Memorable quotes for
A Hard Day's Night (1964) More at IMDbPro »

George: That's not your grandfather.
Paul: It is, you know.
George: But I've seen your grandfather. He lives in your house.
Paul: Oh, that's my other grandfather, but he's my grandfather, as well.
John: How do you reckon that one out?
Paul: Well, everyone's entitled to two, aren't they?

---

Grandfather: Hullo.
John: He can talk then, can he?
Paul: 'Course he can talk. He's a human being, isn't he?
Ringo: Well if he's your grandfather, who knows! Ha ha ha!

---

[the boys are listening to the radio]
Man on Train: And we'll have that thing off as well, thank you.
Ringo: But...
Man on Train: An elementary knowledge of the Railway Acts would tell you that I'm perfectly within my rights.
Paul: Yeah, but we want to hear it, and there's more of us than you. We're a community, like, a majority vote. Up the workers and all that stuff!
Man on Train: Then I suggest you take that damned thing to the corridor or some other part of the train where you obviously belong.
John: [Leaning over to the man] Give us a kiss.

---

Man on train: Don't take that tone with me, young man. I fought the war for your sort.
Ringo: I bet you're sorry you won.

---

Man On Train: I shall call the guard!
Paul: Ah, but what? They don't take kindly to insults, you know.

---

George: What's the matter with you, then?
Ringo: It's his grandfather. I can tell he doesn't like me. It's cause I'm little.
George: Ah, you've got an inferiority complex, you have.
Ringo: Yeah, I know, that's why I play the drums - it's me active compensatory factor.

---

Norm: The place is surging with girls.
John: Please, sir, sir, can I have one to surge me, sir, please, sir?
Norm: No, you can't!

---

[Huge stacks of fan mail is delivered]
Ringo: None for me, then?
Norm: Sorry.
John: [handing Ringo one letter] Here, this'll keep you busy.

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Grandfather: It's your nose, you know. Fans are funny that way, they take a dislike to things. They'll pick on a nose.
Ringo: Aw, you pick on your own.

---

[Ringo gets a large pile of fan mail]
John: Must have cost you a fortune in stamps, Ringo.
George: He comes from a large family.

---

Ringo: Any of you lot put a man in the cupboard?
George: Nah!
Paul: Don't be soft!
[George looks in the cupboard, then sits back down]
George: He's right, you know
John: There you go.

---

George: Honestly! Me mind boggles at the very idea, a grown man and you haven't shaved with a safety razor.
Shake: It's not my fault. I come from a long line of electricians.

---

Reporter: How did you find America?
John: Turned left at Greenland.

---

Reporter: Has success changed your life?
George: Yes.

---

Reporter: Are you a mod or a rocker?
Ringo: Um, no. I'm a mocker.

---

Reporter: Do you think these haircuts have come to stay?
Ringo: Well, this one has. You know, it's stuck on good and proper now.

---

Reporter: What would you call that hairstyle you're wearing?
George: Arthur.

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Reporter: What do you call that collar?
Ringo: A collar.

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Reporter: Do you often see your father?
Paul: No, actually, we're just good friends.

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Ringo: There you go, hiding behind a smokescreen of bourgeois cliches.

---

George: He's very fussy about his drums, you know. They loom large in his legend.

---

T.V. Director: Get me a bottle of milk and some tranquilizers. I see it all now, it's a plot... a plot...

---

Simon Marshall: If you don't cooperate, you won't get to meet Susan.
George: And who's this Susan when she's at home?
Simon Marshall: Only Susan Canby, our resident teenager.
George: Oh! You mean that posh bird who gets everything wrong?
Simon Marshall: Excuse me?
George: Oh, yeah. The lads frequently sit around the telly and watch her for a giggle. One time, we actually sat down and wrote these letters saying how gear she was and all that rubbish.
Simon Marshall: She's a trendsetter. It's her profession.
George: She's a drag. A well known drag. We turn the sound down on her and say rude things.
Simon Marshall: [horrified] Get him out of here! He's knocking the program's image!
George: Have I said something amiss?
Simon Marshall: Get him out!
George: Sorry about the shirts!

---

George: Sorry we hurt your field, mister.

