Daily Dialogue — December 12, 2017
Fletcher: [picks up a blue pen] Okay, the pen is red… the pen is red. The color of this pen is ruh-ruh-ruh-ruh [laughs] This pen is…
Fletcher: [picks up a blue pen] Okay, the pen is red… the pen is red. The color of this pen is ruh-ruh-ruh-ruh [laughs] This pen is reeeeeeeeeeehhh- [struggle] The color of the pen that I HOLD in my hand is rrrrr-rrroyal blue!
He falls to the floor exhausted.
Fletcher: AHH! [grabs a piece of paper] Okay, if I can’t say it, I’ll write it!
He starts writing “The color of the pen is…“ but his hand shakes away involuntarily.
Fletcher: No! You write! Write it!
His hand points the pen at himself and he wrestles it to the ground.
Greta: [enters the office] Mister Reede? Are you all right?
Fletcher: [rises from behind the desk with ‘Blue’ written all over his face] It’s blue. It’s blue! The god damn pen is blue!
— Liar Liar (1997), written by Paul Guay, Stephen Mazur
The Daily Dialogue theme for the week: Lie.
Trivia: When Fletcher is having the pen war in his office, he comes up from behind the desk with the word Blue written all over his face. On his left jaw, “B.B. King” is written among all the blues.
Dialogue On Dialogue: The central conceit of the movie is this: “A fast-track lawyer can’t lie for 24 hours due to his son’s birthday wish after he turns his son down for the last time.” The dialogue featured here and in the scene below demonstrates the power of the birthday wish over Fletcher’s instinct to lie.