EXT. HAM’S HOUSE BY THE POOL
There is a group of partying people who grab the plastic Jack-In-The-Box and start throwing him around. Eventually he ends up in the pool and people are jumping on him from the deck and trying to surf on him.
HAM grabs the intercom mic.
HAM
Hey everybody, they’re tapping the next keg inside right now, so why don’t you all go get some.
All the people get out of the pool except for TODD, who is balancing on the floating Jack-In-The-Box, and they all go inside, leaving just HAM and TODD.
HAM
Man, why did you guys get that thing?
TODD
From your mom.
For a long moment HAM and TODD look at each other.
HAM
No, I said ‘why.’
An older gentleman from next door, MR. FREIDMAN, approaches HAM. He is wearing a smoking jacket.
MR. FREIDMAN
Hamilton, I need a word with you.
HAM
Oh, hello there Mr. Freidman. How is your party over there going?
MR. FREIDMAN
Not as well as yours I see, which is what I was meaning to speak to you about. I am not sure how Dr. Radcliffe would feel about this. As his friend I would have to inform him if this party got too out of hand.
TODD
Dick.
HAM
I am sorry if we were disturbing you and your guests. If we’ve been rowdy then you must excuse us. You see my two best friends just sold their first screenplay.
MR. FREIDMAN
Oh, do give them my congratulations.
HAM
Congratulations Todd.
TODD
Thank you, Hamilton.
TODD falls off the Jack-In-The-Box, into the water. He starts to climb out, holding the Jack-In-The-Box.
HAM
I will make sure to pass on your congratulations to John as well.
TODD
Hey Ham, think fast!
HAM and MR. FRIEDMAN turn to look at TODD just as TODD flings the Jack-In-The-Box like a Frisbee, hitting MR. FRIEDMAN right in the nose, breaking his glasses. MR. FRIEDMAN falls, unconscious, into the pool. HAM stares for a moment.
HAM
Todd, what the fuck did you do that for?
TODD
Shit, man, I thought you’d catch it.
HAM
He’s friends with my father. This is gonna be my ass.
This whole time, MR. FRIEDMAN lies in the water, floating face-down, bubbling, blood seeping into the water around his face.
TODD
Well fuck. You don’t have to yell at me. I’ll just apologize to him –
They both turn to look at him and see him lying face-down, releasing bubbles.
HAM
Oh . . . um …
TODD
Sorry, dude.
HAM
Man, Todd, he’s just floating there.
TODD
Swim, man!
They both keep staring for a couple of seconds, and then his body starts to float down to the bottom.
TODD
What, come on, swim! Why is he sinking?
HAM
Okay. That means he’s filling with water.
(beat)
Uh . . . let’s get him out.
HAM looks at TODD expectantly.
TODD
What, I’m not gonna touch him. You know him. He’s old, I don’t know him.
HAM
But you killed him.
TODD
Wh – he’s dead?
HAM
He’s at the bottom. He’s been there for like ten seconds.
TODD
You get him.
HAM
You’re already wet!
TODD
Oh, fuck…
TODD steps down into the pool and circles MR. FRIEDMAN’S body, unsure where to begin at pulling him up. He keeps reaching under the water, but doesn’t want to submerge his head, and can’t reach him.
TODD
I can’t reach him!
HAM
Put your head under the fucking water and get him outta there!
TODD holds his nose and goes under. He grabs onto MR. FRIEDMAN’S arm and pulls it up with him, dragging him to the edge.
BRENDA leans out the patio door.
BRENDA
Ham, you guys should come inside where the party’s at.
TODD drops the body back to the bottom and looks up, scared.
TODD
Nothing!
BRENDA
What?
TODD
We’re . . . doing nothing, just hanging out.
BRENDA
Okay. Um, well come on inside sometime.
HAM
Yeah, we will, Brenda.
BRENDA goes back inside. HAM goes to the patio door and shuts it, looks around, then returns to the side of the pool and helps TODD lift the body out, with a lot of struggle.
HAM
Alright, let’s take him to the side door.
then, much later, as they are fleeing through Mexico, heading to the bottom of the world,
INT. MUCHO POLLO – NIGHT
The group is sitting in a booth eating from a bucket.
VINCE
So you don’t talk about the reason this dude is a serial killer?
TODD
Well we sort of do. We’ve got this flashback scene of him as a child. His parents would always smoke weed and then beat him.
JOHN
That’s right before the part where, well after the flashback, he puts razors in the pizza after he smokes up with the captain of the football team, and it cuts up his insides and he starts vomiting blood everywhere.
VINCE
You know what I hope they don’t do when they make the movie is … you know where it shows a character young and then fades to him older, and like his face morphs from young to old? I hate that shit. I think that shit is stupid.
HAM
Yeah, that is pretty dumb.
JOHN
It’s not so bad. They did it in Saving Private Ryan.
VINCE
I definitely prefer match cuts. Like in 2001.
TODD
Yeah, the quintessential match cut.
VINCE
You know, where it shows the monkey throwing up the bone and then it cuts to the nuclear satellite floating through space.
JOHN
Yeah, when he just ate the other monkey?
HAM
Right.
TODD
Right, because it shows how the early humans went from using bone weapons to these satellite weapons, showing like the evolution of man.
VINCE
Yeah.
HAM
But you know, that’s not supposed to imply that it’s earth.
JOHN
What do you mean?
HAM
The apes. It isn’t trying to say that those are what man evolved from. It’s not the same planet.
VINCE
What are you talking about? It says “The Dawn of Man.”
HAM
I know. But we’re not supposed to make that assumption that it’s the same planet.
VINCE
But that’s the assumption that we naturally make when we see that.
HAM
But he doesn’t control your assumptions.
JOHN
Yes, actually he kind of does.
VINCE
Yeah, I mean, he chooses what to put on the screen, and what he chose was a title card that clearly says “The Dawn of Man,” then it shows apes, which we all were taught to believe man evolved from, using this bone and then they throw it in the air and it match cuts to another human weapon in space.
HAM
But he never specifically states it.
VINCE
That doesn’t matter. It’s the Dawn of Man. Why would he not mean to say what he knows we will naturally assume him to mean? That’s just obtuse.
HAM
Then why are there two moons?
VINCE
What?
TODD
Where?
HAM
In the Dawn of Man sequence it shows two moons.
VINCE
Does it show them at the same time?
JOHN
Well that was made back in the sixties.
TODD
Oh, right, that was before we knew there was only one moon!
VINCE
Back when there was that theory of the “second moon.”
JOHN
No, no, the other moon just crashed into the Earth!
TODD
Yeah, it became Australia. It just kind of hit and then rolled over.
VINCE
I want to see these two moons.
JOHN
Because if there are two moons, that becomes the only anomaly, so that it’s not like, “Oh, okay there are two moons so it must not be Earth,” it’s like “Why are there two moons around Earth?”
TODD
Maybe it implies that we were transplanted from a different world or something.
HAM
It only means that you’re not supposed to assume that they’re connected.
VINCE
But we naturally make that assumption. If there are two moons, it’s just stupid.
JOHN
It’d be like on Tatooine, where it shows the two moons. I guess that means that Tatooine is not necessarily Earth.
They all sit for a moment and catch their breath from laughing. HAM is not laughing. HAM shakes his head.
HAM
Two moons. Fuckers. |