Chinatown Page #2

MRS. MULWRAY

Money doesn't matter to me, Mr.

Gittes.

Gittes sighs.

GITTES:

Very well. We'll see what we can do.

EXT. CITY HALL - MORNING

already shimmering with heat. A drunk blows his nose with

his fingers into the fountain at the foot of the steps.

7.

Gittes, impeccably dressed, passes the drunk on the way up

the stairs.

INT. COUNCIL CHAMBERS

Former Mayor SAM BAGBY is speaking. Behind him is a huge

map, with overleafs and bold lettering: "PROPOSED ALTO VALLEJO

DAM AND RESERVOIR" Some of the councilmen are reading funny

papers and gossip columns while Bagby is speaking.

BAGBY:

-- Gentlemen, today you can walk out

that door, turn right, hop on a

streetcar and in twenty-five minutes

end up smack in the Pacific Ocean.

Now you can swim in it, you can fish

in it, you can sail in it -but you

can't drink it, you can't water your

lawns with it, you can't irrigate an

orange grove with it. Remember -we

live next door to the ocean but

we also live on the edge of the

desert. Los Angeles is a desert

community. Beneath this building,

beneath every street there's a desert.

Without water the dust will rise up

and cover us as though we'd never

existed!

(pausing, letting the

implication sink in)

CLOSE - GITTES

sitting next to some grubby farmers, bored. He yawns -- edges

away from one of the dirtier farmers.

BAGBY(O.S.)

(continuing)

The Alto Vallejo can save us from

that, and I respectfully suggest

that eight and a half million dollars

is a fair price to pay to keep the

desert from our streets -- and not

on top of them.

AUDIENCE - COUNCIL CHAMBERS

An amalgam of farmers, businessmen, and city employees have

been listening with keen interest. A couple of the farmers

applaud. Somebody shooshes them.

COUNCIL COMMITTEE

in a whispered conference.

8.

COUNCILMAN:

(acknowledging Bagby)

-- Mayor Bagby... let's hear from

the departments again -- I suppose

we better take Water and Power first.

Mr. Mulwray.

REACTION - GITTES

looking up with interest from his racing form.

MULWRAY:

walks to the huge map with overleafs. He is a slender man in

his sixties, who wears glasses and moves with surprising

fluidity. He turns to a smaller, younger man, and nods. The

man turns the overleaf on the map.

MULWRAY:

In case you've forgotten, gentlemen,

over five hundred lives were lost

when the Van der Lip Dam gave way -core

samples have shown that beneath

this bedrock is shale similar to the

permeable shale in the Van der Lip

disaster. It couldn't withstand

that kind of pressure there.

(referring to a new

overleaf)

Now you propose yet another dirt

banked terminus dam with slopes of

two and one half to one, one hundred

twelve feet high and a twelve thousand

acre water surface. Well, it won't

hold. I won't build it. It's that

simple -- I am not making that kind

of mistake twice. Thank you,

gentlemen.

Mulwray leaves the overleaf board and sits down. Suddenly

there are some whoops and hollers from the rear of the

chambers and a red-faced FARMER drives in several scrawny,

bleating sheep. Naturally, they cause a commotion.

COUNCIL PRESIDENT

(shouting to farmer)

What in the hell do you think you're

doing?

(as the sheep bleat

down the aisles toward

the Council)

Get those goddam things out of here!

FARMER:

(right back)

Tell me where to take them!

(MORE)

9.

FARMER (CONT'D)

You don't have an answer for that so

quick, do you?

Bailiffs and sergeants-at-arms respond to the imprecations

of the Council and attempt to capture the sheep and the

farmers, having to restrain one who looks like he's going to

bodily attack Mulwray.

FARMER:

(through above, to

Mulwray)

-- You steal the water from the

valley, ruin the grazing, starve my

livestock -- who's paying you to do

that, .Mr. Mulwray, that's what I

want to know!

L.A. RIVERBED - LONG SHOT

It's virtually empty. Sun blazes off it's ugly concrete banks.

Where the banks are earthen, they are parched and choked

with weeds.

After a moment, Mulwray's car pulls INTO VIEW on a flood

control road about fifteen feet above the riverbed. Mulwray

gets out of the car. Me looks around.

WITH GITTES:

holding a pair of binoculars, downstream and just above the

flood control road -- using some dried mustard weeds for

cover. he watches while Mulwray makes his way down to the

center of the riverbed. There Mulwray stops, tuns slowly,

appears to be looking at the bottom of the riverbed, or -at

nothing at all.

GITTES:

trains the binoculars on him. Sun glints off Mulwray's

glasses.

BELOW GITTES:

There's the SOUND of something like champagne corks popping.

Then a small Mexican boy atop a swayback horse rides it into

the riverbed, and into Gitte's view.

MULWRAY:

himself stops, stands still when he hears the sound. Power

lines and the sun are overhead, the trickle of brackish water

at his feet. He moves swiftly downstream in the direction

of the sound, toward Gittes.

10.

GITTES:

moves a little further back as Mulwray rounds the bend in

the river and comes face to face with the Mexican boy on the

muddy banks. Mulwray says something to the boy. The boy

doesn't answer at first. Mulwray points to the ground. The

boy gestures. Mulwray frowns. He kneels down in the mud and

stares at it. He seems to be concentrating on it. After a

moment, he rises, thanks the boy and heads swiftly back

upstream -- scrambling up the bank to his car. There he

reaches through the window and pulls out a roll of blueprints

or something like them - he spreads them on the hood of his

car and begins to scribble some notes, looking downstream

from time to time. The power lines overhead HUM. He stops,

listens to them -- then rolls up the plans and gets back in

the car. He drives off.

GITTES:

Hurries to get back to his car. He gets in and gets right

back out. The steamy leather burns him. He takes a towel

from the back seat and carefully places it on the front one.

He gets in and takes off.

POINT FERMIN PARK - DUSK

Street lights go on.

MULWRAY:

pulls up, parks. Hurries out of the car, across the park

lawn and into the shade of some trees and buildings.

GITTES:

pulls up, moves across the park at a different angle, but in

the direction Mulwray had gone. He makes it through the trees

in time to see Mulwray scramble adroitly down the side of

the cliff to the beach below. Be seems in a hurry. Gittes

moves after him - having a little more difficulty negotiating

the climb than Mulwray did.

DOWN ON THE BEACH

Gittes looks to his right - where the bay is a long, clear

crescent. He looks to his left - there's a promontory of

sorts. It's apparent Mulwray has gone that way. Gittes

hesitates, then moves in that direction -- but climbs along

the promontory in order to be above Mulwray.

Rate this script:3.5 / 10 votes