Copyright and Movie scene quote as lyrics question

[HowlingUlf]

I just had an idea which included taking a snippet of the dialog from a movie that most civilized people know about and turn it into the chorus of a song.
So here is another snippet that''s not good for a chorus but better for a strange verse maybe.
I never liked this particular movie but was tricked into the theater, so now I finally find some use for it.

"Ever since I can remember I always wanted to be a gangster. To me that was better than being president of the United States. To be a gangster was to own the world."
Henry Hill/Ray Liotta in Goodfellas (1990)

I use something else as an example but the final product would be the same legally.
It's like birthday presents and christmas gifts, you can't see until THE DAY!!!
Let's say it' was the above example, let's say I use it in a song and let's say it get spread nationwide via TAXI as a song behind some product propaganda.
Now if somebody take issues with this, does it mean I'm guilty of something?

Just to get that out of the question, it's the text as lyrics sung in a song I'm interested in, not a sound sample.

[edit]

also extracting the lines from one person, is that disrespectful?
same for choping off short words like "yes" and "no" that makes no sense out of context when the lines have been butchered.

***

Is this a good "General Hangout" question?
It's ABOUT lyrics but it's not lyrics so ...
Where are the copyright questions?

[Russell Landwehr]

This is a good question and a good place to ask it.

Hopefully you can get a satisfying answer to this.

Russell

[hummingbird]

I would say the 'idea' expressed in this text not copyrighted, however, the exact text used to express that idea is. If you quote the phrases exactly as is in your lyric, you may run into trouble. Best put it in your own words. IMHO.


[Caveat: I am not a lawyer]

[Len911]

First of all, it's doubtful that anything remotely questionable would ever pass the screening process.
The boilerplate text in the listings about universal lyrics and ripping off the artists in any way, shape or form, is probably enough to eliminate consideration for a forward.

Secondly, I don't see a problem if used as a quote, "just like Ray in Goodfellas said......" Though by doing that, you no longer have universal lyrics, because you have a name and the name of a movie in your lyrics.

[HowlingUlf]

Thanks, I've kind of cut down on the mass of text hehe so only the end or "punch line" if you wish that remains, since the whole thing was too ... wordy?
This chorus with a quote was a reasonably good idea in its own space but it was a Teflon concept and nothing else wanted to stick to it.
It's possible that I scrap this thing all together for this song and save the quote thingie for a better occasion because I'm running out of time sort of.

***

But keep adding more thoughts or drift off into something related. It's interesting and important stuff in this part of the interwebs!

[mojobone]

When it comes to dialog, you can quote a line, you can quote a phrase, even swipe a title, but it's generally understood that you can't lift consecutive sentences, verbatim. Catchphrases are only exempt if they've been trademarked, so you can go ahead and title your song I'm Getting Too Old For This Sh*t after Danny Glover's famous line in all the Lethal Weapon movies.