Million Dollar Baby (2004)

Morgan Freeman: Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris

Photos 

Quotes 

• Frankie Dunn : It wasn't fault. I was wrong to say that.

  Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : You damn right. I found you a fighter. You made her the best fighter she could be.

  Frankie Dunn : I killed her.

  Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : Don't say that. Maggie walked through that door with nothing buts guts. No chance in the world of being what she needed to be. It was because of you that she was fighting the championship of the world. You did that. People die everyday, Frankie - mopping floors, washing dishes and you know what their last thought is? I never got my shot. Because of you Maggie got her shot. If she dies today you know what her last thought would be? I think I did all right.

• Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : If there's magic in boxing, it's the magic of fighting battles beyond endurance, beyond cracked ribs, ruptured kidneys and detached retinas. It's the magic of risking everything for a dream that nobody sees but you.

• [Eddie has his feet up on the desk] 

  Frankie Dunn : You got big holes in your socks.

  Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : Oh, they're not that big.

  Frankie Dunn : Didn't I give you money for some new ones?

  Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : These are my sleeping socks. My feet like a little air at night.

  Frankie Dunn : How come you're wearing them in the daytime, then?

  Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : 'Cause my daytime socks got too many holes in them.

• Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : Frankie likes to say that boxing is an unnatural act, that everything in boxing is backwards: sometimes the best way to deliver a punch is to step back... But step back too far and you ain't fighting at all.

• Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : The body knows what fighters don't: how to protect itself. A neck can only twist so far. Twist it just a hair more and the body says, "Hey, I'll take it from here because you obviously don't know what you're doing... Lie down now, rest, and we'll talk about this when you regain your senses." It's called the knockout mechanism.

• Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : Some people say the most important thing a fighter can have is heart. Frankie'd say: show me a fighter who was nothing but heart and I'll show you a man waiting for a beating.

• Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : People love violence. They'll slow down at a car wreck to check for bodies. Same people claim to love boxing. They got no idea what it is. Boxing is about respect. Getting it for yourself, and taking it away from the other guy.

• Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : [after hitting someone]  110. Get a job, punk.

• Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : She came from southwest Missoura, the hills outside the scratchy-ass Ozark town of Theodosia, set in the cedars and oak trees, somewhere between nowhere and goodbye.

• Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : To make a fighter you gotta strip them down to bare wood: you can't just tell 'em to forget everything you know if you gotta make 'em forget even their bones... make 'em so tired they only listen to you, only hear your voice, only do what you say and nothing else... show 'em how to keep their balance and take it away from the other guy... how to generate momentum off their right toe and how to flex your knees when you fire a jab... how to fight backin' up so that the other guy doesn't want to come after you. Then you gotta show 'em all over again. Over and over and over... till they think they're born that way.

• [last lines] 

  Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : [Narrating]  No matter where he is, I thought you should know what kind of man your father really was.

• Frankie Dunn : How many times do I got to tell you that bleach is bleach. Why can't you just buy the cheap stuff, you always have to buy the expensive stuff.

  Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : It smells better, Frankie.

  Frankie Dunn : Bleach smells like bleach.

• Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : [narrator/Dupris]  "Maggie always did like taking 'em out in the first round."

• Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : All fighters are pig-headed some way or another: some part of them always thinks they know better than you about something. Truth is: even if they're wrong, even if that one thing is going to be the ruin of them, if you can beat that last bit out of them... they ain't fighters at all.

• Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : She's getting pretty good.

  Frankie Dunn : Yeah, real fast. It's almost as if someone's been helping her.

  Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : Oh, I don't know. She might just be a natural. Looks like she's got something.

  Frankie Dunn : She's got my speed bag, that's what she's got.

  Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : I wonder how the hell she got that.

  Frankie Dunn : [walking away]  I wonder!

• Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : There is magic in fighting battles beyond endurance

• Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : Boxing is an unnatural act. Cos everything in it is backwards. You wanna move to the left, you don't step left, you push on the right toe. To move right, you use your left toe. Instead of running from the pain - like a sane person would do, you step into it.

• Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : Anybody can lose one fight, anybody can lose once, you'll come back from this you'll be champion of the world.

• [first lines] 

  Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : [Narrating]  Only ever met one man I wouldn't wanna fight. When I met him he was already the best cut man in the business. Started training and managing in the sixties, but never lost his gift.

• Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : Yeah right, you're the smart one. You're the one learning Greek.

  Frankie Dunn : It's Gaelic.

  Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : Well you just protected yourself out of a championship fight! How do you say that in Gaelic?

• Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : She grew up knowing one thing: she was trash.

• Frankie Dunn : [about Danger]  He paid his dues?

  Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : Dues? The boy can't afford pants, you want him to pay dues?

  Frankie Dunn : Get out of my office!

• Frankie Dunn : What's she sayin'?

  Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : Wants to know what you're readin'.

  Frankie Dunn : It's Yeats.

  [turns to Maggie] 

  Frankie Dunn : Keep your head back.

  Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : Why don't you talk a little Yeats to her? Show her what a treat that is.

• Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : Seems there are Irish people everywhere, or people who want to be.

• Frankie Dunn : [Reads a script from a book in Gaelic] 

  Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : What the hell kind of language is that?

  Frankie Dunn : What do you want?

  Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : I just thought you should know you got a fighter out there not talking to another manager.

  Frankie Dunn : Not talking to another manager?

  Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : And not just any manager. Mickey Mack.

  Frankie Dunn : You came in here to tell me Big Willie is not talking to Mickey Mack.

  Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : Not a word. Neither one of him.

  Frankie Dunn : [Frustrated]  I'm tryin' to read here.

  Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : Well, if you think that more important.

• Maggie Fitzgerald : Will you tell him I'm real sorry?

  Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : No. I will do no such thing, Maggie.

• Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : Damndest thing. So, What's the plan? I know you got one, so you might as well tell me what it is.

  Frankie Dunn : It's your fault. Yeah, it's your fault she's lying in there like that. You kept after me until I trained her. I knew I shouldn't have done it, her being a girl and all. Everything kept telling me not to. Everything but you.

• Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : See the way she did that? Sugar Ray could do that. The girl's got Sugar!

• Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : [about Maggie's decision to go by air and back by car]  She made her return trip by ambulance.

• Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : ...but maybe he didn't have anything left in his heart. I just hope he found someplace where he could find a little peace. A place set in the cedars and oak trees. Somewhere between nowhere and goodbye. But that's probably wishful thinking.

• Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : I have HBO.

• Maggie Fitzgerald : Did you see the fight?

  Eddie Scrap-Iron Dupris : Of course I did. You had her cold, Maggie.

  Maggie Fitzgerald : I shouldn't have dropped my hand. I shouldn't have turned. Always protect myself... how many times did he tell me that?