The Fortune Cookie (1966)

Jack Lemmon: Harry Hinkle

Photos 

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Quotes 

• Harry Hinkle : Florida and Mustangs and foxes, how are you gonna pay for all of this?

  Willie Gingrich : Our credit is good.

  Harry Hinkle : Well don't you think we better wait 'til we see some of that insurance money?

  Willie Gingrich : Wait? Who waits nowadays? Take the government. When they shoot a billion dollars worth of hardware into space, do you think they pay cash? It's all on the Diner's Club!

• [repeated line] 

  Harry Hinkle : You can fool all of the people some of the time, you can even fool some of the people all of the time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time!

• Harry Hinkle : Funny thing about marriage. It's like being in the Army. Everybody knocks it, but don't be surprised how many guys reenlist.

• Willie Gingrich : He's gonna give you a shot to help you pass those tests.

  Harry Hinkle : Oh, I'm not gonna take any shots from a waiter!

  Willie Gingrich : What do you mean "waiter?" This is Doc Schindler, from Chicago.

  Doc Schindler : Howdy.

  Willie Gingrich : Those insurance guys think they're such geniuses. What they forget is every time they build a better mousetrap, the mice gets smarter, too.

  Harry Hinkle : You'll be careful, won't you, Doc?

  Doc Schindler : I better be, because I'm on parole.

  Harry Hinkle : Parole?

  Doc Schindler : They caught me tampering with a horse at Arlington Park.

  Harry Hinkle : A veterinary?

  Willie Gingrich : Well actually, he's a dentist.

  Doc Schindler : What do you want?

  Willie Gingrich : Right arm and left leg. Make them good and numb.

  Doc Schindler : Oh, *numb*.

  Willie Gingrich : Sure, we want those nerves blocked!

  Doc Schindler : Oh, then I better use the Novocain, because with this stuff, he'll run the mile in 1:34 flat.

• Professor Winterhalter : Fake! All these newfangled machines. Fake! It proves nothing. In the old days, we used to do these things better. The man says he's paralyzed, we simply throw him in the snake pit. If he climbs out, then we know he's lying.

  Specialist #1 : [shocked]  And if he doesn't climb out?

  Professor Winterhalter : Then we have lost the patient, but we have found an honest man.

  Harry Hinkle : Wait a minute, you guys. You're not throwin' me in any pit! And you bring one snake in here, just one little snake... Willie!

• Harry Hinkle : [Harry looks disgustingly at Sandy while she's on the floor looking for her contact lens]  I don't want to find you here when I get back. And take your damn meatloaf with you.

• Harry Hinkle : Of course he's upset. He's a lawyer - he's paid to be upset.

• Willie Gingrich : What're you watchin'?

  Harry Hinkle : [Watching television]  An old movie about Abraham Lincoln.

  Willie Gingrich : Lincoln! Great President. Lousy lawyer.

• Harry Hinkle : [as Mother Hinkle weeps over him]  I'll be all right, Mother.

  Willie Gingrich : Sure he will. Every week you read in Time Magazine how they're transplanting kidneys and making new spines out of fiberglass. Don't you think the doctors read that stuff, too?

• Willie Gingrich : Get back in bed. Get into bed!

  Harry Hinkle : Okay! But only because it's draughty and l got no pants.

• Harry Hinkle : There's nothing wrong with my *back* - if you'd just get off it!

• Harry Hinkle : What are you looking for? The junk you women carry around. It's like the inside of a claw machine.

• Sandy Hinkle : You should have run after me and belted me, if you would. Drug me back.

  Harry Hinkle : Oh it's lucky I didn't... because I would have strangled you with one of Gus Gilroy's fancy ties. That's how nice and kind I am.

• Harry Hinkle : And stupid, huh? Never read a book in her life. I to... wh... She read one book, "The Carpetbaggers." End of six months, she was on page 19.

• Harry Hinkle : [as Doc Schindler is about to give him a shot of Novocain in the arm]  I sure hope they don't give me a saliva test.

