MovieChat Forums > The Ice Storm (1997) Discussion > The best quote in the film - why was it ...

The best quote in the film - why was it missing all these years?


The quote that impressed me most in the film was this one:

"

When you think about it,
it's not easy to keep from just wandering out of life. It's like someone's always leaving the door open to the next world,
and if you aren't paying attention you could just walk through it,
and then you've died.
That's why in your dreams it's like you're standing in that doorway...
and the dying people and the newborn people pass by you... and brush up against you as they come in and out of the world during the night.
You get spun around, and in the morning... it takes a while to find your way back into the world.
"

I'm not saying that I agree, or that it's a wonderful philosophical point. However, it's evocative and nicely poetic. Interestingly so.

I just wonder how, and why, nobody has bothered to add it as a quote - anywhere - not just on imdb.

My wife suggests that it's too close to the bone; to evocative of death and our closeness to it.

I wonder.

Any suggestions?

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This quote immediately makes me think of the character of Bobby in A Home at the End of the World. He has experienced a lot of loss and seems to live in that doorway even in his waking hours. A flawed but worthwhile book (and not a very good movie), but a unique character. If that passage in Ice Storm does something for you, you might want to take a look at AHatEotW if you haven't already.

"I would have my secretary do it, but she's dead."

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It's an awesome quote - thanks for contributing that. I'd forgotten it.

"If you can laugh at yourself you'll laugh your whole life."

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It's amazing what this quote means. But I read it to friends and they did not understand what it meant. I think seeing the whole movie and then hearing the quote narrated by Paul at the end really let's you know what he is trying to say. A day doesn't go by when I don't think about this movie and realize what an impact it has had on me and how it has made me see the world differently. Truly amazing.

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Same here makschaef.

I watch it every year before Thanksgiving.

As a matter of fact, I have it on pause in the other room.

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