- Cole Sear: I see dead people.
- Malcolm Crowe: In your dreams?
- [Cole shakes his head no]
- Malcolm Crowe: While you're awake?
- [Cole nods]
- Malcolm Crowe: Dead people like, in graves? In coffins?
- Cole Sear: Walking around like regular people. They don't see each other. They only see what they want to see. They don't know they're dead.
- Malcolm Crowe: How often do you see them?
- Cole Sear: All the time. They're everywhere.
- [last lines]
- Malcolm Crowe: [after realizing the time has come for him to move on] I think I can go now. Just needed to do a couple of things. I needed to help someone; I think I did. And I needed to tell you something: You were never second, ever. I love you. You sleep now. Everything will be different in the morning.
- Anna Crowe: [in her sleep] Good night, Malcolm...
- Malcolm Crowe: Good night, sweetheart.
- Cole Sear: [of his grandmother] She wanted me to tell you...
- Lynn Sear: Cole, please stop...
- Cole Sear: She wanted me to tell you she saw you dance. She said, when you were little, you and her had a fight, right before your dance recital. You thought she didn't come see you dance. She did. She hid in the back so you wouldn't see. She said you were like an angel. She said you came to the place where they buried her. Asked her a question? She said the answer is... "Every day." What did you ask?
- Lynn Sear: Do... Do I make her proud?
- Cole Sear: You know the accident up there?
- Lynn Sear: Yeah.
- Cole Sear: Someone got hurt.
- Lynn Sear: They did?
- Cole Sear: A lady. She died.
- Lynn Sear: Oh, my god. What, you can see her?
- Cole Sear: Yes.
- Lynn Sear: Where is she?
- Cole Sear: Standing next to my window.
- Lynn Sear: Cole, you're scaring me.
- Cole Sear: They scare me too sometimes.
- Lynn Sear: They?
- Cole Sear: Ghosts.
- Malcolm Crowe: Once upon a time there was this person named Malcolm. He worked with children. He loved it. He loved it more than anything else. And then one night, he found out that he made a mistake with one of them. He couldn't help that one. And he can't stop thinking about it, he can't forget. Ever since then, things have been different. He's not the same person that he used to be. And his wife doesn't like the person that he's become. They barely speak anymore, they're like strangers. And then one day Malcolm meets this wonderful little boy, a really cool little boy. Reminds him a lot of the other one. And Malcolm decides to try and help this new boy. 'Cause he feels that if he can help this new boy, it would be like helping that other one too.
- Cole Sear: How does the story end?
- Malcolm Crowe: I don't know.
- Cole Sear: I walk this way to school with Tommy Tammisimo.
- Malcolm Crowe: He your best buddy?
- Cole Sear: He hates me.
- Malcolm Crowe: Do you hate him?
- Cole Sear: No.
- Malcolm Crowe: Did your mom set that up?
- Cole Sear: Yes.
- Malcolm Crowe: Do you ever talk to your mom about how things are with Tommy?
- Cole Sear: I don't tell her things.
- Malcolm Crowe: Why not?
- Cole Sear: Because she doesn't look at me like everybody else, and I don't want her to. I don't want her to know.
- Malcolm Crowe: Know what?
- Cole Sear: That I'm a freak.
- Malcolm Crowe: Hey... you are not a freak. Okay? Don't you believe anybody that tries to convince you of that. That's bullshit! You don't have to go through your life believing that. Okay?
- Cole Sear: You said the "s" word.
- Malcolm Crowe: Yeah... I know. Sorry.
- Cole Sear: Instead of something I want, can it be something I don't want?
- Malcolm Crowe: Okay...
- Cole Sear: I don't wanna be scared anymore.
- Malcolm Crowe: [to Anna sleeping in a chair] Anna?
- Anna Crowe: [in her sleep] I miss you.
- Malcolm Crowe: I miss you too.
- Anna Crowe: Why, Malcolm?
- Malcolm Crowe: What, what is it?
- Anna Crowe: Why did you leave me?
- Malcolm Crowe: I didn't leave you.
- [the ring Anna is holding falls out of her hand to the floor, and Malcolm suddenly remembers everything]
- Malcolm Crowe: Wanna play a game? It's a mind-reading game. Here's how it works. I read your mind. If what I say is right, you take one step towards the chair. If what I say is wrong, you take one step back... towards the doorway. If you reach the chair, you sit down. If you reach the door, you can go. Wanna play?
