Tom Hanks credited as playing...
Ray Peterson
- Ray Peterson: I've never seen that. I've never seen anybody drive their garbage down to the street and bang the hell out of it with a stick. I-I've never seen that.
- Ray Peterson: [chanting] I'm not going to listen to this, I'm not going to hear this now.
- Art: Ray! Ray! You're chanting!
- Art: [points to book] Ray. Ray, look.
- Art: Ray, unconscious chanting! You're chanting!
- Ray Peterson: [continues chanting with fingers in ears]
- Art: [chants] I want to kill everyone. Satan is good. Satan is our pal.
- Art: Ray. Ray, you're chanting! Hey, once they
- [points to book]
- Art: get in here...
- [points to Ray's head]
- Art: ...it's over, pal.
- Ricky Butler: Green sky at morning, neighbor take warning.
- Ray Peterson: Green sky at night?
- Ricky Butler: Neighbor take flight?
- Ray Peterson: Remember what you were saying about people in the 'burbs, Art, people like Skip, people who mow their lawn for the 800th time, and then SNAP? WELL, THAT'S US. IT'S NOT THEM, THAT'S US. WE'RE the ones who are vaulting over the fences, and peeking in through people's windows. We're the ones who are THROWING GARBAGE IN THE STREET, AND LIGHTING FIRES. WE'RE THE ONES WHO ARE ACTING SUSPICIOUS AND PARANOID, ART. WE'RE THE LUNATICS. US. IT'S NOT THEM. It's us.
- Art Wiengartner: [after a pause] I don't know what to say... What, do you want me to move?
- [Ray charges at him]
- Ricky Butler: Ya know, did you ever see the movie, "The Sentinel", Mr. Peterson? It's about the old guy who owned the apartment, which is kind of like the, uh, gateway to Hell?
- Ray Peterson: No, I... I didn't see that.
- Ricky Butler: Oh, well, I was doing some thinking. And, you know, being that their last house burnt down and all, it's like, maybe... somebody left the gate open.
- [a generator starts up from the Klopek's basement]
- Art Wiengartner: It's them. They're movin' around again. Ya know... it was a night just like this that it happened.
- Ricky Butler: What happened, Mr. Weingartner?
- Art Wiengartner: Oh, it was a long time ago, Ricky. Hinkley Hills was a lot smaller then... safer too! You never had to lock your doors. Everybody knew everybody. I must have been maybe oh nine - ten years-old. You know where the big mall is?
- Ricky Butler: Yeah.
- Art Wiengartner: Well, there used to be a big drugstore on the corner there, had a big soda fountain, remember?
- Ray Peterson: Yeah.
- Art Wiengartner: Yeah, and the guy who ran it was a - was a rotund guy, had glasses. His name was Skip. Lived over on Elm, had a wife, a couple of kids, ya know? Not too sharp, I mean, hey the guy's 40 years old, he's wearing a paper hat and he's makin' cherry Cokes, it's a cinch he's not runnin' for governor, right?
- [Ricky chuckles]
- Art Wiengartner: Anyway, it got hot that summer, I remember it got REAL hot. It was sweltering. Ya know that heat where your underwear sweats and it crawls up the... anyway, it's hot, okay? And they start... they start smellin' this... this really vile stench over on Elm and they figure it's comin' from Skip's place. And no one wants to say anything, I mean, what do you do, go knock on the guys door, "Hi, you're house stinks"? So - so people are trying to ignore it, right? They're trying to pretend it - it isn't happening. A-and you know those pine things? They're trying to cover up with those pine things that you can put in cars. People are hanging those on their porches.
- [Ricky laughs]
- Art Wiengartner: Oh, you think that's funny, Rick?
- Ricky Butler: Well, yeah.
- Art Wiengartner: Well yeah - let me tell you what happened next, OK. The state health inspector shows up. They go over, they talk to Skip, he says he's got a sump pump problem. They leave. Hey, they guy's got a sewer problem, he says he'll look after it, everything's okay, right?