---

Millie: Hello.
John: Hello.
Millie: Oh wait a minute, don't tell me who you are.
John: No I'm not.
Millie: Oh you are.
John: I'm not.
Millie: Oh you are, I know you are.
John: I'm not, no.
Millie: You look just like him.
John: Do I? You're the first one that's said that ever.
Millie: Yes you do, look.
John: No my eyes are lighter. The nose.
Millie: Oh yes your nose is very.
John: Is it?
Millie: I would have said so.
John: You know him better though.
Millie: I do not. He's only a casual acquaintance.
John: That's what you say.
Millie: What have you heard?
John: It's all over the place.
Millie: Is it? Is it really?
John: But I wouldn't have it. I stuck up for you.
Millie: I knew I could rely on you.
John: Thanks.
Millie: [puts on her glasses] You don't look like him at all.
[John walks away pouting]
John: She looks more like him than I do.

---

Shake: It's not my fault.
Norm: What?
Shake: I'm not taller than you. You're shorter than I am.

---

John: I bet he hasn't even got a wife. Look at his sweater.
Paul: You never know, she might have knitted it.
John: She knitted him.

---

[the Beatles are late for a rehersal]
T.V. Floor Manager: They'll be here.
T.V. Director: Yes, well, if they aren't on this stage in precisely thirty seconds there'll be trouble? Do you hear me? Trouble.
[exactly three seconds after he stops speaking, the Beatles calmly amble on stage]
John: [to director] Standin' around, hey? Some people have it dead easy.

---

Norm: Shake, take that wig off! It suits you.

---

Norm: Ringo, what are you up to?
[Ringo is getting his hair done and reading a magazine]
Ringo: Page five!

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Paul: Oh, that this too, too solid flesh would melt... Zap!

---

[Having makeup applied]
George: Hey, you won't interfere with the basic rugged concept of me personality, will you madam?

---

Grandfather: Look, I thought I was supposed to be getting a change of scenery. But so far, I've been in a train and a room, and a car and a room, and a room and a room. Well, maybe that's all right for a bunch of powdered gee-gahs like yourselves, but I'm feeling decidedly strait-jacketed.
Lead makeup woman: What a clean old man!
Grandfather: Ah, don't press your luck.

---

John: We know how to behave! We've had lessons.

---

[George runs into Ringo in the hallway]
George: Hey, do you know what happened to me?
Ringo: No, I don't.
[Ringo walks on]

---

Norm: God knows what you've unleashed on the unsuspecting South. It'll be wine, women, and song all the way with Ringo when he gets the taste for it.

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John: Control yourself. You'll spurt.

---

Ringo: [arrested, at the police station] I demand to see my solicitor!
Police Inspector: What's his name?
Ringo: Well, if you're gonna get technical about it...

---

T.V. Director: You don't know what this means to me. If you hadn't come back it would have meant... the epilogue or the news... in Welsh... for life!

---

[Paul asks if he should flirt with two pretty schoolgirls]
George: Aye, but don't rush. None of your five bar gate jumps and over sort of stuff.
Paul: What's that supposed to mean?
George: I don't know, I just thought that it sounded distinguished-like.

---

Ringo: I'm going out parading before it's too late!

---

Shake: Well, he just asked if he could have those photos, and Norm said no, and I said, "Well, why not be big about it?"
Paul: Yeah, and?
Norm: And your grandfather pointed out that Shake was always being taller than me just to spite me!

---

T.V. Director: We are on in twenty minutes.
George: Can I say something?
T.V. Director: What?
George: I don't think it's very likely that we will go on. The law of averages is against it.

---

Norm: Stop being taller than me!
Shake: I can't help it.

---

Norm: This is a battle of nerves between John and me.
Shake: John hasn't got any.
Norm: Any what?
Shake: Nerves.
Norm: That's the trouble. I've toyed with the idea of a ball and chain, but he'd probably just rattle them at me, and in public, too. Sometimes I think he enjoys seeing me suffer.

---

John: Hey he's reading the Queen... that's an in joke, you know.

---

John: You're a swine.

---

Norm: I just have one thing to say to you, John Lennon.
John: What's that?
Norm: You're a swine.

---

John: You should have gone west to America. You would have been a senior citizen of Boston. But you took a wrong turn, and what happened? You're a lonely old man from Liverpool.
Grandfather: But I'm clean.
John: Are you?

---

Ringo: Come in, number seven, your time's up!

---

Grandfather: Well, you got me here so do your worst, but by God, I'll take one of you with me! I know your game. Get me into that tiled room and then out come the rubber hoses!
Police Inspector: Oh, there's a fire, is there?
Grandfather: You ugly, great brute. You have sadism stamped all over your bloated British kisser!
Police Inspector: Eh?
Grandfather: I'll go on hunger strike! I know your caper. The kidney punch and the rabbit clout. The third degree and the size twelve boot ankle tap.
Police Inspector: What's he on about?
Grandfather: I'm a soldier for the Republic! You'll need the mahogany truncheons on this boyo.