- [Cole nods]
- Malcolm Crowe: Okay... When your mother and father were first divorced, your mom went to see a doctor like me, and he didn't help her. So you think I'm not going to be able to help you.
- [Cole takes a step forward]
- Malcolm Crowe: You're worried that she said she told him things - things she couldn't tell anyone else... Secrets.
- [Cole takes another step forwards]
- Malcolm Crowe: You have a secret, but you don't want to tell me.
- [Cole takes another step forwards]
- Malcolm Crowe: [looking at Cole's watch] Your dad gave you that watch as a present just before he went away.
- [Cole takes a step back]
- Cole Sear: He forgot it in a drawer. Doesn't work.
- Malcolm Crowe: You keep pretty quiet in school, but... you're a good student, you've never really been in any serious trouble.
- [Cole takes another step back]
- Cole Sear: We were supposed to draw a picture. Anything we wanted. I drew a man. He got hurt in the neck by another man with a screwdriver.
- Malcolm Crowe: You saw that on TV, Cole?
- [Cole steps back again]
- Cole Sear: Everyone got upset. They had a meeting. Mom started crying. I don't draw like that anymore.
- Malcolm Crowe: How do you draw now?
- Cole Sear: I draw... people smiling, dogs running, rainbows. They don't have meetings about rainbows.
- Malcolm Crowe: No, I guess they don't.
- Cole Sear: What am I thinking now?
- Malcolm Crowe: I don't know what you're thinking now.
- [Cole takes his last step back towards the door]
- Cole Sear: I was thinking... you're nice, but you can't help me.
- [walks away]
- Cole Sear: [angrily] I don't like it when people look at me like that!
- Stanley Cunningham: Like what?
- Cole Sear: Stop it!
- Stanley Cunningham: I don't know how else to look, I...
- Cole Sear: You're a stuttering Stanley!
- Stanley Cunningham: Excuse me?
- Cole Sear: You talked funny when you went to school. You talked funny all the way to high school.
- Stanley Cunningham: What...
- Cole Sear: You shouldn't look at people, it makes them feel bad!
- Stanley Cunningham: How did you...
- Cole Sear: [screams] Stop looking at me!
- Stanley Cunningham: [stutters] Who have you b-b-been speaking to?
- Cole Sear: [repeatedly] Stuttering Stanley! Stuttering Stanley!
- Stanley Cunningham: S-s-stop it!
- Stanley Cunningham: Philadelphia is one of the oldest cities in this country. A lot of generations have lived here and died here. Almost any place you go in this city has a history and a story behind it. Even this school and the grounds it sits on. Can anyone guess what this building was used for a hundred years ago, before you went to this school, before I went to this school? Yes, Cole?
- Cole Sear: They used to hang people here.
- Stanley Cunningham: No, uh, that, mm-mm, that's not correct. Uh, where'd you hear that?
- Cole Sear: They'd pull the people in, crying and kissing their families 'bye. People watching would spit at them.
- Stanley Cunningham: Uh, Cole, this, this building was a legal courthouse. Laws were passed here. Some of the very first laws of this country. This whole building was full of, uh, lawyers, uh, lawmakers.
- Cole Sear: They were the ones that hanged everybody.
- Cole Sear: Are you a good doctor?
- Malcolm Crowe: Well... I used to be. I won an award once. From the Mayor. It had an expensive frame.
- Cole Sear: I'm gonna see you again, right?
- Malcolm Crowe: If that's okay with you.
- The Cabinet Lady: You can't hurt me anymore!
- [holds up her wrists, which are slit]
- Cole Sear: What do you want more than anything?
- Malcolm Crowe: I don't know.
- Cole Sear: I told you what I want.
- Malcolm Crowe: I know what I want: I want to be able to talk to my wife again. The way we used to talk to each other. Like there's no one else in the world except us.
- Cole Sear: How are you gonna do that?
- Malcolm Crowe: [sighs] Can't be your doctor anymore: I haven't paid enough attention to my family. Bad things happen when you do that. Do you understand? I'm gonna transfer you...
- Cole Sear: Don't fail me! Don't give up: you're the only one who can help me. I know it.
- Malcolm Crowe: [looks away] I can't help you.
- Cole Sear: [starts breathing unsteadily] You...
