What we've got here is (a) failure to communicate

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The phrase "What we've got here is (a) failure to communicate" is a famous line from the 1967 film Cool Hand Luke.

There are actually two close variants of the line that are spoken at different points in the film. Nuances of accent, delivery, and intonation aside, they are as follows:

"What we've got here is...failure to communicate." — spoken by "The Captain", the imperious prison warden played by Strother Martin, near the epitasis of the storyline.
"What we've got here is a failure to communicate." — spoken by "Luke", the reprobate inmate played by Paul Newman near the catastrophe of the action.

The context of the line, as it is first delivered in the film, is a young prisoner, Luke, refusing to sacrifice his dignity under the instruction of the brutal prison Captain. Having just been captured and returned to the chain gang after a clever and daring but all too brief escape, Luke mocks the despotic affectations of benevolence on the part of the Captain. The outraged Captain lashes out and strikes Luke, who then falls and rolls down the hill. While Luke remains slumped in the culvert beside them on the roadway, the frustrated Captain recovers his composure and delivers the line, pronouncing his summary judgment of the problem: that it can be nothing more than a matter of Luke failing to understand the one-way nature of the communication that is incumbent on his present demotion in social status. The line is an opening for a warning speech directed to the other prisoners who are watching.

The theme is recapitulated during the final action of the main plot. As evening falls, Luke's third escape from prison brings him to a roughhewn country church hall, where he seeks shelter and makes his last despairing attempt to communicate with "the Maker", who he believes made him the way he is. Quickly surrounded by the flashing lights of police cars, Luke is entreated to surrender by his adoptive sidekick, the character handled "Dragline" (George Kennedy). Laughing at the irony, Luke goes to the window — to either concede defeat, size up the enemy, or taunt his captors one more time — and he speaks his rendition of the line, this time being a stark allusion to the ironic way that God has answered his plea, and the posse instantly shoots him.

In contemporary usage the line is usually an illustrative mockery of the principle behind it; the allocation of blame or fault for refusal to agree with or accept a powerful nemesis. The phrase is often articulated with a Southern American drawl in imitation of the character who first delivered the line.

The phrase is one of the AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movie Quotes of 2005.

[edit] Uses of the phrase

1967 - The phrase is first used in the motion picture Cool Hand Luke, delivered by actor Strother Martin.
1984 – In the TV series The Dukes of Hazzard (episode "Cool Hands, Bo and Luke"), the phrase is uttered by Colonel Cassius Claiborne (Morgan Woodward) when addressing inmates Bo and Luke Duke after a failed escape attempt.
1991 - Hard rock band Guns N' Roses sample the line, and its ensuing speech, direct from the film for the introduction to their song "Civil War", from their Geffen album Use Your Illusion II.
Jim Carrey played a prison warden in a skit on the comedy show In Living Color (1990-1994). When a riot broke out, Carrey uttered the phrase before being immediately overcome by the inmates.
1993 - Used once in the Rugrats episode "Cool Hand Angelica".
1993 - Uttered by Kramer in the Seinfeld episode "the Puffy Shirt"
1995 - Damon Wayans uses the line in the film Major Payne.
1997 - The Frasier episode "Three Days of the Condo" uses the line as the title for one of its scenes.
2000 - Terry Pratchett uses the line in his novel The Truth (vocalized by Mr. Pin).
2002 - The line is quoted by the bandit unit in Blizzard Entertainment's Warcraft 3.
2003 - In CSI Miami episode Hard Time, the parole officer uses the line. Horatio Caine smiles, and they both say they liked that movie.
2004 - Robbie Coltrane uses the line on his television series Cracker after an argument that resulted in a woman throwing a glass of water in his face.
2005 - MF Doom uses the line on the song "El Chupa Nibre" on the DANGERDOOM album.
2005 - Roddy Piper uses the line during a segment of Piper's Pit at WrestleMania 21.
2006 - "Failure to Communicate" is the title of an episode of the television series House in a reference to a patient's word salad inflected speech.
In a Johnny Bravo episode, where Johnny is wrongfully imprisoned, the warden repeatedly uses the phrase. However, Johnny always replies with "What?" The warden thinks Johnny is ridiculing her and proceeds to beat him up, however it turns out Johnny was saying that because he couldn't hear her for some reason.
In the game Sam & Max Hit The Road, when talking to the cat outside the Freelance Police's office Sam use this phrase when the cat don't respond to his questions.