---

[Grandfather and Ringo are held in a police station]
Grandfather: Have they roughed you up yet?
Ringo: What?
Grandfather: Oh, they're a desperate crew of drippings, and they've fists like mature hams for pounding poor defenseless lads like you. One of us has got to escape. I'll get the boys. Hold on, son, I'll be back here.
Ringo: For me?
Grandfather: And if they get you on the floor, watch out for your brisket.
Ringo: They seem all right to me.
Grandfather: Ah, sure, that's what they want you to think. All coppers are villains.
Police Inspector: Would you two like a cup of tea?
Grandfather: See, *sly* villains.

---

George: Put yer tongue away, it looks disgustin hangin out, all pink and naked.

---

John: [John is combing a fake beard in the mirror; girlish voice] My name's Betty.

---

John: We've broken out! Ah, the blessed freedom of it all! Have you got a nail file, these handcuffs are killin me! I was framed, I'm innocent, I don't want to go!
Paul: Sorry for disturbing you, girls!
John: I betchya can't guess what I was in for!
[laughs psychotically]

---

Norm: [sees Paul's grandfather for the first time] Hey...
George, Paul, John, Ringo: [in unison] Who's that little old man?
Norm: Well, who is he?
Ringo: He belongs to Paul.

---

Grandfather: Would you look at him? Sittin' there with his hooter scrapin' away at that book!
Ringo: Well, what's the matter with that?
Grandfather: Have you no natural resources of your own? Have they even robbed you of that?
Ringo: You can learn from books!
Grandfather: You can, can you? Pahh! Sheeps' heads! You could learn more by gettin' out there and living!
Ringo: Out where?
Grandfather: Any old where! But not our little Richard. Oh, no. When you're not thumpin' them pagan skins you're tormenting your eyes with that rubbish.
Ringo: Books are good.
Grandfather: *Parading's* better.
Ringo: Parading?
Grandfather: [nods eagerly] Parading the streets! Trailing your coat! Bowling along! LIVING!
Ringo: Well, I am living.
Grandfather: You? Living? When was the last time you gave a girl a pink-edged daisy? When did you last embarrass a sheila with your cool, appraising stare?
Ringo: You're a bit old for that sort of chat, aren't you?
Grandfather: Well at least I've got a backlog of memories! All you've got is - THAT BOOK!

---

T.V. Director: Now, look. If you think I'm unsuitable, let's have it out in the open. I can't stand these backstage politics.
John: Aren't you tending to black-and-white the situation somewhat?
T.V. Director: Well, quite honestly, I wasn't expecting a musical arranger to question my ability picture-wise.
John: [to the others] I could listen to him for hours.

---

Grandfather: Hey, Paulie, they're trying to fob you off with this musical charlatan. But I gave him the test.
T.V. Director: I'm quite happy to be replaced.
Grandfather: He's a typical buck-passer.

---

John: And we're looking after him, are we?
Grandfather: I'll look after myself.
Paul: Yeah, that's what I'm afraid of.
John: He's got you worried, then?
Paul: Him? He's a villain, a real mixer. And he costs you a fortune in Breach of Promise cases.

---

Ringo: I don't snore.
George: You do, repeatedly.
Ringo: Do I snore, John?
John: Yeah, you're a window-rattler, son.
Ringo: That's just your opinion. Do I snore, Paul?
Paul: With a trombone hooter like yours, it would be unnatural if you didn't.
Grandfather: Now, Paulie... don't mock the afflicted.
Paul: Ah, come off it, it's only a joke!
Grandfather: Aye, it may be a joke to you, but it's his nose. He can't help having a hideous great hooter! And his poor little head, trembling under the weight of it!

---

[repeated line about Grandfather]
Paul: He's very clean.

---

John: [cuts tailor's tape measure with scissors and in girly voice] I now declare this bridge open.

---

[Paul, John and George come out of the studio, looking for Ringo]
Paul: Let's split up and look for him!
[Paul walks away, George and John follow him. Paul turns around]
John: We've become a limited company.

---

John: Don't worry, son, we'll get you the best lawyer green stamps can buy.
Paul: Oh, ho! It's a laugh a line with Lennon!