- Malcolm Crowe: [looks back] Someone else can help you.
- Cole Sear: [tear falls down right cheek] You believe me, right? Dr. Crowe, you believe my secret, right?
- Malcolm Crowe: [looks away again] I don't know how to answer that, Cole.
- Cole Sear: [pushes penny across desk; Crowe looks at penny then Cole] How can you help me... if you don't believe me? Some magic's real.
- [Malcolm arrives late for dinner with his wife]
- Malcolm Crowe: I thought you meant the other Italian restaurant I asked you to marry me in.
- Cole Sear: You ever feel the prickly things on the back of your neck?
- Malcolm Crowe: Yes.
- Cole Sear: And the tiny hairs on your arm, you know when they stand up? That's them. When they get mad... it gets cold.
- Malcolm Crowe: Do you know what free association writing is, Cole?
- Cole Sear: No.
- Malcolm Crowe: Free association writing is when you take a pencil in your hand and you put the pencil to a peice of paper and you start writing. You don't look at or think about what you're writing. And after a while, you keep writing long enough, words and thoughts come out that you didn't even know you had in you. It could be something you heard, something you saw, or feelings you had deep inside of you. Have you done any free association writing, Cole?
- Cole Sear: Yes.
- Malcolm Crowe: What did you write?
- Cole Sear: Upset words.
- Malcolm Crowe: Did you write any upset words before your father left?
- Cole Sear: I don't remember.
- Cole Sear: Tell me the story about why you're sad.
- Malcolm Crowe: You think I'm sad?
- [Cole nods]
- Malcolm Crowe: What makes you think that?
- Cole Sear: Your eyes told me.
- Ghost in the Dungeon: Is someone out there? Open this door, please! Come on. I can't breathe! If you can hear me, open this door... I swear on my life I didn't take the master's horse! OPEN THIS DOOR, OR I'LL BREAK THROUGH IT AND GRAB YOU!
- Gunshot Boy: Hey, come on! I'll show you where my dad keeps his gun. Come on!
- [turns to reveal bloody hole in the back of his head]
- Malcolm Crowe: [after being shot by Vincent Gray] I think I'm okay really. I think it just went in and out. I... It doesn't even hurt anymore.
- Malcolm Crowe: [looking at Vincent in the bathroom] Vincent Gray. I do remember you. Quiet, very smart, compassionate. Unusually compassionate.
- Vincent Gray: You forgot cursed.
- Malcolm Crowe: Do you know what "Yo no quiero morir" means? It's Spanish. It means "I don't want to die." What do you think these ghosts want when they talk to you? I want you to think about it, Cole. I want you to think about it really carefully.
- Cole Sear: Just help.
- Malcolm Crowe: That's right. That's what I think too. They just want help, even the scary ones. I think I might know a way to make them go away.
- Cole Sear: How?
- Malcolm Crowe: Listen to them.
- Cole Sear: What if they don't want help? What if they're just angry and they just want to hurt somebody?
- Malcolm Crowe: I don't think that's the way it works.
- Cole Sear: How do you know for sure?
- Young Woman Buying Ring: [after Anna tells her that the ring belonged to a woman who loved a man she couldn't be with] Did he have wavy hair and chestnut eyes?
- Malcolm Crowe: [to Anna] I would like some wine in a glass, I would not like it in a mug, I would not like it in a jug.
- Malcolm Crowe: [to Cole] If you could change something in your life, anything at all, what would it be?
- [first lines]
- Anna Crowe: It's getting cold.
- Malcolm Crowe: That is one fine frame; one fine frame that is. How much...
- [he sits down with a grunt]
- Tommy Tammisimo: Mommy? Daddy?
- [coughs]
- Tommy Tammisimo: My throat hurts.
- [Mommy and Daddy give Tommy the cough syrup. The scene then changes to Tommy playing fetch with a dog]
- Commercial Narrator: Pedia-Ease cough suppressant. Gentle, fast, effe...
- [Cole throws a shoe at the TV]
- Tommy Tammisimo: Hey freak, how'd you like the "arm around your shoulder" bit. I just made it up. Went with it. That's what great actors do. It's called improv.
- Stanley Cunningham: I don't know which one of these guys told you that, but they were just trying to scare you, I think.
- Cole Sear: I don't like people looking at me like that.
- Stanley Cunningham: Like what?
- Cole Sear: Stop it!