Tom Cruise credited as playing...
Ron Kovic
- Mrs. Kovic: [sobbing] Don't say penis in this house!
- Ron Kovic: Penis!
- Mrs. Kovic: Stop!
- Ron Kovic: Penis! Big fucking erect penis, Mom!
- Mrs. Kovic: Stop!
- Ron Kovic: Penis! Penis!
- [in the Bronx VA hospital]
- Ron Kovic: This place is a fuckin' slum!
- Marvin: You want out of here, man? Fine. We take that leg of yours, and we can get you out of here in two weeks!
- Ron Kovic: I want my leg.
- Marvin: Why?
- Ron Kovic: I want my leg!
- Marvin: Why? You can't feel it no how!
- Ron Kovic: [incredulous and angry] It's my leg! I want my leg, you understand? Can't you understand that? All's I'm sayin' is that I want to be treated like a human being! I fought for my country! I am a Vietnam veteran! I fought for my country!
- Patient: [off-camera] Shut the fuck up!
- Ron Kovic: And I think that I deserve to be treated... decent!
- Steve Boyer: You could start out as a cashier... and then work your way up to becoming a manager of one of these places - just like your dad.
- Ron Kovic: I get $1700 a month from the government. I think I'm just going to lay low, and look around...
- Steve Boyer: [dismissively] That's charity money, Ronnie; this isn't.
- Ron Kovic: Charity?
- Steve Boyer: All I'm saying is that you got to - you got to put the war behind you, you know; you got to forget about this chair you're in!
- Ron Kovic: [leans forward] Sometimes, Stevie, I think people, they know you're back from Vietnam, and their face - changes: the eyes, the voice, the way they look at you, you know.
- Steve Boyer: I know what you mean, Ronnie, but people here - they don't give a shit about the war! Yeah! To them it's just a million miles away. It's all bullshit, anyway. I mean, the government sold us a bill of goods and we bought it, and got the shit kicked out of us, and for what, huh?
- Ron Kovic: What do you mean, "we," Stevie? You were in college, man.
- Steve Boyer: [shrugs shoulders] You bought that Communist bullshit, Ronnie. Yeah, they were going to take over the world, you remember that? Fenelli, you, Walsh - the whole town was devastated.
- [pause]
- Steve Boyer: For what? For lies, for bullshit lies?
- Ron Kovic: You don't get it. You don't get it. You had a town once, Charlie, and a mother and father. Things - thing that made sense. Do you remember things that made sense, things you could count on, before we all got so lost? What are we going to do, Charlie? What am I going to do, man?
- Ron Kovic: We went to Vietnam to stop communism!... We shell women and children!
- Mrs. Kovic: You didn't shoot women and children! What are you saying?
- Ron Kovic: That was the war, communism, the incidious evil! They told us to go.
- Mrs. Kovic: Yes, yes that's what they told us.
- Ron Kovic: Thou shalt not kill, Mom. Thou shalt not kill women and children! Thou shalt not kill! Remember? Isn't that what you taught us? Isn't that what they taught us?
- Mrs. Kovic: Stop it! Stop it!
- Ron Kovic: I remember the day he was killed. It was a strange day. We were out on patrol near a beach area - and it was very confusing. There was screaming and firing. It was getting late, and there were these children, these babies, that we killed by mistake.
- Mrs. Wilson: How awful.
- Ron Kovic: And then it - got really crazy. And we had to pull back because the NVA were coming up on us. And we got scattered in the dunes. People were yelling at anything, firing at anything. And that was when it happened. I was - confused, scared. I raised my rifle three times - and shots... The body fell in the dunes. God, this is - this is very difficult for me to say.
- Mr. Wilson: We don't have to hear this, Ron.
- Ron Kovic: But, Mr. Wilson, I think I was the one that killed your son that night. I was the one. I was the one. I was the one.
- Jamie Wilson - Georgia: What's done is done, sir. I can't ever forgive you, but maybe the Lord can.
