Famous Movie Quotes EVERYONE Gets Wrong

We all have our favourite movie moments, with many of them coming in the shape of classic one-liners. However, some of Hollywood’s most famous catchphrases, which have become part of popular culture, are often - after years of Chinese whispers - quite inaccurate.

Showing our very pedantic side, here are some of the lines that people get wrong time and time again.

Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back

Try talking to a diehard ‘Star Wars’ fan and then casually throw in that you love the bit in 'The Empire Strikes Back’ when Darth Vader says “Luke, I am your father.”

Cue gnashing of the teeth and frustrated wailing that 'You’ve got it all wrong’. The line Vader actually utters isn’t the one we have all been saying for years. What he actually tells Luke is, “No, I am your father."

- Actors Who Got Rich Outside of Acting
- Why Do Movie Phone Numbers Start 555?
- Weirdly Brilliant Movie Trivia

Which, while making sense during the film, is nowhere near as catchy as the one we all say now.

Wall Street

In the 'Wall Street’ sequel 'Money Never Sleeps’, Michael Douglas repeats his character’s famous catchphrase, “Greed is good”. A saying that has become so ingrained in popular culture, it’s synonymous with financial avarice.

What Gordon Gekko actually says in the 1987 classic is, however, “The point is, ladies and gentlemen, that greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right, greed works.”

Dirty Harry

Ushering a new kind of cop on the big screen, Clint Eastwood’s Harry was an angry, vicious police officer, with a mean line in goading those who crossed his path - case in point, the snarling one-liner that we all know and love, “Do you feel lucky, punk?”

The real quote comes at the end of a long, but awesome, monologue, “Ah, I know what you’re thinking, punk. You’re thinking, 'Did he fire six shots or only five?’ Well, to tell you the truth, I’ve forgotten myself in all this excitement. But being as this is a .44 Magnum, the most powerful handgun in the world, and would blow your head clean off, you’ve got to ask yourself one question, 'Do I feel lucky?’ Well, do ya punk?”

You can see why it was shortened.

The Silence of the Lambs

Anthony Hopkins’s iconic performance has since slipped into parody thanks to endless spoof performances and disappointing sequels.

However, the conversations between Hannibal Lecter and Jodie Foster’s Clarice in 'The Silence of the Lambs’ still chill. But one line in particular that gets repeated constantly, was never actually uttered. Instead of the now popular quote, “Hello Clarice”, what he actually says is “Good evening, Clarice”.

He may be a bonkers cannibal but he does have some well-polished manners.
Funnily enough, and like 'Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps’, the film’s sequel 'Hannibal’ included the often misquoted line thanks to its popularity.

Snow White and the Seven Dwarves

We all know the famous scene - and no doubt the narcissistic ones among us have said it to themselves in the mirror at one point. But the evil Queen doesn’t strike up a conversation with her household furniture by saying, “Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all?”

What she really said was, “Magic mirror on the wall, who is the fairest one of all?”.

Casablanca

Probably the most famous misquote in movie history, the line “Play it again, Sam” is never uttered in 'Casablanca’. The closest you get to it in the film comes from Ingrid Bergman telling the piano player, “Play it Sam, for old times”.

The world-weary Humphrey Bogart also says at one point, “You played it for her, you can play it for me. If she can stand it, I can. Play it!”

However, the line has been used in several films - including the Marx Brothers’ 'A Night in Casablanca’ - which led many to believe 'Play it again, Sam’ originated from the movie.

Star Trek

One of 'Star Trek’s most quoted lines was never spoken in either the TV series or the many films.

Instead, the closest we ever got to hearing William Shatner’s Captain Kirk saying, “Beam me up Scotty”, was in 1987’s 'Star Trek: The Voyage Home’ - which had Kirk saying , “Scotty, beam us up”.

Field of Dreams

Even if you’ve never seen this Kevin Costner baseball film that was nominated for Best Picture at the 1990 Oscars, we guarantee you know its most iconic quote: “If you build it, they will come”.

The actual quote that Costner hears mysteriously whispered to him in the film is “If you build it, he will come”, but lets not let the truth stand in the way of a cracking quote shall we?

- Actors Who Hated Their Own Films
- Mind-Blowing Disney In-Jokes
- Great Actors Now Making Rubbish Films

Image credits: 20th Century Fox/Warner Bros./Disney/Universal