---

Norm: Now look, I've had a marvelous idea. Just for once, let's all try to behave like ordinary, respectable citizens. Let's not cause any trouble, pull any strokes, or do anything I'm gonna be sorry for. Especially tomorrow at that television theater, because...
[looks at John, who is holding up a bottle to his nose]
Norm: Are you listening to me, Lennon?
John: You're a swine. Isn't he, George?
George: Yeah, a swine.
Norm: [indifferently] Thanks.

---

Norm: Now you've got about an hour, but don't leave the theater. Where are you going, John?
John: [with a dancing girl] She's gonna show me her stamp collection.
Paul: [also with a girl] So's mine.
Norm: John, I'm talking to you. This final run-through is important, understand? Important!
[John snorts like a pig, then leaves]
Grandfather: I want a cup of tea!
Norm: Uh, Shake?
Shake: [reaching for a guitar] Um... I've got to adjust the decibels on the imbalance, Norm.
Norm: Clever. George?
[George puts his fingers in his ears]
Norm: Ringo, look after him, will you?
Ringo: Ah, Norm!
Norm: Do I have to raise my voice?
Ringo: All right. Come on, Granddad.
[mumbling]
Ringo: I'm a drummer, not a wet nurse, you know?

---

Ringo: [laughing happily after winning a card game with his bandmates and getting the won cards] Ahahaha! All mine!
George: He's wearing his lucky rings.

---

[playing baccarat]
Grandfather: My turn? Er... bingo!
Croupier: Pas "bingo," monsieur. "Banco."
Grandfather: Ah, I'll take the little darlin's anyway.

---

T.V. Director: I won an award.
John: A likely story.
T.V. Director: It's on the wall in my office.

---

Norm: All right, get your pens out.
Paul: Why?
Norm: It's homework time for you load of college puddings. I want this lot answered tonight.
Ringo: [sulking] Aww... I want to go out.
Norm: I'll brook no denial.
John: You couldn't get a pen in your foot, you swine.
Norm: Ooh! Chatter on, son, chatter on. A touch of the writer's cramp will soon sort you out.

---

Ringo: Funny, really, 'cause I'd never thought of it, but being middle-aged and old takes up most of your time, doesn't it?
Grandfather: You're only right.

---

Grandfather: It's my considered opinion that you're a bunch of sissies.
John: You're just jealous.
Norm: Leave him alone, Lennon... or I'll tell them all the truth about you.
John: You wouldn't.
Norm: Oh, I would, though.

---

John: He's sex obsessed! The older generation's leading our nation in a state of galloping ruin!

---

Paul: Yeah, where's the old mixer?
Grandfather: Here, Paulie.
Paul: I've got a few words to say to you, two-faced John McCartney.
John: Oh, leave him alone. He's back, isn't he? He can't help being old.
Paul: What's being old got to do with it? He's a trouble-maker and a mixer, that's good enough for me!

---

Norm: Hey, have you seen Paul's grandfather?
John: Of course. He's concealed about my person.
Norm: [rolls his eyes] He must have slipped off somewhere.
Paul: Have you lost him?
Norm: Don't exaggerate.
Paul: You've lost him!
Shake: Put it this way, Paulie: he's mislaid him.

---

Norm: I thought I told you lot to stay here. When I say stay put, I mean stay put.
John: [drops to his knees] Don't cay me, sir! I was led astray.
Norm: Shut up, John!

---

[George has been mistaken for a teen model]
Simon Marshall: We'd like you to give us your opinion on some clothes for teenagers.
George: Oh, by all means. I'd be quite prepared for that eventuality.
Simon Marshall: Well, not your REAL opinion, obviously. It'll be written out for you. Can you read?
George: Of course.
Simon Marshall: I mean lines, ducky, can you handle lines?
George: Well, I'll have a bash.
Simon Marshall: Good. Get him whatever it is they drink, uh, coke-a-rama?
[gives George some shirts]
Simon Marshall: Now you'll like these. You'll really "dig" them. They're "fab," and all the other pimply hyperboles...
George: I wouldn't be seen dead in them. They're dead grotty.
Simon Marshall: Grotty?
George: Yeah, grotesque.
Simon Marshall: Make a note of that word and give it to Susan. It's quite touching, really. Here's this kid, giving me his utterly valueless opinion, when I know for a fact that within a month, he'll be suffering from a violent inferiority complex and loss of status because he isn't wearing one of these nasty things. Of course they're grotty, you wretched nit, that's why they were designed! But that's what you'll want.
George: No, I won't.
Simon Marshall: You can be replaced, chickie baby.
George: I don't care.

---

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