Captain Kidd (1945)

[from the scaffold]
Capt. William Kidd: So here's me bequest to them what hunts what I have hid and to their sons sons down through the corridors of time: greed that spawns murder; hatred that corrodes the soul; ambition - the foulest strumpet of all.
Heckler at Kidd's hanging: [to hangman] Hey, Dick - Dick Kent. Sell me a bit of that rope for a sixpence will you?
Capt. William Kidd: Save your money, me lads. You can have it all for nothing if you'll only step here and wear it!
[to hangman]
Capt. William Kidd: Hurry up, Kent. Can't wait forever.

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Capt. William Kidd: I'm one of nature's gentlemen, but I need polish, my good man. If I'm to improve myself...
Cary Shadwell: A gentleman only employs the term "My good man" when addressing lower servants or his inferiors, sir.
Capt. William Kidd: You see...
[sucks his teeth]
Capt. William Kidd: ...that's why I want you.
[sucks his teeth again]
Capt. William Kidd: With my upbringing...
Cary Shadwell: A gentleman never sucks his teeth, sir. Many a man's social career has been ruined by less, sir.

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Capt. William Kidd: Governor, would you be good enough to tell them what we're here for?
Newgate Prison Governor Landers: Give heed you-you vermin. Here's news to your advantage...
First prisoner: Is the hangman dead, then?
Second prisoner: Out with it, Jock Nastyface! Is it that your mother's turned into an honest woman?
Newgate Prison Governor Landers: Silence you mutinous dogs! If another man speaks. I'll trice him up by the thumbs and flog him raw!
Capt. William Kidd: Tsk-tsk-tsk. Is that the way to win the love of these unfortunate gentleman?

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Four years before this movie was made, Charles Laughton co-starred in It Started with Eve, In that film, Laughton's character, Jonathan Reynolds Sr., is said to have been born two centuries too late. The assistant newspaper editor comments that he could have been "Captain Kidd himself".
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