Amazing Grace (2006)
Benedict Cumberbatch: William Pitt
Photos
Quotes
-
Pitt the Younger : Why is it you only feel the thorns in your feet when you stop running?
William Wilberforce : Is that some sort of heavy-handed metaphorical advice for me, Mr. Pitt?
Pitt the Younger : Yes, I suppose it is. You must keep going. Keep going fast.
-
William Wilberforce : No one of our age has ever taken power.
Pitt the Younger : Which is why we're too young to realize certain things are impossible. So, we will do them anyway.
-
Pitt the Younger : As your Prime Minister, I urge you caution
William Wilberforce : And as my friend?
Pitt the Younger : To hell with caution.
-
Pitt the Younger : I don't care how important this is. I'll finish my shot.
Pitt the Younger : [aims with club]
Pitt the Younger : [exasperated] Oh, for God's sake, what is it?
-
Pitt the Younger : It's your wedding day - I agree with everything you say.
-
Pitt the Younger : I need an answer, Wilber. Do you intend to use your beautiful voice to praise the lord - or change the world?
-
Pitt the Younger : Trouble is, Doctor, he doesn't believe he has a body. Utterly careless of it.
-
Pitt the Younger : Barbara. You have my deepest condolescences.
Barbara Wilberforce : [feigning seriousness] Thank you.
Pitt the Younger : But do me a favour. Make him eat some of his pets.
Barbara Wilberforce : [picking up rabbit] I rather like them.
Pitt the Younger : I like them, too - in brandy sauce.
-
Pitt the Younger : [on his deathbed] No more excuses, Wilber. Finish them off.
-
Pitt the Younger : We cracked crowns, didn't we?
William Wilberforce : We left the heads intact.
Pitt the Younger : Because we're so pathetically English.
-
Pitt the Younger : You act like you've never seen slavery before.
William Wilberforce : For me, it's like arsenic. Each new tiny dose doubles the effect.
-
Pitt the Younger : [to Lord Fox] You always look more at home when you're doing something devious.
-
Pitt the Younger : Is that the main course?
William Wilberforce : No. It's the Duke of Clarence.
-
Pitt the Younger : I find that the older I get, the more tender I become.
-
William Wilberforce : I never change.
Pitt the Younger : Well, hurrah for you.
-
Thomas Clarkson : Part of the war effort, patriotism, and all that.
Pitt the Younger : Since when have you been interested in the war effort, patriotism, and - all that?
Thomas Clarkson : I'm not.
-
Pitt the Younger : As Prime Minister, idle gossip collects around you like scum in slack water.
-
Pitt the Younger : So, they want bloody noses and cracked crowns.
William Wilberforce : Shakespeare. Henry the IV.
Pitt the Younger : A play about England changing.
William Wilberforce : As it will soon change.
Pitt the Younger : Only if we change it. You don't believe you and I could change things?
-
Pitt the Younger : I urgently need to know where your heart lies, Wilber.
-
Pitt the Younger : They say in the cafes that Clarkson is a French spy. And Equiano, they say he was born in Carolina and as an American; therefore, must be a revolutionary. Others say they've seen with their own eyes letters addressed to you - from Thomas Jefferson.
William Wilberforce : All matters to do with abolition!
-
Pitt the Younger : Silence. Silence! You sound like a chorus of bloody tomcats. Now, let me introduce you to somebody who does it - properly.
William Wilberforce : I would like to dedicate this song to my honorable friend, his Grace, the Duke of Clarence. It was written by my old preacher. He was Captain of a slave ship for 20 years. He repented his sins and then he wrote this song.
[singing]
William Wilberforce : Amazing grace, How sweet the sound, That saved a wretch like me, I once was lost, but now I'm found, Was blind, but now I see.