Taps
Taps is a 1981 film about a group of teenage military cadets who take extreme measures to insure the future of their academy when its existence is threatened by local condo developers.
This school is our home, we think it's worth defending.
- Directed by Harold Becker. Written by Robert Mark Kamen, James Lineberger and Darryl Ponicsan, based on the novel Father Sky by Devery Freeman.
Brian Moreland
- Honor doesn't count for shit when you're looking at a dead little boy.
- I don't ever want to see what I just saw out there. We're soldiers!
- We have three demands, they're very reasonable. When they're met, we'll be happy to return every weapon, every shell.
- STAY WHERE YOU ARE, SHERIFF!
David Shawn
- [about firing his assault rifle at the townies and cops, to facilitate their escape] I saw my duty, and I did it.
- [Firing machine gun] It's beautiful, man!
Others
- General Harlan Bache: Was I scared! I must have lost fifty pounds, all of it brown.
- Colonel Kerby: A soldier! No, goddamnit, I'm a soldier, with the career goal of all soldiers - staying alive in situations where it ain't all that easy to do! You're a death-lover. Yes, I know the species. Seventeen years old and some sorry son of a bitch has got you convinced that dying for a cause is oh, so romantic. Well, that's the worst kind of all the kinds of bullshit there is!
Dialogue
- Brian Moreland: [on the closure of the academy] Sir, how could they do this?
- General Harlan Bache: With the stroke of a pen, sir. Their field of honor was a desktop.
- David Shawn: Brian, Dungeons and Dragons game tonight?
- Brian Moreland: Nah. Not tonight, Shawn.
- Alex Dwyer: Nice of you to ask. [Shawn gives him the finger] Have a good day.
- J.C. Pierce: [the truck won't start] Aw, shit!
- Alex Dwyer: Want me to check under the hood?
- J.C. Pierce: For what?
- Alex Dwyer: I'll know when I get there, won't I?
- Alex Dwyer: What the hell were you doing back there?
- David Shawn: Pulling your lame ass out of the grinder and it's okay enough to thank me, shithead!
- Alex Dwyer: I'd like to kick your ass from here to Albany, you savaged moron!
- Brian Moreland: Tan Hut!
- Alex Dwyer: This guy's a maniac, Brian. He rammed a sheriff.
- Brian Moreland: What's the problem?
- Alex Dwyer: The problem is that this asshole just shot the town! I didn't buy into this to get people blown away, for christ's sake.
- Master Sergeant Kevin Moreland: Let me tell 'em it was growing pains - the wrong execution of the right idea.
- Brian Moreland: "The wrong execution of the right idea"?
- Parent: Sergeant, we aren't in the Army.
- Master Sergeant Kevin Moreland: No need for apologies.
Cast
- George C. Scott - General Harlan Bache
- Timothy Hutton - Brian Moreland
- Ronny Cox - Colonel Kerby
- Sean Penn - Alex Dwyer
- Tom Cruise - David Shawn
- Brendan Ward - Charlie
- Evan Handler - Edward West
- John P. Navin Jr. - Derek Mellott
- Billy Van Zandt - Bug
- Giancarlo Esposito - J.C. Pierce
- Wayne Tippit - Master Sergeant Kevin Moreland