15 Best Claude Frollo Quotes You’ll Love

Here Are the Best Claude Frollo Quotes

Judge Claude Frollo might be Disney’s greatest and most realistic villain ever. He wields nearly unlimited power in Paris, where he is willing to embrace horrible means to achieve his ends of cleansing corruption from the city.

But what makes him more frightening and relatable than any other villain is that we as audience members sadly know such evil exists in the real world.  So without further ado, let’s revisit some of the best Claude Frollo quotes from the Disney animated film The Hunchback of Notre Dame!

The Best Claude Frollo Quotes

“A baby?! A monster!”

Within the first few minutes of screen time, Frollo has ordered the arrest of a group of gypsies who have snuck into Paris. He orders them all to be locked up. When a woman carrying a small bundle runs, Frollo pursues and kills her on the steps of Notre Dame cathedral. 

Taking the bundle from the woman’s body he discovers it is a baby. Horrified, Frollo checks to make sure nobody has seen him and attempts to discard the baby into a well, a loose end to his crime tied up.

It is ironic that Claude Frollo calls the unseen baby a monster when  it is Frollo himself in a very short amount of time has engaged in the persecution of ethnic minorities, killed a woman and whose reaction to seeing a baby that looks different is to attempt infanticide.

“This is an unholy demon. I’m sending it back to hell, where it belongs!” 

As Claude Frollo attempts to discard the inconvenient proof of murdering the gypsy woman, he is told to stop by the Archdeacon of Notre Dame who sees that Frollo is about to drown the baby in the well.

Here we see the other important aspect of Frollo’s character, that he uses the faith and the church as justification for his actions. He may be a political figure, but clearly he views himself worthy of being able to drive demons from society. 

This simple line of dialogue also helps drive home that for Frollo the ends justify the means to reach religious purity regardless of how horrible those means are.

3. “Just so he’s kept locked away where no one else can see. The bell tower, perhaps. And who knows? Our Lord works in mysterious ways. Even this foul creature may yet prove one day to be of use to me”

In his conversation with the Archdeacon, Claude Frollo begins to feel uneasy about the survival of his immortal soul. When Frollo asks the Archdeacon what he must do to atone for the murder of the baby’s mother, the judge is told to raise the baby.

Of course rather than allow this living reminder of his transgressions to be seen in the light, Frollo manipulates the church doctrine of sanctuary to allow the baby to live while being hidden.

We also see that Frollo values people for their utility to him. The baby is just another potential tool in his toolbox.

4. “Dear boy, whomever are you talking to?”

20 years later, we meet Quasimodo who is having conversations with his friends the gargoyles in the bell tower on the day of the festival of fools. The gargoyles encourage Quasimodo to go to the festival despite what he knows will be Frollo’s objections. 

When Frollo questions Quasimodo about the conversation, we see that these well remembered comic sidekicks are stone which leads the audience to begin to question whether or not the gargoyles are real or a figment of Quasimodo’s imagination.

5. “Shall we review your alphabet today?”

Hopefully nobody has ever had a teacher ask this question in such a sinister way. Frollo teaches the alphabet to Quasimodo using nothing but pure negative reinforcement.

A is for abomination, B is for blasphemy, C is for contrition, D is for damnation and E is for eternal damnation. After the recitation of these letters Frollo affirms that Quasimodo knows his letters. Talk about twisted teaching methods.

6. “I am a public official. I must go but I don’t enjoy a moment. Thieves and cutpurses, the dregs of humankind all mixed together in a shallow, drunken stupor”

When Quasimodo tells Frollo that he would like to go to the festival of fools and that Frollo goes every year, Frollo once again returns to his political roots. Frollo’s delivery conveys that he feels having to be in the public eye as such a burden for him. Clearly not enough for him to give up power but definitely enough for him to complain about it.

We also get to see a very clear picture of what Frollo views as the “common man”. There is Frollo and his ilk, and everyone else beneath him.

7. “When your heartless mother abandoned you as a child, anyone else would have drowned you. And this is my thanks for taking you in and raising you as my son?”

Talk about the ultimate emotional guilt trip. Quasimodo just thinks about going to the festival and Frollo suggests that the mere thought of going is an act of defiance.

We also see that Frollo has taken advantage of being one of only two people in all of Paris to know the truth of how Quasimodo came to Notre Dame to rewrite history placing Frollo in the role of noble hero.

8. “Be faithful to me, grateful to me, do as I say, obey and stay in here.”

This line concludes a song Frollo uses to deter Quasimodo from leaving to go to the Festival of Fools. In the song, Frollo calls Quasimodo ugly and that the world is a cruel place. Again we see Frollo’s knack for projecting his prejudices onto the rest of the world.

9. “The real war captain is what you see before you. For twenty years I have been taking care of the gypsies one by one and yet for all my success they have thrived.”

Frollo tells his new captain of the guard that he has brought the captain back from wars abroad to wage war on the gypsies inside Paris. In the same conversation with the captain of the guard Frollo then squishes a nest of insects as an illustration of what Frollo wants for the gypsies. 

10. “In a moment captain, a lesson must be learned here”

At the Festival of Fools, Quasimodo is revealed to not be a reveler in costume causing the peasants to panic and attack the poor bellringer. Quasimodo cries out to Frollo for help and the captain of the guard wishes to intervene. Yet we see that Frollo has decided to use pain and punishment as the teacher for the man that he claims to love as a son.

11. “How dare you defy me?”

The gypsy girl Esmerelda cuts the ropes binding a beaten and bruised Quasimodo from the public square ending Frollo’s sadistic lesson. Esmerelda replies that Quasimodo is being treated no differently by Frollo than the gypsies are. 

What transpires next is Esmerelda escaping and openly embarrassing Claude Frollo and his guard. This moment also marks the open undermining of Frollo’s seemingly unlimited power.

12. “You think you have outwitted me, but I am a patient man and gypsies do not do well inside stone walls”

Esmerelda believes she has escaped Frollo in the sanctuary of Notre Dame as the Archdeacon says that she can have sanctuary. Frollo delivers the line in a menacing whisper after grabbing Esmerelda from behind.

13. “I was just imagining a rope around that beautiful neck”

This is Frollo’s reply after he takes a sniff of Esmerelda’s hair and is asked what he is doing by the woman in his clutches. Visually this marks the point where Frollo’s goal for Esmerelda is to become a physical/ romantic conquest rather than a political conquest.

14. “But she will be mine or she will burn”

The concluding lines of Frollo’s villain song Hellfire mark a change in Frollo’s view of Esmerelda. In his mind she must fulfill his lustful desires or be destroyed as a witch. If you listen to the lyrics of this song, you’ll discover Frollo’s undoing. What makes this song different from any other Disney song is that Frollo asks for divine mercy both for he and Esmerelda. 

15. “Find the girl. If you have to burn the entire city to the ground so be it!”

After Hellfire, Frollo discovers the Esmerelda has escaped from the sanctuary of Notre Dame. He unleashes his full power and orders the destruction of Paris for his selfish personal interests. His political ambitions no matter compared to fulfilling his earthly physical desires. This also marks the point where there can be no redemption for the judge.

He indeed is evil and his goals are not ones that should be replicated, yet Claude Frollo has some of the most memorable quotes of all Disney villains and definitely deserves a place on anyone’s list of top Disney villains.

This article was written by Brian and edited by Michael.

Michael has been visiting Disney World since he was a kid. He's also been to Disneyland and sailed on the Disney Dream. Michael is the owner and editor of Countdown to Magic.

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