Image via Warner Bros.
Published May 12, 2026, 8:55 PM EDT
Lisa Nordin is an actress, writer, and fan of all things performing arts. Her favorite genres are Sci-Fi and Fantasy. She is a self-published author and enjoys exploring how fictional stories help define and qualify the human experience.
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Well-written movie scripts stay with you, whether they impact the way you think or give you a chuckle every time you recall them. The past 10 years of cinema have gifted the world with some wonderful, quotable movies. Whether they were shouted in solidarity, emblazoned on a T-shirt, or became an inside joke with friends and family, the lines written in these movies stayed with their audiences long after the credits rolled.
This list is wide and varied, highlighting the kaleidoscope of entertainment the studios and streamers have produced during the last decade. From box-office blockbusters to animated earworms and even unexpected indie triumphs, the 21st century has been a rich and diverse landscape for original and adaptive storytelling. With an embarrassment of riches to choose from, these 10 stood out from the rest, and chances are their memorable quotes aren’t going away anytime soon.
10 'Sinners' (2025)
Image via Warner Bros.Written and directed by visionary Ryan Coogler, Sinners is a vampire horror film with great depth and intrigue. It broke several Oscar records, including a six-decade-long drought of an actor winning for playing multiple roles. Michael B. Jordan is phenomenal, portraying twin brothers Elijah "Smoke" and Elias "Stack" Moore.
Amid the truly terrifying scenes and stellar special effects, there are some profound and haunting quotes in Sinners. Capturing the essence of the movie, the foreboding “You keep dancing with the devil... one day he's gonna follow you home,” said by Jedidiah (Saul Williams), is one of the best. There are also many lines from the hellish Remmick (Jack O'Connell), who uses his powers of persuasion to turn ordinary people into victims and followers, demonstrating the influence words can have.
9 'Everything Everywhere All at Once' (2022)
Image via A24Everything Everywhere All at Once is an indie movie that took the box office by storm. Written by Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert, it is a cerebral sci-fi from A24, and it focuses on a nuclear family with a multiverse of possibilities for their lives. It won seven Academy Awards, including Best Original Screenplay. Although the setting of the film seems a bit chaotic, the central focus of a middle-aged wife and mother exploring what her life is and isn’t proves to be spellbinding.
The dialogue in Everything Everywhere All at Once is heart-wrenching at times and clever at others. It fluctuates between humor and drama superbly. One of the best quotes from the film is the touching, “So, even though you have broken my heart yet again, I wanted to say... In another life, I would have really liked just doing laundry and taxes with you,” by Ke Huy Quan as Waymond. Another simple statement that means so much is when Michelle Yeoh, as Evelyn, realizes the quiet and unassuming strength Waymond has had all along and says, "I'm learning to fight like you," at the culmination of the battle. Everything Everywhere All at Once is a movie that can be watched multiple times, with something new to take away from each viewing, and its wonderful writing is a large part of that benefit.
8 'Encanto' (2021)
Image via Walt Disney Studios Motion PicturesDisney has a habit of making songs that get stuck in your head. From Frozen’s “Let It Go” to the often dreaded “It’s a Small World,” the staying power of these musical numbers is without question. In 2021, Disney released Encanto, a visually beautiful film full of color, life, and engaging animation. Add to that a fascinating storyline about a family with supernatural gifts, save for one young girl, and Lin-Manuel Miranda’s epic soundtrack, and it was a recipe for success.
Encanto won the Oscar for Best Animated Film and is one of Disney’s best animated films of all time. It is a good thing that the infamous “We Don’t Talk About Bruno,” written by Miranda, is fun and enjoyable, because once you listen to it, it will be stuck in your head for hours. Not since Frozen had a song had such an indelible impact on audiences. In addition to being the inspiration for several internet memes, “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” is so iconic that it was chosen by Disney to become one of three songs reanimated into American Sign Language. Now this fantastic song can be quoted and enjoyed in an entirely new form.
Collider Exclusive · Oscar Best Picture Quiz
Which Oscar Best Picture
Is Your Perfect Movie?
