Captain Finlander: He didn't surface during the night, he couldn't, we must've been directly over him. So he's out of breathing air. Staying down, he couldn't charge his batteries, so he can't run. And there he is. So you see, Commodore, we've accomplished the most important step. We've made him desperate.
Commodore Wolfgang Schrepke, Deutsche Marine: He's certainly desperate. That is the danger. You are dealing with a desperate force.
Captain Finlander: And we're a determined force.
Commodore Wolfgang Schrepke, Deutsche Marine: YOU are in the power here, Eric. It is not a force, it is just you.
Captain Finlander: Uh, you mean you're trying to say that, uh, you consider ME desperate.
Commodore Wolfgang Schrepke, Deutsche Marine: No, Captain. To be frank, I consider you frightening.


--Eric Portman (as ) in The Bedford Incident

Colonel Richmond: [discussing the death of Mac] We had a talk. I did the talking mostly. I was very unpleasant to him. I told him straight that he was too big. I told him every sentry in the camp was gunning for him - that he hadn't a hope of getting past the guards, and he agreed. I recommended him to think of standing down. There the discussion ended.
Pat Reid: And his life as well!
Colonel Richmond: The fact that he's dead hasn't escaped me, Pat!
Pat Reid: [resentfully] That sentry didn't kill him!
Colonel Richmond: [angrily] Watch your tongue or get out!
Pat Reid: We knew he was too big, but it was his idea. We were prepared to take the risk!
Colonel Richmond: I wasn't though, you muddle-headed idiot! Why can't you understand I'm not an individual like you, free to act according to my own desires! I'm senior British officer! I wish I wasn't, but I am. As such, my unfortunate responsibility is to see that British officers in here don't act like fools and lose their lives by doing it. By taking Mac with you, you might have lost half a dozen lives, not one!


--Eric Portman (as ) in The Colditz Story

Colonel Richmond: [watching a particularly rough game of soccer in the excercise yard] Who was it said our ancestors were apes?


--Eric Portman (as ) in The Colditz Story

Lee Warren: I'll try anything once.


--Eric Portman (as ) in Dear Murderer

Lieutenant Hirth: Yes, I am a Nazi. Heil Hitler!


--Eric Portman (as ) in Forty-Ninth Parallel

Thomas Colpeper, JP: [hidden in the tall grass] Glorious, isn't it?
Alison Smith: [startled] Is anybody there?
Thomas Colpeper, JP: [standing] It's a real voice you heard. You're not dreaming.
Alison Smith: You know, just now I - I heard sounds.
Thomas Colpeper, JP: What sounds did you hear?
Alison Smith: Horses' hooves, voices, and a lute. Or an instrument like a lute. Did you hear anything?
Thomas Colpeper, JP: Those sounds come from inside, not outside. Then only when you're concentrating, when you believe strongly in something. Just now I was concentrating on who was coming up the hill to disturb me.
Alison Smith: Disturb you? At what?
Thomas Colpeper, JP: Breathing the air, smelling the earth, watching the clouds. Why don't you sit down?


--Eric Portman (as Thomas Colpeper, JP) in A Canterbury Tale

Thomas Colpeper, JP: Pity.
Bob Johnson: Pity?
Thomas Colpeper, JP: Pity when you get home and people ask what you've seen in England and you say "Well I saw a movie in Salisbury. And I made a pilgrimage to Canterbury and I saw another one."
Bob Johnson: [laughs] You've got me all wrong. I know that in Canterbury I have to look out for a cathedral.
Thomas Colpeper, JP: Yes do look out for it. It's just behind the movie theatre. You can't miss it.


--Eric Portman (as Thomas Colpeper, JP) in A Canterbury Tale

Thomas Colpeper, JP: Well, there are more ways than one of getting close to your ancestors. Follow the old road, and as you walk, think of them and of the old England. They climbed Chillingbourne Hill, just as you. They sweated and paused for breath just as you did today. And when you see the bluebells in the spring and the wild thyme, and the broom and the heather, you're only seeing what their eyes saw. You ford the same rivers. The same birds are singing. When you lie flat on your back and rest, and watch the clouds sailing, as I often do, you're so close to those other people, that you can hear the thrumming of the hoofs of their horses, and the sound of the wheels on the road, and their laughter and talk, and the music of the instruments they carried. And when I turn the bend in the road, where they too saw the towers of Canterbury, I feel I've only to turn my head, to see them on the road behind me.


--Eric Portman (as Thomas Colpeper, JP) in A Canterbury Tale