory. I congratulate you. Well done.

I've been thinking. Tomorrow it will be 28 years to the day that I've been in the service. 28 years in peace and war. I don't suppose I've been at home more than 10 months in all that time. Still, it's been a good life. I loved India. I wouldn't have had it any other way. But there are times... when suddenly you realize you're nearer the end than the beginning. And you wonder, you ask yourself, what the sum total of your life represents. What difference your being there at any time made to anything - or if it made any difference at all, really. Particularly in comparison with other men's careers. I don't know whether that kind of thinking's very healthy, but I must admit I've had some thoughts on those lines from time to time. But tonight... tonight!

What have I done?

He's going to do it, believe me, he's really going to do it!

I can think of a lot of things to call Saito, but "reasonable"... that's a new one.