Lawman (1971)

Burt Lancaster: Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox

Photos 

Quotes 

• Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : I'm a lawman. Do you know what a lawman is, Crowe? He's a killer of men. That's what the job calls for. There are new ways to put it, but it reads the same. That's the difference between us, and it's all the difference I need.

• Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : I remember you at Fort Bliss.

  Sabbath Marshal Cotton Ryan : That's my trouble. Everybody remembers me at Fort Bliss.

• Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : It's always the same. If you post a man, he has to come into town to prove he's a man. Or you kill a man, he's got a friend or kin -- he just has to come against you... and for no reason... no reason that makes any sense. And it don't mean a damn to the man already in the ground. Nobody wins.

• Crowe Wheelwright : He didn't have a chance! You don't even care, do you Maddox?

  Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : No... No, I don't care. You say he didn't have a chance. He went for his gun first. When he does that, he uses up all his chances.

• Lucas : I know what you're doin' is wrong, Maddox. You were wrong in San Acoma. You're wrong here.

  Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : Not from where I stand.

  Lucas : You can't see from where you stand.

• Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : On the way back, they hit a town called Bannock. They drank their fill, had their women, shot up the town - all just cowboy fun. They killed an old man.

• Minister : Is there something you wanted?

  Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : Can't say there is, minister.

  Minister : A man comes to the house of God, he comes to seek.

  Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : I'm not a believing man, minister.

  Minister : Then why have you come?

  Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : A man doesn't see many churches like this in a town like Sabbath.

  Minister : The shape of the house of God is unimportant.

  Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : That's not so, minister. The kind of church man builds to pray in tells you a lot about the man. Further south there are some fine old adobe churches - Mexican. They're cool and dark inside. Give a man peace. They're made for kneelin'. This one's made for standin' upright.

  Minister : There is no easy comfort from God.

• Sabbath Marshal Cotton Ryan : It's a great life. If you were some cheap gunsel with a big name running out in front of you, they'd all be buying you drinks... rubbing up against you... fixing up what they're going to tell their kids and the ones who weren't there. But if you're a lawman, you're a disease. They need you, but they hate you.

  Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : It comes with the job.

• Minister : Why do you ask me?

  Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : I figured you'd be the one man in this town who'd find it difficult to lie to me.

• Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : I don't call the numbers, Ryan. I never drew first on a man in my life. That's the only way to stay clean - you play it by the rules. Without the rules, you're nothing!

• Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : You can't break the rules, Laura.

  Laura Shelby : Oh, the rules! I forgot the rules. You think they change the killing? Because you never draw on a man first, you think that really matters? Do you know what they call you, Jared? The widowmaker!

• Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : A man gets caught in his own doing. You can't change what you are. And if you try, something always calls you back.

• Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : Which one has the words? You're the store keeper - Luther Harris, ain't it? Let me say them for you. You want me out of your town. What happened some other time some other place ain't your trouble. I've seen men like you in every town in the West. You want the law, but you want it to walk quiet. You don't want it to put a hole in your pocket. You take courage from each other and you come armed. Well, there are enough of you. All you need is one man with enough stomach to die first. I'm not leaving until what I came for is done. So if you plan to do anything about it do it now or go home.

• Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : He'll go back to Bannock and stand trial.

  Laura Shelby : Will they hang him?

  Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : The circuit judge is no hanging judge. In fact, a man like Bronson could buy him cheap.

  Laura Shelby : I don't mean just the judge. I mean the town, the good people with the rope.

  Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : It's my town, Laura. Nobody gets a mob rope in my town. You know that. I give you my word. If he comes in peaceful, there will be no hurt come to him.

  Laura Shelby : You never did give much away.

• Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : Any free land around here?

  [Vernon doesn't answer] 

  Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : I asked you a question, mister.

  Vernon Adams : Only high up. South of the river there's some for the buyin'.

  Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : Good land?

  Vernon Adams : [contemptuously]  Men like you don't buy land, Maddox. You don't buy it, and you don't work it.

• Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : Would you have come, Laura, if you're man hadn't been on the list?

  Laura Shelby : No. There's nothing left, Jared.

• Bannock Marshal Jared Maddox : [to Crowe, who just threatened to kill him]  There's been enough.