Parasite · Everything Everywhere · Oppenheimer · Birdman · No Country
Five Oscar Best Picture winners. Five completely different visions of what cinema can be — and what it can do to you. One of them is the film that was made for the way your mind works. Ten questions will figure out which one.
🪜Parasite
🌀Everything Everywhere
☢️Oppenheimer
🐦Birdman
🪙No Country for Old Men
FIND YOUR FILM →
01
What kind of film experience do you actually want? The best movies don't just entertain — they leave something behind.
ASomething that pulls the rug out — that makes me think I'm watching one kind of film and then reveals I'm watching another entirely. BSomething overwhelming — funny, sad, absurd, and genuinely moving, all at once. CSomething grand and weighty — a film that makes me feel the full scale of what I'm watching. DSomething formally daring — a film that pushes what cinema can even do. ESomething lean and relentless — pure tension with no wasted frame.
NEXT QUESTION →
02
Which idea grabs you most in a film? Great films are driven by a central obsession. What's yours?
AClass, inequality, and what people are willing to do when desperation meets opportunity. BIdentity, family, and the chaos of trying to hold your life together when everything is falling apart. CGenius, moral responsibility, and the catastrophic weight of a decision you can never take back. DEgo, legacy, and the terror of becoming irrelevant while you're still alive to watch it happen. EEvil, chance, and whether moral order actually exists or if we just tell ourselves it does.
NEXT QUESTION →
03
How do you like your story told? Form is content. The way a story is shaped changes what it means.
AGenre-twisting — I want it to start in one lane and migrate into something completely different. BMaximalist and genre-blending — comedy, action, drama, sci-fi, all in one ride. CEpic and non-linear — cutting between timelines, building a mosaic of cause and consequence. DA single unbroken flow — I want to feel like I'm living it in real time, no cuts to safety. ESpare and precise — every scene doing exactly what it needs to do and nothing more.
NEXT QUESTION →
04
What makes a truly great antagonist? The opposition defines the protagonist. What kind of opposition fascinates you?
AA system — invisible, structural, and almost impossible to fight because it has no single face. BThe self — the ways we sabotage, abandon, and fail the people we love most. CHistory — the unstoppable momentum of events that no single person can stop or redirect. DThe industry — the machinery of culture that chews up talent and spits out irrelevance. EPure, implacable evil — a force so certain of itself it becomes almost philosophical.
NEXT QUESTION →
05
What do you want from a film's ending? The final note is the one that lingers. What do you want it to sound like?
AShock and inevitability — a conclusion that recontextualises everything that came before it. BEarned emotion — I want to cry, laugh, and feel genuinely hopeful, even if the world is a mess. CDevastation and grandeur — an ending that makes me sit in silence for a few minutes after. DAmbiguity — something that leaves enough open that I'm still thinking about it days later. EBleakness — an honest refusal to pretend the world is tidier than it actually is.
NEXT QUESTION →
06
Which setting pulls you in most? Where a film takes place shapes everything — mood, stakes, what's even possible.
AA gleaming modern city with a hidden underside — beauty masking rot, wealth masking desperation. BA collapsing suburban life that opens onto something infinite — the multiverse of a single ordinary person. CThe corridors of power and science at a world-historical turning point — where decisions echo for decades. DThe grimy, alive chaos of New York and Hollywood — fame as both destination and trap. EVast, indifferent landscape — desert and highway where violence arrives without warning or reason.
NEXT QUESTION →
07
What cinematic craft impresses you most? Every great film has a signature — a technical or artistic element that makes it unmistakable.
AProduction design and mise-en-scène — every frame composed to carry meaning beneath the surface. BEditing and tonal control — the ability to move between registers without losing the audience. CScore and sound design — music that becomes inseparable from the dread and awe of what you're watching. DCinematography as performance — the camera not recording events but participating in them. ESilence and restraint — what's left unsaid and unshown doing more work than any dialogue could.
NEXT QUESTION →
08
What kind of main character do you root for? The protagonist is the lens. Who you choose to follow says something about you.