- Mrs. Wilson: We understand, Ron. We understand the pain you've been goin' through.
- Mrs. Kovic: [enters the room, beaming] You're right, Ronnie. You're doing the right thing! Communism has to be stopped! It's God's will that you go. I'm proud of you.
- [gently pats his shoulder]
- Mrs. Kovic: You know, be careful, that's all.
- Infantry Colonel: [in the background, on the TV] Up there in Hanoi, they don't allow magazines and newspapers and televisions to cast doubts on the system - the military system.
- Ron Kovic: Don't you know what it means to me to be a Marine, Dad? Ever since I was a kid I've wanted this. I've wanted to serve my country. And I want to go. I want to go to Vietnam. And I'll die there if I have to.
- Doctor: We want to make one thing very clear to you, Ron. The possibility of your ever walking again is minimal... almost impossible. You're a T6 - paralyzed from the mid-chest down. Probably... you'll be in a wheelchair for the rest of your life. (pause) Do you understand what I'm saying?
- Ron Kovic: Well, doctor...
- Doctor: Hmm?
- Ron Kovic: Doctor, will I ever be able to - to have children?
- Doctor: No.
- [pause]
- Doctor: No, but we have a good psychologist. He's helped a lot of people.
- Ron Kovic: I'll walk again.
- Doctor: No you won't...
- Ron Kovic: No, I know I'll walk again!
- Doctor: No, let me tell you something, Ron. You will NEVER walk again.
- Ron Kovic: When I was in the hospital, I thought, yeah - yeah, this makes sense.
- Timmy Burns: What makes sense?
- Ron Kovic: Because I failed, Timmy.
- Timmy Burns: What are you talking about?
- Ron Kovic: Because I - I killed some - people; I made some terrible - mistakes!
- Timmy Burns: Oh, for Christ's sake, Ronnie, we all made mistakes. I mean, you - you had no choice. That's something that those goddamn pansy demonstrators ain't never gonna understand! Now, you don't even have to talk about it, Ronnie; I mean, it was insane over there! It was crazy!
- Ron Kovic: Sometimes I wish, I wish I'd - The first time I got hit, I was shot in the foot. I could have laid down, I mean - who gives a fuck now if I was a hero or not? I was paralyzed, castrated that day; why? It was all so - stupid! I'd have my dick and my balls now, and some days, Timmy - some days I think I'd give everything I believe in - everything I got, all my values, just to have my body back again, just to be whole again. But I'm not whole; I never will be, and that's - that's the way it is, isn't it?
- Timmy Burns: [after a slight pause] For Christ's sake, Ronnie, it's your birthday. You're alive. You made it! Smile.
- Ron Kovic: [to the reporters on a news camera] My name's Ron Kovic. I'm a Vietnam veteran. I'm here to say that this war is wrong, that this society lied to me, and my brothers. It deceived the people in this country. It tricked them into going 13,000 miles to fight a war against a poor peasant people who have a proud history of resistance, who have been struggling for their own independence for 1,000 years - the Vietnamese people. I can't - I can't find the words to express how the leadership of this government *sickens* me. Now, people say - people say if you don't love America, then get the hell out. Well, I love America. We love the people of America very much. But when it comes to the government, it stops right there. The government is a bunch of corrupt thieves. They are *rapists* and robbers. We are here to say - that we don't have to take it any more. We are here to say - we are here to tell the truth. They're killing our brothers in Vietnam. We want them to hear the truth tonight.
- Ron Kovic: They burned the flag and they demonstrated against us; it's on the cover of the paper today. They have no respect. They have no idea what's going on over there, Mom - the men that are sacrificing their lives. People are dying every day over there, and nobody back here even seems to care. It's a bunch of goddamn shit if you ask me!
- Mrs. Kovic: Ronnie, don't take the Lord's name in vain - not in front of the children. I agree with everything you say!
- Ron Kovic: I served my country - and they just want to take from it - just take, take! Love it or leave it, that's what I think.
