Prophecy Quotes

M'Rai This camp is as the old people did it. I'm teaching these young people so that someone here will remember. There are underground tunnels beneath the frost line to store perishables. The forest provides more food than a man could possibly need. Here, everything grows big—real big.

Robert Well, I saw a salmon that, uh, took my breath away.

M'Rai It is the garden of Eden. I've let no one come here. You are the first to see it.

Maggie It's magical.

Hawks We were once a magical people.

Ramona It's true. When I was a child, every rock, every tree had a story. The whole forest was filled with legends.

Maggie We heard about one of them.

Ramona Yes?

Maggie Uh, katydah, something.

Ramona Katahdin.

M'Rai Katahdin is no legend.

Ramona My grandfather is the oldest person in our tribe. It's his duty to foster these beliefs.

M'Rai I have seen him.

Maggie And what does he look like?

M'Rai He is part of all things created. And he bears a mark of each of God's creatures.

Maggie You say that with great affection.

M'Rai He has awakened to protect us.

Hawks The environment is us. And it's being mangled. And I'm gonna make something very clear to you. My people are violently ill. They're beginning to lose their faculties. They stagger and they fall, and this has nothing to do with alcohol, as these villagers claim. My people are fishermen; their lives are clean.

Ramona I'm a midwife, and I've seen children born dead, born deformed.

Hawks So badly, some have had to be put to death.

Ramona Three times we have been to the Government, and three times they've turned us away.

Hawks You see, the end of this forest is the end of my people. Don't talk about the environment as though it had nothing to do with us.

Robert Can these people help us?

Hawks They can send someone from the village.

Robert Send them. Tell them to get people here. I want people to see this. Is there a newspaper in town?

Hawks Yes.

Robert Get them here with a camera... and people from that paper mill... and that sheriff.

Hawks Not that sheriff. I can't do that.

Robert Hawks! He'll see the truth here and you have more here at stake in this truth than I have.

Dr. Robert Verne Described as the most potent neurotoxin of the post-World War II age. Used from 1948 to 1956 in pulping processes as a cheap and effective caustic agent that prevents algae from forming on waterlogged timber. It is also known for its mutagenic properties, concentrating in the bodies of fish and plankton-eating crustacea, affecting the fetal development of everything that ingests it. The ratio of toxin to blood level is 30% higher in the developing fetus than in the host. It was discovered, after extensive testing, that it is the only mutagen that jumps the placental barrier, concentrating in fetal blood cells, where it adheres to the DNA and corrupts the chromosomes.

Taglines She is alive and will grow to be 15 feet tall. With teeth and talons that are razor sharp, with flesh twisted and warped. She will kill. She will find you.

John Hawks I'm gonna tell you right now!! You cut my head off before you cut these trees!!

Maggie I believe him.

Robert Why?

Maggie Why would he have offered to let you test the water?

Robert Maybe it wasn't in the water.

Maggie Huh?

Robert Maybe it's heavier than the water. That silvery stuff on your boot... is it dry?

Maggie Yes.

Robert They gave us a trick question in medical school. What's the only liquid in the world that isn't wet?

Maggie What was the answer?

Robert Mercury.

Isley These people are from the Environmental Protection Agency. I'd appreciate being let through.

Hawks No car from the lumber company gets through here.

Isley This is against the law, John.

Hawks The law has not brought justice.

Isley The Supreme Court has issued a restraining order against this blockade.

Hawks And which Supreme Court is that, Mr. Isley?

Isley The Supreme Court of the United States.

Hawks Yes, we've tried that Supreme Court. Now we're going to one that's higher.

Taglines The Monster Movie.

Taglines It is not an offspring of witchcraft or Satan. It was created by man. It will grow to be 15 feet tall. It will have huge eyes, webbed hands, hooked claws. It will walk upright. And it will mindlessly, mercilessly, kill every living thing it meets.

Maggie Rob, what is it?

Robert It's methylmercury poisoning, that's what it is. This whole place has been contaminated.

Maggie How do you know?

Robert The Indians eat the fish, and they behave like they're drunk when they haven't had a drop of liquor. That raccoon convulsing and turning vicious, its brain turned to mush. Even that old man, that Indian, you saw the burns on his fingers.

Maggie Is that from mercury?

Robert It's from cigarettes; the reason he didn't feel it is from mercury. You see, it acts on the nervous system; it destroys the brain.

Taglines She Lives. Don't Move. Don't Breathe. She Will Find You.

Dr. Robert Verne Inorganic methylmercury, known as PMT, used as a desliming agent that collects algae and prevents it from forming on preprocessed timber. Its widespread use discontinued in 1956 when evidence of its fatal effects... were seen in the deaths of 100,000 people in Minamata, Japan.

Dr. Robert Verne A developing fetus goes through certain distinct phases. Each phase represents a specific stage of evolution. A human fetus, for instance. At one stage, it's a fish. It looks like a fish; it's got fins and gills. At another, it's amphibian—webbed hands; at another, reptilian; at another, it's feline—developing upward in the distinct shapes and phases of the evolutionary scale. If this chemical, methylmercury, adheres to the DNA—DNA's a chromosomal fixative—it could freeze certain parts at one evolutionary stage, while the other parts continue growing. A pregnant animal ingests the fish, and it corrupts the fetus to a point where it gives birth to a monster.

John Hawks The environment is us. And it's being mangled. And I'm gonna make something very clear to you. My people are violently ill. They're beginning to lose their faculties. They stagger and they fall, and this has nothing to do with alcohol, as these villagers claim. My people are fishermen; their lives are clean.

Robert What's going on here?

Isley There were more killings in the forest last night. We're not waiting for any more.

Robert Who was killed?

Isley A family up at Mary's Bend.

Robert What makes you think these people had anything to do with it?

Isley They're guilty as hell, Vern.

Sheriff I want the following people to step forward as their names are read! John Hawks!

Robert Where's the evidence?

Isley The evidence is at the hospital! It's in baskets!

Hector M'Rai This camp is as the old people did it. I'm teaching these young people so that someone here will remember. There are underground tunnels beneath the frost line to store perishables. The forest provides more food than a man could possibly need. Here, everything grows big—real big.

Maggie Jumps the placental barrier. What does that mean?

Robert It's a mutagen.

Maggie A mutagen. What is that?

Robert Freakism! Freakism! That's what's been going on out there. That's why there's a goddamn salmon five feet long, and a tadpole the size of what a bullfrog should be! And stillbirths.

Maggie What?

Robert That's what that Indian woman said. And deformed children. And God knows what else has been going on out there.

Maggie So if a pregnant animal ate some fish, it could—

Robert Yes. My God. Is it possible?

Maggie Yes.

Robert The size of a dragon.

Maggie What?

Robert The size of a dragon. Isn't that what Isley said at the airport? And something about eyes, cat's eyes. And the old man, the Indian. Didn't he describe that creature as being a... part of everything in God's creation? Isn't that what he said?

Maggie Yes.