ASomeone smart and resourceful who makes increasingly dangerous decisions under pressure. BSomeone overwhelmed and ordinary who turns out to be capable of something extraordinary. CA brilliant, tortured figure whose gifts and flaws are inseparable from each other. DA self-destructive artist whose ego is both their superpower and their undoing. EA quiet, principled person trying to make sense of a world that has stopped making sense.
NEXT QUESTION →
09
How do you feel about a film that takes its time? Pace is a choice. Some films sprint; others let tension accumulate slowly, deliberately.
AI love a slow build when I know the payoff is going to be seismic — patience for a devastating reveal. BGive me relentless momentum — I want to feel breathless and emotionally spent by the end. CEpic runtime doesn't scare me — if the material demands three hours, give me three hours. DI want it to feel propulsive even when nothing is technically happening — restless energy throughout. EDeliberate and unhurried — I want dread to accumulate in the spaces between the action.
NEXT QUESTION →
10
What do you want to feel walking out of the cinema? The best films leave a mark. What kind of mark do you want?
AUnsettled — like I've just seen something I can't fully explain but can't stop thinking about. BMoved and energised — like the film reminded me what actually matters and gave me something to hold onto. CHumbled — like I've been in the presence of something genuinely important and overwhelming. DExhilarated — like I've just seen cinema doing something it's never quite done before. EHaunted — like a cold, quiet dread that stays with me for days.
REVEAL MY FILM →
The Academy Has Decided Your Perfect Film Is…
Your answers have pointed to one Oscar Best Picture winner above all others. This is the film that was made for the way your mind works.
Parasite
You are drawn to films that operate on multiple levels simultaneously — that begin in one genre and quietly, brilliantly migrate into another. Bong Joon-ho's Parasite is a film about class, desire, and the architecture of inequality that manages to be darkly funny, deeply suspenseful, and genuinely shocking across a single extraordinary running time. Your instinct is for cinema that hides its true intentions until the moment it's ready to reveal them. Parasite is exactly that — a film that rewards close attention and punishes assumptions, right up to its devastating final image.
Everything Everywhere All at Once
You want it all — and this film gives you all of it. The Daniels' Everything Everywhere All at Once is one of the most maximalist films ever made: action comedy, multiverse sci-fi, family drama, existential crisis, and a genuinely earned emotional core that sneaks up on you amid the chaos. You are someone who responds to ambition, who doesn't want cinema to choose between being entertaining and being meaningful. This film refuses that choice entirely. It is overwhelming by design, and its overwhelming nature is precisely the point — because the feeling of being crushed by infinite possibility is exactly what it's about.
Oppenheimer
You are drawn to cinema on a grand scale — films that understand history not as a backdrop but as a force, and that place their characters inside that force and watch what happens. Christopher Nolan's Oppenheimer is a film about the terrifying gap between what we can do and what we should do, told with the full weight of one of the most consequential moments in human history behind it. You want your films to feel important without feeling self-important — to earn their ambition through sheer craft and the gravity of their subject. Oppenheimer does exactly that. It is enormous, complicated, and refuses easy comfort.
Birdman
You are drawn to films that foreground their own construction — that make the how of the filmmaking part of the what it's about. Alejandro González Iñárritu's Birdman, shot to appear as a single continuous take, is cinema examining itself through the cracked mirror of a fading actor's ego. You respond to formal daring, to the feeling that a film is doing something that probably shouldn't be possible. Michael Keaton's performance and Emmanuel Lubezki's restless camera create something genuinely unlike anything else — a film that is simultaneously about creativity, relevance, self-destruction, and the impossibility of ever truly knowing if your work means anything at all.
No Country for Old Men
You are drawn to cinema that trusts silence, that refuses to explain itself, and that treats dread as a form of meaning. The Coen Brothers' No Country for Old Men is a film about the arrival of a new kind of evil — implacable, arbitrary, and utterly indifferent to the moral frameworks we use to make sense of the world. It is one of the most formally controlled films ever made, and its controlled restraint is what makes it so terrifying. You want your films to haunt you, not comfort you. You are not interested in resolution if resolution would be dishonest. No Country for Old Men is honest in a way that most cinema never dares to be.
