“One small thing…
…you are going to die.” – Death
This opening line sets a uniquely appropriate tone for 2 hours of thought provoking empathy that can only be rejected by a stone. I have never seen a movie that captured my attention and heart with both the storyline and the retrospective emotions of the history I know. A review of any sort would not do the work justice; so, I will simply offer some of the more memorable quotes spoken by Death. The fact that many of these quotes are absent from the movie does not take away from the value of seeing the production; it simply adds to the value of the written work.
- “The only thing worse than a boy who hates you: a boy that loves you.” – Death
- “A small but noteworthy note. I’ve seen so many young men over the years who think they’re running at other young men. They are not. They are running at me.” – Death
- “Is there cowardice with the acknowledgement of fear?” – Death
- “You might well ask just what the hell he was thinking. The answer is, probably nothing at all.He’d probably say he was exercising his God-given right to stupidity.” – Death
- “The consequence of this is that I’m always finding humans at their best and worst. I see their ugly and their beauty, and I wonder how the same thing can be both.” – Death
- “Sometimes people are beautiful. Not in looks. Not in what they say. Just in what they are.” – Death
- “He does something to me, that boy. Every time. It’s his only detriment. He steps on my heart. He makes me cry.” – Death
- “His soul sat up. It met me. Those kinds of souls always do – the best ones. The ones who rise up and say “I know who you are and I am ready. Not that I want to go, of course, but I will come.” Those souls are always light because more of them have been put out. More of them have already found their way to other places.” – Death
- “I wanted to tell the book thief many things, about beauty and brutality. But what could I tell her about those things that she didn’t already know? I wanted to explain that I am constantly overestimating and underestimating the human race-that rarely do I ever simply estimate it. I wanted to ask her how the same thing could be so ugly and so glorious, and its words and stories so damning and brilliant.” – Death
- “Like most misery, it started with apparent happiness.” – Death
- “It kills me sometimes, how people die.” – Death
- “Even death has a heart.” – Death
- “If only she could be so oblivious again, to feel such love without knowing it, mistaking it for laughter.” – Death
- “Somewhere, far down, there was an itch in his heart, but he made it a point not to scratch it. He was afraid of what might come leaking out.” – Death
- “People observe the colors of a day only at its beginnings and ends, but to me it’s quite clear that a day merges through a multitude of shades and intonations with each passing moment. A single hour can consist of thousands of different colors. Waxy yellows, cloud-spot blues. Murky darkness. In my line of work, I make it a point to notice them.” – Death
- “I guess humans like to watch a little destruction. Sand castles, houses of cards, that’s where they begin. Their great skills is their capacity to escalate.” – Death
- “One was a book thief. The other stole the sky.” – Death
- “If they killed him tonight, at least he would die alive.” – Death
- “Five hundred souls. I carried them in my fingers, like suitcases. Or I’d throw them over my shoulder. It was only the the children I carried in my arms.” – Death
- “It’s hard to not like a man who not only notices the colors, but speaks them.” – Death
- “For some reason, dying men always ask the question they know the answer to. perhaps it’s so they can die being right.” – Death
I will close by allowing Death to correct a common misconception of himself,
“A SMALL PIECE OF TRUTH:
I do not carry a sickle or scythe.
I only wear a hooded black robe when it’s cold.
And I don’t have those skull-like facial features you seem to enjoy pinning on me from a distance. You want to know what I truly look like? I’ll help you out. Find yourself a mirror while I continue.”