- [Ron is attempting to walk in the hospital; Willie is beside him]
- Ron Kovic: How do I look, Willie? Good?
- [drags himself forward]
- Ron Kovic: Hey, I look good?
- Willie: We'll, you're one crazy Marine, Kovic - so gung-ho and everything, but you don't know shit about what's goin' on over here in this country.
- Ron Kovic: Fuck you, Willie.
- Willie: I'm serious man. It ain't about burnin' the flag and Vietnam, man. While we fight for rights over there, we ain't got no rights at home. It's about Detroit and Newark, man. It's about racism, man.
- Ron Kovic: Is that right?
- Willie: Because you can't get no job at home. Vietnam is a white man's war, a rich man's war.
- Ron Kovic: [contemptuously] Where's my money?
- Willie: I'm serious. You gotta read some books, man. There's a revolution going on, Kovic. Brothers are gettin' it together, and if you ain't part of the solution, then you'se part of the problem.
- Ron Kovic: [to the reporters on a news camera] Is that what we get? A spit in the face! We're never going to let the people of the United States forget the Vietnam War. We won't have it. You're not going to sweep it under the rug because you didn't like the ratings - like some television... This wheelchair, our wheelchairs, this steel, our steel, is your Memorial Day on wheels. We are your Yankee Doodle Dandy come home. We're your Yankee Doodle Dandy come home.
- Chaplain - Vietnam: How are you?
- Ron Kovic: [weakly] Tell them - they have to operate on me. There's something wrong with me.
- Chaplain - Vietnam: The doctors are real busy right now. There's a lot of wounded here today. No time for anything except trying to stay alive, so you got to try and stay alive, okay? You hear me? Try and stay alive.
- [pause]
- Chaplain - Vietnam: I've come to give you your last rites. Are you ready?
- Ron Kovic: [weakly] Yeah.
- Chaplain - Vietnam: I am the Resurrection and the Life. He who believes in Me, though he were dead, yet shall he live, and whoever lives and believes in Me shall never die. You brught nothing into this world, and it is certain that you will take nothing out of it. The Lord gives, and the Lord takes away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.
- Ron Kovic: Communism is moving in everywhere.
- Steve Boyer: Oh, yeah, sure. Where, Ronnie? I don't see them. They're not right here in Massapequa, so I'll just take care of number one.
- [Jimmy laughs]
- Steve Boyer: No, that's right, Jimmy. Me, Stevie, number one.
- Ron Kovic: Stevie, Stevie. It's okay. Someone's got to stay home with the women and children while the *men* go do the fightin'.
- Mrs. Kovic: Ronnie, where'd you get this?
- Ron Kovic: Mom, what are you doing in my room, anyway?
- Mrs. Kovic: Don't change the subject. You know I don't allow Playboy magazine in this house.
- Ron Kovic: Stevie gave it to me. I was holding it for Stevie.
- Mrs. Kovic: You have filthy, impure thoughts. God is going to punish you. God is going to punish you for this.
- Ron Kovic: I haven't even looked at it yet, all right?
- Mrs. Kovic: Wait a minute. Wait a minute. I want you to go to confession. I want you to tell Father McKenna. You hear me? And I don't ever want to see this filthy magazine in my house again. Now, take this away!
- Donna: I heard that you were going into the Marines.
- Ron Kovic: Yeah, yeah. It's better than working at A&P.
- Donna: That's great, Ronnie. That's wonderful.
- Ron Kovic: I'm going to boot camp soon. I joined the Marines for four years, so I go to Vietnam. They say I probably go right on the front line.
- Donna: Really?
- Ron Kovic: I'll see a lot of action.
- Donna: Wow.
- Ron Kovic: Our dads got to go to WWII. This is our chance to do something - to be part of history, guys.
- Ron Kovic: Don't you remember what President Kennedy said? There's not gonna be an America any more unless there are people who are willing to sacrifice. I love my country, Dad.