The 1996 film, Jerry Maguire, starring Tom Cruise, Renee Zellweger, and Cuba Gooding Jr., is one of the most acclaimed films of the nineties. It received a Best Picture nomination, and Cuba Gooding Jr. won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role in the film. Not only is Jerry Maguire a great film, but it is full of famous movie quotes.
“Show me the money!” may be the most recognizable movie quote from Jerry Maguire, but it’s hardly the only one. In fact, according to the American Film Institute, the movie contains some of the greatest and most inspirational quotes in movie history.
So grab your goldfish, and let’s look at some of the most memorable quotes from Jerry Maguire.
“Show Me The Money”
Okay, let’s get one of the most famous Jerry Maguire quotes out of the way first.
“Show me the money” was ranked as the 25th best movie quote of all time by the American Film Institute. The line comes as Jerry, who has just been fired, frantically tries to retain his client roster for the new agency he intends to start.
He’s down to Rod Tidwell, Cuba Gooding Jr.‘s character — but Tidwell has some unique demands that Jerry first has to satisfy before he’ll sign with him:
- Jerry Maguire: Show you the money.
- Rod Tidwell: Oh, no, no. You can do better than that, Jerry! I want you to say it with you, with meaning, brother! Hey, I got Bob Sugar on the other line; I bet you he can say it!
- Jerry Maguire: Yeah, yeah, no, no, no. Show you the money.
- Rod Tidwell: No! Not show you! Show me the money!
- Jerry Maguire: Show me the money!
- Rod Tidwell: Yeah! Louder!
- Jerry Maguire: Show me the money!
- Rod Tidwell: Yes, but, brother, you got to yell that shit!
- Jerry Maguire: Show me the money!
- Rod Tidwell: I need to feel you, Jerry!
- Jerry Maguire: Show me the money!
- Rod Tidwell: Jerry, you better yell!
- Jerry Maguire: (screaming) Show me the money! Show me the money!
“You complete me.”
This great moment comes at the end of the movie, when Jerry’s emotional breakthrough is complete.
- Jerry Maguire: I love you. You… you complete me.
There’s also a symmetry here. When Dorothy (Renee Zellweger‘s character) joins Jerry’s venture, they encounter a couple in the elevator, and the man signs this very phrase to his lover.
“You had me at hello.”
This memorable quote has also made it on the American Film Institute’s list, at #52. It comes at the end of the film, right after “you complete me,” in what is surely one of the most famous scenes in this great movie:
- Jerry Maguire: I love you. You… you complete me. And I just…
- Dorothy: Shut up… just shut up. You had me at “hello. You had me at “hello.”
“Help me help you.”
- Jerry Maguire: I am out here for you. You don’t know what it’s like to be ME out here for YOU. It is an up-at-dawn, pride-swallowing siege that I will never fully tell you about, okay? Help me… help you. Help me, help you.
“I had a breakdown. Breakdown? No, breakthrough.”
This might not be one of the most famous lines in Jerry Maguire. But it really sets up the premise of the movie. It comes at the beginning, as Jerry recounts the series of events that led him to change his entire thinking about his job as a sports agent.
As he puts it, he “had lost the ability to bullsh*t.” Maybe it looked like a mid-life crisis, or a mental breakdown. But it wasn’t. This is the mission statement that changes Jerry’s life and sets up the premise for the film.
- Jerry Maguire: (narrating) Who had I become? Just another shark in a suit? Two nights later at a conference in Miami I had a breakdown. Breakdown? No, breakthrough. I couldn’t escape one single thought: I hated myself. No, no, here’s what it was: I hated my place in the world. I had so much to say and no one to listen. And then, suddenly, it happened. It was the oddest, most out-of-the-ordinary thing. I began writing what they call a mission statement. Not a memo, a mission statement. You know, a suggestion for the future of our company. A night like this doesn’t come along very often. I seized it. What started out as one page became twenty-five. Suddenly, I was my father’s son again. I was remembering the simple pleasures of this job, how I ended up here out of law school, the way a stadium sounds when one of my players performs well on the field. The way we are meant to protect them in health and in injury. There were so many clients that we forgot what was important. I wrote and wrote and wrote, and I’m not even a writer. I was even remembering the words of the original sports agent, my mentor, the late, great, Dickie Fox who said “The key to this business is personal relationships.” And suddenly, it was all pretty clear. The answer was fewer clients, less money. More attention. Caring for them. Caring for ourselves. And the games, too. Starting our lives. Really, I’ll be the first to admit, what I was writing was somewhat- touchy feely. I didn’t care. I had lost the ability to bullsh*t. It was the me I had always wanted to be. I ran out in the middle of the night to find an all night CopyMat before i could change my mind. It looked incredible. Even the cover looked like The Catcher in the Rye. I entitled it “The Things We Think And Do Not Say: The Future of Our Business.”
- CopyMat Employee: That’s how you become great, man. Hang your balls out there.
- Jerry: Thanks.
“That’s how you become great, man. Hang your balls out there.”
The first person to see Jerry Maguire’s new mission statement is an employee at CopyMat that helped print it. He offers this memorable quote of approval in the film.
- Jesus Of CopyMat: That’s how you become great, man. Hang your balls out there.
