The Terminal Man (1974)

Richard Dysart: Dr. John Ellis

Photos 

Quotes 

• Benson : [mumbles] 

  Dr. John Ellis : [operating on Benson]  What was that?

  Dr. Robert Morris : Patient.

  Dr. John Ellis : You all right, Mr. Benson?

  Benson : [groggily]  Fine... fine...

  Dr. John Ellis : Any pain?

  Benson : No...

  Dr. John Ellis : Good. Just relax now.

  Benson : You too doctor...

• Dr. John Ellis : [Finishing up a briefing to a large audience of doctors and nurses, prior to the operation that will be performed on Benson]  We have performed this operation successfully on animals 57 times. This will be the first such procedure on a human being.

  Dr. Ezra Manon : [arising from his chair in the back of the audience]  I'm grateful to Dr. Ellis that we are talking about a man, and not an animal. It seems to me that all the technical data, so skillfully expounded, is mere paper over the cracks. The patient is also a paranoid psychotic who is afraid of machines, and afraid that men will be turned *into* machines. Your operation may exaggerate these feelings.

  Dr. John Ellis : I understand the objection, Dr. Manon...

  Dr. Ezra Manon : [cutting him off]  Let me finish! I frankly feel that if somebody stuck wires in my brain, and a computer in my neck, and an atomic battery in my shoulder, I'd wonder if *I* hadn't been turned into a machine.

  Dr. John Ellis : I see what you're saying...

  Dr. Ezra Manon : [cutting him off]  Let me also remind you of the estimated 50 thousand pre-frontal lobotomies performed in the 1940s and 50s for all sorts of mental illnesses and brain diseases. They created an unknown number of human vegetables. Vegetables are easier for mental institutions to control.

  Dr. John Ellis : Well, now, this is *not* a lobotomy...

  Dr. Ezra Manon : [cutting him off]  Those operations were also carried out by physicians who were too eager to act! And they were stopped not by Congress, nor the American Medical Association, nor the American Psychiatric Association, but by the development of new tranquilizing drugs.

  Dr. John Ellis : [Calmly and matter-of-factly]  Mr. Benson has agreed to have this operation.

  [Dr. Manon, looking disgusted, says no more and sits down] 

• Gerhard : Any time you want to begin, Dr Ellis.

  Dr. John Ellis : [Benson hasn't arrived yet]  Thank you. I think we'll wait for the patient.

• Dr. John Ellis : This is the only work I know that's boring and nerve wracking at the same time.

• Dr. John Ellis : Surgery is a craft. Practical. Real. Direct.