↻ RETAKE THE QUIZ
7 'Wicked' (2024)
Image via Universal PicturesWhen a work of fiction has been a book, a Broadway play, and finally a motion picture, it is bound to have some staying power. Wicked gave viewers an interwoven and interesting backstory to some of the most iconic characters from the world of The Wizard of Oz. Though the Tony Award-winning songs are catchy enough, screenplay writers Winnie Holzman and Dana Fox were sure to include lines that were well worth remembering sans a score.
“I don't cause commotions — I am one,” is a perfect statement for Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo). Her whole life, she has been different, and it is by nothing she has done; she was simply born that way. Likewise, “The best way to bring folks together is to give them a real good enemy,” fits like a glove for the character of The Wizard (Jeff Goldblum). His MO throughout the film is to use smoke and mirrors to distract the public from any secret or scandal he wants to hide. Though the sequel Wicked: For Good did not quite live up to expectations, the first film is a crowd-pleasing triumph and has made its mark on pop culture, fashion, and more.
6 'KPop Demon Hunters' (2025)
Image via NetflixOne of the best animated movies in the past five years, KPop Demon Hunters was a streaming success that no one saw coming. Made for Netflix and brought to stunning life by Sony Pictures Animation, the extremely popular movie written by Danya Jimenez, Hannah McMechan, and Maggie Kang blended fantasy with mythos and created a genuine treasure. KPop Demon Hunters broke records for viewership and musical achievement and earned both critics’ and audiences’ admiration.
The music of KPop Demon Hunters is integral to the story as the plot follows a singing trio called Huntrix, who are pop stars on stage and demon hunters on the side. The terrific soundtrack earned five Grammy nominations, and “Golden” won for Best Song Written for Visual Media. From the memorable music to fun quips like chanting “couch, couch, couch” when it’s time to lounge, KPop Demon Hunters was an unprecedented phenomenon and continues to leave its mark on the industry.
5 'Black Panther' (2018)
Image via Marvel Studios“Wakanda forever!” Saying the catchphrase from Black Panther is rousing. The stirring cry from the Marvel film evokes multiple emotions within viewers. Tributes to the signature line have been as commonplace as a T-shirt and as lasting as a tattoo. Perhaps the highest honor a movie quote can achieve, several fans have chosen to permanently etch the saying onto their bodies.
When most MCU films leaned more toward action and meta-humor, Black Panther was a breath of fresh air with its complex storytelling and gravitas. Besides the most famous tagline, Black Panther has a plethora of excellent quotes, like Okoye's (Danai Gurira) "Guns, so primitive," and Killmonger's (Michael B. Jordan) poignant "Bury me in the ocean, with my ancestors that jumped from the ships, because they knew death was better than bondage." Written by Ryan Coogler and Joe Robert Cole, Black Panther stands apart from the rest of the MCU and is a unique masterpiece.
4 'Deadpool' (2016)
Image via 20th Century StudiosWhen the protagonist of the movie is known as the “Merc with a Mouth,” some good quotes are sure to follow. Though most of the best quotes from Deadpool can’t be repeated here, the R-rated superhero-flavored hit had audiences rolling with its razor-sharp wit and fourth-wall-breaking asides. Deadpool went on to see two tremendously successful sequels with the third installment, Deadpool & Wolverine, smashing box office records like crazy and raking in $1.338 billion worldwide.
Though any one of the Deadpool movies could be on this list, nothing beats the original. Written by Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick, Deadpool is full of sarcasm, swear words, and swings taken at the comic book and movie industries. Deadpool delivered the snarky, irreverent, and highly entertaining banter fans had been waiting decades for. Deadpool is still quoted by devotees, and the risqué, rude humor only makes it more appealing.