- Jerry: Thanks.
NERD NOTE: If you are a fan of alternative and grunge music, then the person who plays the role of the Jesus of CopyMat in Jerry Maguire might look familiar. It’s none other than Jerry Cantrell from Alice In Chains. Cantrell is a friend of Cameron Crowe, the writer and director of Jerry Maguire. Accoring to Cantrell, Crowe cast him in the film just so he could see Cantrell dressed up in preppy clothes.
“These fish have manners.”
In his final moments at the company that he helped found, Jerry Maguire gives an odd but memorable speech. He takes a fish with “manners” out of the office fish tank and makes a public request for some of his colleagues to follow him on his way out.
- Jerry Maguire: Well, don’t worry. Don’t worry. I’m not gonna to do what you all think I’m gonna to do, which is just FLIP OUT! But let me just, let me just say, as I ease out of the office I helped build — I’m sorry, but it’s a FACT! — that there is such a thing as manners, a way of treating people.
- Jerry Maguire: (Noticing the fish tank nearby) These fish have manners. These fish have manners. In fact, they’re coming with me. I’m starting a new company, and the fish will come with me. You can call me sentimental. The fish — they’re coming with me.
- Jerry Maguire: (scoops a fish out of the tank) Okay. If anybody else wants to come with me, this moment will be the moment of something real, and FUN, and inspiring in this god-forsaken business, and we will do it together. Who’s coming with me? Who’s coming with me? Who’s coming with me besides “Flipper,” here?
- Jerry Maguire: (looks around) This is embarrassing. Wendy?
- Wendy: Oh Jerry, I’m three months away from the pay increase.
- Jerry Maguire: Ok. Ok. (starts to walk out)
- Dorthy: (stands up) I will go with you.
- Jerry Maguire: (happily surprised) Dorothy Boyd, thank you!
- Dorthy: (whispers) Right now?
- Jerry Maguire: (nods)
- Coworker: (quietly whispers) Don’t do it.
- Dorthy: (sternly whispers) Shhh!
- Jerry Maguire: We’ll see you all again. Sleep tight.
“Did you know that the human head weighs 8 pounds?”
This list of famous quotes from Jerry Maguire wouldn’t be complete without a quote from the adorable Ray, played by a very young Jonathan Lipnicki. In the film, Jerry and Ray have great relationship and this scene is a great example of the on set chemistry between Tom Cruise and Jonathan Lipnicki.
- Ray: Did you know that the human head weighs 8 pounds?
- Jerry Maguire: Did you know that Troy Aikman, in only six years, has passed for 16,303 yards?
- Ray: D’you know that bees and dogs can smell fear?
- Jerry Maguire: Did you know that the career record for hits is 4,256 by Pete Rose who is NOT in the Hall of Fame?
NERD NOTE: According to IMDB, child actor Jonathan Lipnicki was a little chatterbox during production of Jerry Maguire. One day he showed up on set telling everyone that “the human head weighs eight pounds”. After director Cameron Crowe heard the line, he thought it was so funny that he decided to add it to the script.
“Don’t cry at the beginning of a date. Cry at the end, like I do.”
In a movie with many funny quotes, this is one of the funniest.
It’s uttered by Dorothy’s overprotective sister, Laurel, when Dorothy and Jerry are about to go out on a first date. Dorothy, who’s pretty much always been in love with Jerry, gets a little teary; that’s when Laurel uses this line to get her sister to compose herself.
- Laurel: Don’t cry at the beginning of a date. Cry at the end, like I do.
Throughout the movie, Laurel is always looking out for her little sister. It’s one of those beautiful aspects of the film — it’s not all about the relationship between Jerry and Dorothy. There are plenty of great side relationships, too, including that between Laurel and Dorothy, and between Jerry and Rod.
“I love him for the man he wants to be. And I love him for the man he almost is.”
Dorothy and Jerry’s romantic life is a big part of the movie’s story arc.
Jerry’s job is his whole life, and his budding relationship with Dorothy seems—at least for Jerry’s part—very workmanlike. But not so for Dorothy. She’s admired him from the beginning, even before his life-changing “mission statement.”
This line comes after their first night together, when Dorothy gushes to her sister about her love for Jerry, and her optimism about what he can become:
- Dorothy: I love him! I love him for the man he wants to be. And I love him for the man he almost is.
“I love my wife. I love my life. And I wish you my kind of success.”
Finally, we have this gem from the close of the movie.
Throughout the film, we get little snippets of advice from Jerry’s “late, great mentor” Dicky Fox. They often correlate with some part of Jerry’s emotional journey, and the closing line pretty much sums up Jerry’s final discovery of happiness:
- Dicky Fox: Hey, I don’t have all the answers. In life, to be honest, I failed as much as I have succeeded. But I love my wife. I love my life. And I wish you my kind of success.
The Best Jerry Maguire Quotes
Whether it’s “show me the money” or “you had me at hello,” Jerry Maguire is chock-full of memorable quotes. It’s a classic movie, and we’re pretty sure people will be quoting it for a long time to come.
If you’ve enjoyed this article, go ahead and check out some of MethodShop’s other movie quotes articles.
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