Heroes for Sale (1933)

Robert Barrat: Max Brinker

Quotes 

• Thomas 'Tom' Holmes : I thought you hated all employers and capitalists.

  Max Brinker : I despise them! I spit on them! But, I'm villing to get rich vith them.

• Pa Dennis : You're trying to tell me the world ain't getting any better.

  Max Brinker : It's getting worse.

  Pa Dennis : But why is it getting worse?

  Max Brinker : Oh, the burden of proof is on you, my friend. Why is it getting better?

  Pa Dennis : Look how much longer people live.

  Max Brinker : I admit that, but that only prolongs their suffering.

  Pa Dennis : Well, if you think life is so awful, why don't you cut your throat?

  Max Brinker : Because I can't afford to buy a knife.

  [Pa hands Max a knife] 

  Max Brinker : Oh, you are stupid, my friend. That's why you can't accept the doctrines of Communism, why you endure class servitude. You are a fish, a timid little rabbit, a slinking mouse afraid to fight. And what have you to lose, I ask you?

  Max Brinker , Pa Dennis : Nothing but your chains.

• Max Brinker : The great Lenin once said...

  Mary Dennis : Well, he ain't gonna say it around here. Now, you go on upstairs. All you do is talk everybody into a stomachache.

• Max Brinker : Sheep! When you get to be my age, you'll have a bomb in every pocket.

• Thomas 'Tom' Holmes : I need every penny I make. I'm gonna have a baby.

  Ruth : We're going to have a baby.

  Max Brinker : What good is a baby? Anybody can have a baby.

  Mary Dennis : Yeah? Well, you just try it sometime.

  Max Brinker : Increase and multiply like rabbits. Make more poor people for the rich to prey upon, starve and exploit.

  Thomas 'Tom' Holmes : Max, you're daffy. If everybody felt like that - there wouldn't be any people left, only machines.

  Max Brinker : Vouldn't it be a better vorld?

• Max Brinker : You fool, you idiot. Vhy, you already have an income of a thousand dollars a month. Vhy, you can hire the best lawyers. Bribe everybody. Buy your vay out of here.

• Max Brinker : You enjoy this prison? You like to sit here and rot? Blood on the money? Vho asks you vhat's on the money vhen you spend it? There's only one ting important in the vorld. To have money. Vithout it, you are just garbage. Vith it, you are a king.

  Thomas 'Tom' Holmes : And you used to hate the capitalists.

  Max Brinker : Naturally, that was before I had money.