3 'Dune: Part One' (2021)
Image via Warner Bros. PicturesFrank Herbert's epic six-part novel series has been adapted for the large and small screen several times, with each version bringing something new to the table. Herbert’s world-building and lore are so complex that the source material is open to many interpretations, and the writing within it is some of the most memorable. The 2021 feature-length film, written by Jon Spaihts, Denis Villeneuve, and Eric Roth, stars Timothée Chalamet, Rebecca Ferguson, Oscar Isaac, Stellan Skarsgård, Zendaya, and many other noteworthy actors.
Dune: Part One is full of profound quotes about life, death, and fear, including the popular mantra “I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little death that brings obliteration. I will face my fear, and I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past... I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone, there will be nothing. Only I will remain.”
A particularly dramatic scene in Dune: Part One happens when young Paul Atreides (Chalamet) meets the Reverend Mother Mohiam (Charlotte Rampling) for the first time. She instructs him to stick his hand in a mysterious box, and when he asks what’s inside, she simply responds with “Pain.” She also taunts him further with: “An animal caught in a trap will gnaw off its own leg to escape. What will you do?” It is a lasting moment of drama that stays consistent in its impact throughout many iterations of the IP. Dune is a staple in science fiction, and the fact that it keeps being quoted from adaptation to adaptation speaks to its significant legacy.
2 'Barbie' (2023)
Image via Warner Bros.Critics were skeptical when it was announced that a live-action movie was going to be made about this pop-culture icon. Written by Greta Gerwig and Noah Baumbach, Barbie follows one particular Barbie played by Margot Robbie as she ventures outside the bounds of the idyllic Barbie Land and takes a trip to the real world.
Full of fun dance sequences, playful sets and costumes, and lots of Barbie iconography, the movie also has its share of memorable quotes. A lovely one is given to the creator of Barbie, Ruth Handler, played in the movie by Rhea Perlman. It sums up the generational bond Barbie has signified for decades: “We mothers stand still so our daughters can look back and see how far they have come.” It is a sweet moment and a befitting tribute as Handler named her creation after her daughter, Barbara.
There are many quotes and memes that have been circulated since Barbie’s release, and ironically, several of the more popular ones focus on Ken, including taglines like “I’m just Ken,” “I’m Kenough,” and “Kenergy.” Ryan Gosling stole every scene he was in as one of the more predominant Kens featured in the film. With such dynamic acting performances and a trademarked franchise so deeply ingrained within the zeitgeist, it is no wonder that Barbie is one of the most quotable movies of the past 10 years.
1 'Avengers: Endgame' (2019)
Another blockbuster hit on this list from the Marvel Cinematic Universe is the sequel to Avengers: Infinity War, Avengers: Endgame. As the heroic superhero squad known as The Avengers faced their most notorious foe, Thanos (Josh Brolin), there were opportunities for lighthearted banter and more serious dialogue throughout the film. Writers Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely blended the perfect amount of original content and comic book quotes to please new and lifelong fans. Though the film had some great lines delivered by Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.), “Part of the journey is the end,” and Ant-Man (Paul Rudd), “that’s America’s ass,” there is one line that viewers had waited the entire canon for.
Straight from the comic books, and seven years after the first Avengers film debuted, Captain America (Chris Evans) rallies all the heroes in the ultimate battle with the unforgettable “Avengers, assemble.” The fact that two words can have such an emotional payoff is a boon to Markus, McFeely, and, of course, Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. Much like “May the Force be with you,” it is a line so indelibly linked with its source material that you can’t have one without the other. Cleverly saved until the third film by the writers and producers, it became one of the ultimate script-writing pièces de résistance. Avengers: Endgame, without a doubt, has some of the best writing and the best quotes in the entirety of the MCU, and we love it 3,000.
Avengers: Endgame
Release Date April 26, 2019
Runtime 181 Minutes
Writers Keith Giffen, Stan Lee, Larry Lieber, Don Heck, Jim Starlin, Joe Simon, Steve Englehart, Jack Kirby, Steve Gan, Bill Mantlo, Stephen McFeely, Christopher Markus
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Robert Downey Jr.
Tony Stark / Iron Man
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Chris Evans
Steve Rogers / Captain America
English (US) ·