- Amos Odell: Oh, yeah? What about you? You think the whole world is against you because you're black. Something don't go your way, it's because you're black. They're out of beer at the supermarket, it's because you're black. It rains and you get wet, it's because you're a black man. You saw for yourself there ain't no conspiracy here, no plot to get you off the island, nobody trying to assassinate you. That's all just as crazy thinking that everybody with black skin is your brother.
- Andrew Sterling: What do you know about Black skin?
- Amos Odell: I know for all your talk, you're about the whitest damn Black man I ever met.
- Andrew Sterling: You ever been to New York City?
- Amos Odell: Uh-uh.
- Andrew Sterling: I grew up in New York. We lived in a nice part of Harlem. When I was 12, I came home one day with some friends. We were talking loudly and using the slang we'd learned in the streets. My father overheard us. He told my friends to leave. Then he marched me into the bathroom and washed my mouth out with soap. It was because he didn't want me sounding Black. He was an educated man, my father. He had a college degree, just like his father. He was an accountant, just like his father. He worked for a big New York firm. There were only two Black men in the whole building: my father and the janitor. After 38 years, he retired a full partner. Less than a week later, he died. Not one person from that job came to his funeral. 38 years of his life, and not one white face. Only that broken-down old janitor cared enough to show up. My father made it in the white man's world. He wanted his son to make in the white man's world, too. But don't you for one second think that I've forgotten who I am, or where I come from.
- Amos Odell: Look. I'm not holding you hostage anymore, OK? But you got to know, we're in this together now, right? You and me. Amos and Andrew. Let's go.
- Andrew Sterling: Don't say that.
- Amos Odell: What?
- Andrew Sterling: Our names... together.
- Amos Odell: W-Why?
- Andrew Sterling: Well, I'll spare you the history lesson. Besides, you wouldn't understand.
- Amos Odell: What do you mean, I wouldn't understand? You don't understand, man. We're gangsters. We're outlaws.
- Andrew Sterling: Gangsters? Outlaws? You're a nickel-and-dime criminal, a petty crook. And you to figure out very quickly where it is you think your going. Because let me tell you, white boy, you are definitely headed in the wrong direction. I've had enough of this. I'm going home.
- Amos Odell: You give me a million dollars, I give you a hostage. You give me a helicopter, I give you a hostage. You let me fly out of here...
- Chief of Police Cecil Tolliver: All right. All right. I saw the damn movie.
- Chief of Police Cecil Tolliver: Son, I'm afraid I'm going to have to take that tape.
- Ernie: What about the First Amendment?
- Chief of Police Cecil Tolliver: Fuck the First Amendment.
- Judy Gillman: It was an honest mistake.
- Andrew Sterling: It was supposed to be different. It was supposed to be the kind of place where you don't lock your doors at night, where you don't count your change at the grocery store, where a man in his own home doesn't have to worry about being shot at and nearly killed by the local police simply because he's Black!