- Ricky Butler: Right.
- Art Wiengartner: Wrong. A couple hours later there's smoke pouring out of the windows of Skip's house. The firemen show up, they go into Skip's house. Ya know what they find?
- Ricky Butler: What?
- Art Wiengartner: Skip's family, dead. Murdered... by Skip... weeks earlier... with an ice pick. Yeah, the guy killed his own family with an ice pick. Yeah... yeah just put 'em in the cool basement, covered 'em up with a sheet and went back to makin' ice cream treats for the townsfolk. Only thing... Skip didn't count on there being a big heat wave that summer. You know what that was that all those people were smelling over on Elm, Ricky?
- Ricky Butler: What?
- Art Wiengartner: Skip's family's bodies, decomposing in the summer heat
- [Ricky whistles]
- Art Wiengartner: . Yeah apparently, one day Skip made just made one too many lemon phosphates,
- [snaps fingers]
- Art Wiengartner: El snappo!
- Mark Rumsfield: [Pounds] Good solid walls...
- [Pounds]
- Mark Rumsfield: Good solid floors.
- [Someone in the basement pounds in response. Rumsfield grins]
- Mark Rumsfield: Oh-ho. Got somebody tied up in the ol' cellar, have yah, Rube?
- [Ray chokes on his sardine]
- Ray Peterson: Packing dust, sorry.
- Ray Peterson: I've been blown up, take me to the hospital.
- [Lies on a gurney]
- Ray Peterson: Take me to a hospital, I'm sick. What...?
- [Jumps up, throws the gurney in back of an ambulance than jumps on top of it]
- Carol Peterson: Honey? I'll just find out what hospital they're taking you to and then I'll... Follow right along. Okay?
- Ray Peterson: [Lying face down on the gurney] Okay, honey.
- Ray Peterson: You had a dream a plane was gonna crash, so you took the bus to Las Vegas.
- Art Wiengartner: If I had been on the plane it WOULD have crashed.
- Art Wiengartner: [Ray is trying to jimmy the door open with a store credit card] Where did you learn to do that?
- Ray Peterson: I *don't* know how to do this.
- [the credit card breaks]
- Art Wiengartner: That's a shit store anyway.
- Ray Peterson: So they keep to themselves, can you blame them? They live next door to people who break in their house, AND BURN IT DOWN while they're gone for the day!
- Art Wiengartner: Ray. Ray.
- Ray Peterson: I'm only trying to take a nap! I'm only laying here with my eyes closed trying to keep some goddamn sleep!
- Art Wiengartner: Go ahead, tell him, Ray. We got the goods on them, don't we? You know, some day they're going to dig up the back of that yard and they're gonna find the rest of that skeleton to go with that femur. Oh it might not be Walter but it's gonna be some...
- Ray Peterson: Shut up. SHUT UP, ART, SHUT UP! God, you don't know when to quit, do you? Look at me! I'm a shell of a man because of you, Art!
- Carol Peterson: What are you doing up?
- Ray Peterson: Walter's dog just took a dump on Rumsfield's lawn again.
- Carol Peterson: Good, honey.
- Ray Peterson: You wanna take that out of your pocket? You wanna not steal that from Walter's house, please?
- Ray Peterson: It's Walter's toupée.
- Art Wiengartner: Oh jeez, beautiful place to keep a toupée, on the stove. I'm starving.
- [walks off to the fridge]
- Mr. Rumsfield: One thing about these old guys - they don't ever leave the house without their hair. No sir. Walter left this house in a big hurry.
- Art Wiengartner: I don't know if you've noticed, but there's bars on the basement windows here.
- Ray Peterson: They've got holes in their porch, too.
- Art Wiengartner: Argh! That was a booby trap.
- Ray Peterson: Are you okay?
- Art Wiengartner: Yeah.
- Ray Peterson: Oh, booby trap. I'm not gonna pay for that.
- Art Wiengartner: We shouldn't pay for that, we should sue them.