Summary

• "You Said Science Was About Admitting What We Don't Know." - Highlights the important relationship between Joseph Cooper and his daughter, Murphy.
• "Our Survival Instinct Is Our Single Greatest Source Of Inspiration." - Shows the connection between struggle and extraordinary acts.
• "We Must Reach Far Beyond Our Own Lifespans." - Explores the idea of leaving a lasting impact and thinking beyond oneself.

The best Interstellar quotes not only sum up the themes of the movie but are generally thought-provoking lines. Joseph Cooper (Matthew McConaughey) and his daughter Murph (Jessica Chastain) are only two of the highly intelligent characters that make up the core cast of the movie. With scientists, astronauts, and advanced robots as the main characters, Interstellar is bursting with smart dialogue about scientific and philosophical concepts.

As a black hole and a wormhole in space feature prominently in the movie's plot, there's a lot of theoretical science being mentioned in the dialogue throughout Interstellar. However, the best quotes offer deep insights into the minds of the Interstellar main characters. Many of the core relationships in the film change drastically as the story progresses and several trusted characters are exposed as liars, and certain quotes take on a different meaning once their lies have been discovered. Dissecting some of the most memorable Interstellar quotes can therefore uncover some hidden details within the film.

15 "You Said Science Was About Admitting What We Don't Know."

Murphy Cooper

Joseph Cooper's relationship with his daughter, Murphy, forms the foundation of what Interstellar is all about, and the ways in which they inspire each other to do good things begins and ends with Murphy's trusting nature towards her father. The knowledge passed between parent and child in the movie cuts both ways, which this Interstellar quote shows as Murph reminds Cooper of something that he once taught her. Most interestingly, this happens near the beginning of the film and foreshadows Murphy being older than her father by the end of the film due to the influence of the black hole, becoming a wise figure who advises him by the end.

14 "We Didn't Run Out Of Television Screens And Planes, We Ran Out Of Food."

School Principal

A number of interesting ideas are brought up throughout Interstellar and not just by characters who work in some kind of scientific field. Even though some characters' beliefs and actions aren't heroic or even cast in a positive light, they are still reasoned by the characters themselves. The teachers at Cooper's local high school, for example, are somewhat villainous and ignorant yet have a logic behind their policies. In this thought-provoking Interstellar quote, the school's principal (David Oyelowo) reminds Cooper why farmers have become more important than engineers in their world.

13 "Don't Trust The Right Thing Done For The Wrong Reason. The Why Of The Thing, That's The Foundation."

Donald

Joseph Cooper's father-in-law, Donald (John Lithgow), provides an interesting counterbalance to Cooper's wide-eyed star-gazing with a realistic approach to life that keeps Coop more grounded. As this Interstellar quote shows, his character, though not as prominent as many other supporting roles, is an interesting juxtaposition to other authority figures throughout the story such as the seemingly wise Professor Brand (Michael Caine) and the ultimately villainous Dr. Mann (Matt Damon), whose big words turn out to be little more than lies told to help them in avoiding harsh realities.

12 "Accident Is The First Building Block Of Evolution."

Dr. Amelia Brand

Many mistakes happen throughout Interstellar's story, and many characters feel deep regret over their actions and how things turn out. Yet, it all comes good in the end, and humanity not only survives but changes into something potentially greater. Dr. Amelia Brand (Anne Hathaway) reminds the audience of the scientific principle behind this as she explains why the presence of a black hole has prevented certain worlds near it from being habitable for humans. Without sudden events like asteroid strikes, that would have been sucked into the black hole, the planets haven't had the same kind of transformative events as Earth.

11 "Our Survival Instinct Is Our Single Greatest Source Of Inspiration."

Dr. Mann

Though he's ultimately revealed to be one of the most villainous characters from Christopher Nolan's movies, Dr. Mann is fittingly convincing as a hopeful and selfless astronaut until he shows his true colors. This Interstellar quote comes as he explains to Cooper why robots weren't sent on the movie's perilous colonization missions. He says that their lack of a fear of death prevents them from performing well in situations that require improvisation. Similar to Brand's observation about accidents and evolution, it reminds the audience that struggles in extraordinary circumstances provoke extraordinary acts, which makes it a very inspiring quote that's given by a very villainous character.

10 "You Might Have To Decide Between Seeing Your Children Again And The Future Of The Human Race."

Dr. Amelia Brand

Drama is all about stakes, and the stakes laid out by Dr. Amelia Brand in this Interstellar quote are about as high as they get. Choosing between their own family and the survival of the species is the most difficult decision a person could be expected to make and the gravity of the movie’s premise and its characters’ mission really settles in with this quote. It's a pretty far-fetched dilemma for a person to realistically face, but the movie does a great job of making the audience take it seriously.

9 "We Must Reach Far Beyond Our Own Lifespans."

Professor Brand

Whenever Joseph Cooper and Professor Brand converse in the film it's a meeting of two great minds with conflicting ideas. Professor Brand tells Cooper early in the film. “We must confront the reality that nothing in our solar system can help us...We’re not meant to save the world. We’re meant to leave it, and this is the mission you were trained for.” Cooper says, “I’ve got kids, Professor,” and Professor Brand tells him: "Then get out there and save them. We must reach far beyond our own lifespans. We must think not as individuals but as a species. We must confront the reality of interstellar travel." It's a particularly interesting Interstellar quote because the gist of it turns out to not be as inspiring as it first sounds, as Professor Brand gives up on saving the humans on Earth.

