Frost/Nixon (2008) - 6 quotes

James Reston, Jr.: You know the first and greatest sin of the deception of television is that it simplifies; it diminishes great, complex ideas, trenches of time; whole careers become reduced to a single snapshot. At first I couldn't understand why Bob Zelnick was quite as euphoric as he was after the interviews, or why John Birt felt moved to strip naked and rush into the ocean to celebrate. But that was before I really understood the reductive power of the close-up, because David had succeeded on that final day, and getting for a fleeting moment what no investigative journalist, no state prosecutor, no judiciary committee or political enemy had managed to get; Richard Nixon's face swollen and ravaged by loneliness, self-loathing in defeat. The rest of the project and its failings would not only be forgotten, they would totally cease to exist.

Richard Nixon: I let them down. I let down my friends, I let down my country, and worst of all I let down our system of government, and the dreams of all those young people that ought to get into government but now they think; 'Oh it's all too corrupt and the rest'. Yeah... I let the American people down. And I'm gonna have to carry that burden with me for the rest of my life. My political life is over.

Richard Nixon: Whenever I have had my doubts I remembered the construction worker in Philadelphia because he came up to me and he said 'Sir I got only one criticism of that Cambodia thing; if you'd gone in earlier you might have captured the gun that killed my boy three months ago'. So you're asking me do I regret going into Cambodia?... No, I don't. You know what, I wish I'd gone in sooner. And harder!

Richard Nixon: Why would I want to talk to David Frost?

Swifty Lazar: I've got half a million dollars.

Richard Nixon: Really?

David Frost: I've had an idea for an interview: Richard Nixon.

John Birt: You're a talk show host. I spent yesterday watching you interview the Bee Gees.

David Frost: Weren't they terrific?

David Frost: Are you really saying that the president can do something illegal?

Richard Nixon: I'm saying that when the president does it, that means it's not illegal.

David Frost: ...I'm sorry?