• Harry Hinkle : [as Doc Schindler gives him a shot of Novocain in the leg]  What if I get an infection from this?

  Willie Gingrich : So, we sue the hospital for using dirty needles.

• Harry Hinkle : Of all the miserable broads. I don't know what l ever saw in her in the first place. Cooks like a pig and smokes in bed! Used to walk around like a zombie because her nail polish was always wet. That's unless she was crawling on her knees trying to find her contact lenses. Best thing that ever happened to me was when she cut out!

  Willie Gingrich : Still crazy about her, huh?

• Harry Hinkle : Look, Willie, l'm not sayin' l'm any better than the next guy. Maybe l add a few bucks on my expense account, but an out-and-out fake like this, l'm not...

  Willie Gingrich : Fake? We got 83,000 eyewitnesses. Another 30 million watched it on television. They saw you get hit by a 220 pound monster. They saw you take a spill over that tarpaulin - which shouldn't have been there in the first place. We got a clear-cut case of negligence.

• Harry Hinkle : Hello, Mother. Hi, Charlotte.

  Mother Hinkle : My poor baby. What have they done to you?

  Willie Gingrich : He's wearing a corset, Mother. Everybody wears a corset. You wear a corset, Charlotte wears a corset.

  Charlotte Gingrich : I wear a girdle!

• Harry Hinkle : Remember that day? lt was July 4th. Some wise guy put a firecracker under our bed.

• Harry Hinkle : [laying in a hospital bed]  Could l have that cigarette?

  Willie Gingrich : Cigarette? Is it all right if he smokes?

  Dr. Krugman : Personally, l gave it up. But if you gotta smoke, blow a little bit my way.

• Willie Gingrich : I wish you'd tell him to stay away from here.

  Harry Hinkle : Why? He's a nice guy.

  Willie Gingrich : That's what l mean!

• Harry Hinkle : I don't want that. Would you take it away? Take everything away.

  Ugly Nurse : Are you sure?

  Harry Hinkle : You eat it.

  Ugly Nurse : Don't you even want the fortune cookie? Come on. You've got to open your fortune cookie.

  Harry Hinkle : Oh...

  Willie Gingrich : What does it say?

  Harry Hinkle : "You can fool all of the people some of the time and some of the people all the time..."

  Willie Gingrich : Let me see that. Those Chinese. What do they know?

• Luther 'Boom Boom' Jackson : I sure hope she likes my dinner.

  Harry Hinkle : What are we havin'?

  Luther 'Boom Boom' Jackson : Chicken!

  Harry Hinkle : Fried chicken.

  Luther 'Boom Boom' Jackson : No. Chicken paprika with red cabbage. And for dessert, apricot dumplings.

  Harry Hinkle : What kind of food is that?

  Luther 'Boom Boom' Jackson : Hungarian. I learned it from my mother.

  Harry Hinkle : Your mother?

  Luther 'Boom Boom' Jackson : She used to work as a cook in a Hungarian restaurant.

• Harry Hinkle : Thank you, Boom Boom. But, I'd rather not.

• Willie Gingrich : I can't wait to see that pretty puss again. Why doesn't Boom Boom pick her up, huh?

  Harry Hinkle : Boom Boom?

• Harry Hinkle : What do you think of Sandy? Oh, l guess it's not fair to ask. You just met her. Not that l think she's perfect. They're all unpredictable. And she may not be a raving beauty, but then l'm no Mastroianni either.

• Sandy Hinkle : I've learned to cook now.

  Harry Hinkle : Yeah? Really?

  Sandy Hinkle : I'll make you a meat loaf tomorrow. Unzip me, please?

  Harry Hinkle : Put on a little weight, haven't you?

  Sandy Hinkle : Seven pounds. That's how good a cook l am.

• Sandy Hinkle : Sorry. Just wanted some legal advice from Willie.

  Harry Hinkle : Legal advice?

  Sandy Hinkle : I was wondering, if you can annul a marriage, why can't you annul a divorce?

  Harry Hinkle : Can you?

  Sandy Hinkle : You know Willie. He could find a loophole in the Ten Commandments.