8 "Murphy’s Law Doesn’t Mean That Something Bad Will Happen. It Means That Whatever Can Happen Will Happen."

Joseph Cooper

Murphy is named after Murphy’s law, the philosophical idea that if something can happen then it will happen. At one point, Murph asks her dad, “Dad, why did you and Mom name me after something that’s bad?” and Cooper explains that Murphy’s law isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Though the concept ties into the film's overall themes and scientific principles, Interstellar quotes like these remind the audience that the movie is all about hope. Though the odds are all stacked against her, Murph finds the solution no one else can see in a hopeless situation and saves humanity.

7 "I Have A Cue Light I Can Use To Show You When I’m Joking, If You Like."

TARS

TARS is believable as an A.I. mimicking human characteristics but still gets some of the funniest lines in the movie, often using sarcasm to try and lighten the mood and even straying into some dark humor. TARS quips with Cooper how he can use his cue light to signify that he's kidding around because his robotic voice doesn't lend itself well to the inflections required to tell certain jokes, but his deadpan delivery and lagging cue light only serve to make him all the funnier.

6 "Once You’re A Parent, You’re The Ghost Of Your Children’s Future."

Joseph Cooper

Interstellar is a science fiction epic from the point of view of a family, making it a thought-provoking sci-fi movie like Steven Spielberg’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and the film was originally conceived and developed by Steven Spielberg before Christopher Nolan became attached and made it his own. Still, Interstellar quotes like this one would have sounded right at home within a Spielberg film. The line itself foreshadows Cooper's influence on Murph through the power he discovers at the center of the black hole but is also a poetic mediation on the anxieties that parents feel about mortality.

5 "Mankind Was Born On Earth. It Was Never Meant To Die Here."

Joseph Cooper

This Interstellar quote made a good one-liner to put into the film's marketing and explain the premise of the story with a few short words in a 30-second TV spot, but it's most useful as an insight into Joseph Cooper's mind at the beginning of the movie. Cooper has plenty of heroic qualities and does good things for the right reasons, but he clearly feels dissatisfied with just being a father and a farmer. Murph feels abandoned by Cooper, and he feels a lot of guilt about leaving for his mission. Interstellar quotes like these though show how Cooper is fundamentally driven by that yearning to explore.

4 "We Used To Look Up At The Sky And Wonder At Our Place In The Stars. Now, We Just Look Down And Worry About Our Place In The Dirt."

Joseph Cooper

While Joseph Cooper's wide-eyed qualities aren't always admirable, his frustrations are often relatable. He sees an apathetic world around him that's ignoring its real problems, and he's not completely wrong. It's an inspirational Interstellar quote in many ways, but it's also quite a depressing one from another perspective as it shows Cooper's contempt for "the dirt," which symbolizes not just his life as a farmer but his responsibilities as a father, which keep from the freedom he finds up in the sky when he's flying.

3 "You’re Telling Me It Takes Two Numbers To Measure Your Own Ass But Only One To Measure My Son’s Future?"

Joseph Cooper

In an early scene set on Earth, Cooper meets with the principal of his kids’ school, telling the principal, “You’re ruling out college for my son now? He’s fifteen.” The principal tries to defend this decision: “Tom’s score simply isn’t high enough.” But then Cooper asks, “What’s your waistline? What 32, 33 inseam?” Confused, the principal says, “I’m not sure I see what you’re getting at...” and then Cooper delivers this thought-provoking Interstellar quote. Cooper has a lot of problems with the way that the world around him prioritizes things, and the problems that he has with education in his world are applicable to everyday real life.

2 "We’ve Always Defined Ourselves By The Ability To Overcome The Impossible."

Joseph Cooper

For all of its lofty sci-fi concepts and depictions of distant planets, Interstellar never loses sight of the simple human drama at its core. Cooper explains the miracle of humanity in a great monologue focusing on the ways civilization has always strived to reach for the impossible. Many of the situations that Cooper faces in the movie seem impossible to overcome, but he finds a way to survive and that's a part of what makes the film such an engaging thriller. The stakes keep getting higher, but the characters keep rising to the occasion too.

1 "Love Is The One Thing We're Capable Of Perceiving That Transcends Dimensions Of Time And Space."

Dr. Amelia Brand

This Interstellar quote would come off as corny if it didn’t compliment the themes of the movie so well, or if it wasn’t delivered as beautifully as it is by Anne Hathaway in the role of Amelia Brand. She also adds, “Maybe we should trust that, even if we can’t yet understand it.” The whole conversation between Cooper and Brand that the quite comes from is interesting because it’s two scientific minds grappling with the non-scientific concept of love and trying to understand it. While Brand approaches love from the perspective of an intangible force that must have meaning, Cooper views the emotion through its ability to impact society.

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  Interstellar

  Summary:

  A group of explorers make use of a newly discovered wormhole to surpass the limitations on human space travel and conquer the vast distances involved in an interstellar voyage.

  Release Date:

  2014-11-07

  Cast:

  Anne Hathaway, Matthew McConaughey, Jessica Chastain, Ellen Burstyn, Michael Caine, Bill Irwin

  Director:

  Christopher Nolan

  Rating:

  PG-13

  Writers:

  Christopher Nolan, Jonathan Nolan

  Runtime:

  2h 49m

  Genres:

  Sci-Fi, Drama, Thriller, Action, Adventure, Fantasy

  Budget:

  165 million

  Studio(s):

  Warner Bros. Pictures, Paramount Pictures

  Distributor(s):

  Paramount Pictures, Warner Bros. Pictures