Magistrate: Once in every generation, without fail, along the frontier, there is an episode of hysteria about the barbarians. It's the consequence of too much ease.
Baker's Wife: Why don't they leave us alone? They have their own territories, don't they? We have to protect ourselves.
Magistrate: Protect ourselves, my dear? Against what? Against whom?
Baker's Wife: Against them.
Magistrate: We protect ourselves against wild animals, against snakes.
Baker: If an angry bear approaches you, you'd kill it, Magistrate, wouldn't you?
Magistrate: No, my friends. I-I will be quite content to pass quietly away and merit no more than three lines in the imperial gazette that with nudge here and a touch there, I kept the world on its course.
Colonel Joll: ...and I will need someone to assist with the language.
Magistrate: Let me. I-I'd be glad to help.
Colonel Joll: No, no. You would find it tedious. We have set procedures.
Magistrate: Uh, tell me, wh-what are your procedures?
Colonel Joll: Patience... and pressure. That is the only way to get to the truth.
Magistrate: But how do you know you are hearing the truth?
Colonel Joll: There is a certain tone. A certain tone enters the voice. You come to recognize it with training and experience.
Magistrate: Can you tell whether I am telling the truth?
Colonel Joll: You misunderstand. I am speaking of particular situations, situations where I am probing for the truth. First you get lies. First lies, then pressure, then more lies, then more pressure... then more lies, more pressure... and then comes the break. After the break, more pressure... and then at last the truth. That is how you get it.
Colonel Joll: Pain is truth. All else is subject to doubt.
Colonel Joll: I have orders to obey.
Magistrate: The people who... whom you call barbarians are nomads. They will never permit themselves to be bottled up in the mountains.
Lieutenant: Well, sorry to be frank. Isn't that what war is about? Compelling a choice on someone who would not otherwise make it?
Magistrate: I'll tell you something. We, you and I, think of this country as ours, as part of the Empire. We say to ourselves we reclaimed the land from the desert, we planted it, we built our homes here, but that's not how they see it. They still see us as visitors, transients. They say to one another, "Be patient. One day, these foreigners will pack up and leave. They will never last in the desert."
Lieutenant: But we're not going to leave.
Magistrate: No? Are you sure?
Officer Mandel: You've been treasonously consorting with the enemy. Do you deny it?
Magistrate: We have no enemy that I know of, unless we ourselves are the enemy.
Magistrate: As you see, it contains a single character. It is the... It is the character... Barbarian character for "war." Although it can also stand for "vengeance," and if... if you turn it upside down like this, it can mean... "justice." There's no way of knowing in what sense it is intended. That is a part of barbarian c-cunning.
Magistrate: I refuse.
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+ Quotes on the IMDb
+ Soundtracks
Σ nostradamvs: «Хорошее кино, хотя и заметно упрощённое относительно первоисточника. Книга кажется заканчивающейся ничем, поскольку после ухода полковника вариантов нет: ..... Последние же кадры фильма (не буду спойлерить) сводят этот смысл на нет, упрощая историю для зрителя и ставя под вопрос правоту магистрата. Но в целом дух книги передан хорошо — печальная и монотонная история человека на краю империи, пожирающей самое себя.»
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