Context

This line is spoken by Captain, played by Strother Martin, in the film Cool Hand Luke, directed by Stuart Rosenberg (1967).

Luke Jackson, played by a pre-salad-dressing Paul Newman, may be working on a chain gang, but he doesn't let the shackles stop him from being sarcastic and rebellious every step of the way.

After talking back to the captain, whom they call Captain, Captain has to make Luke respect his authority by screaming at him, hitting him, and pushing him to the ground. As Luke lies in the dust, Captain says, "What we've got here...is failure to communicate."

He plays it off as a "this hurts me more than it hurts him," situation, but Luke, under all the sarcasm, would beg to differ. He repeats the line at the end of the film as he's about to be shot, something that will definitely hurt him more than anyone else.

Where you've heard it

Your mom might have pulled this one out when you were texting and she didn't seem to understand what "lol" meant.

Additional Notable References

• Guns N Roses samples the line in their song "Civil War," which was a massive failure to communicate in U.S. history (the war was pretty bad, too).
• This line was quoted by the Washington Post in an article about teachers and parents disagreeing over standardized testing.

Pretentious Factor

If you were to drop this quote at a dinner party, would you get an in-unison "awww" or would everyone roll their eyes and never invite you back? Here it is, on a scale of 1-10.

If you're saying it because you can't get through to someone, that's not a big deal. But if you're saying it, accompanied with whacking said person across the head with a blunt object, maybe the failure to communicate is all yours.