Frankenstein Page #10

INT - BLACKSMITH SHOP - DAY

Murky and dark. Bellows are pumping. Showers of sparks

cascade. The BLACKSMITH and his ASSISTANT are pounding a

metallic sledgehammer litany, beating a huge copper sheet

into shape. Victor enters. The blacksmith directs his

attention to a finished copper piece leaning against the

wall. Victor runs his hand over the surface. Nice.

INT - MATERNITY WARD - CHARITY HOSPITAL - NIGHT

A WOMAN lies on a table, screaming as she goes into labor.

Her water breaks, cascading into a steel bucket. one of the

ASSISTANTS snatches it up, scurries around the corner.

Victor is waiting in the shadows. Money changes hands.

INT - VICTOR'S GARRET - NIGHT

Victor is examining the amniotic fluid. Boiling it off.

Working to synthesize it.

INT - VICTOR'S GARRET - NIGHT

Victor pours the final drum of fluid into what appears to be

a large copper vat. He dips his hand in, examines the

consistency and smell. ANGLE WIDENS, spinning slowly up to

reveal that the vat is human in shape. A sarcophagus.

EXT - ALLEY - NIGHT

We find Victor examining three corpses on the back of a

wagon, checking nostrils and teeth with gloved hands. A PAIR

OF MEN lurk in the shadows, waiting.

VICTOR:

That one

The corpse is lifted off. Money changes hands.

MAN:

With this cholera come to town, we'll have plenty

more for you.

INT - VICTOR'S GARRET - NIGHT

Victor wearing elbow-length gloves, hacking furiously away

with a bone saw. Tossing aside the scraps.

(CONTINUED)

46

VICTOR'S GARRET - NIGHT

Victor has an arm wired, testing reactions. He scrapes off a

small shred of tissue, drops it in solution, watches it

break apart. it doesn't look good. He glances feverishly at

the clock, makes a fast decision, scribbles in his journal:

VICTOR:

Not optimal. Must use. No time to replace. Body

can't wait.

VICTOR'S GARRET - NIGHT

Victor stitches a torso with one of those big, awful curved

needles, yanking up hard to draw the catgut tight.

ARCTIC VICTOR (V.O.)

I stitched it together with my own hands ...

VICTOR'S GARRET - NIGHT

Victor pulls on a chain, hoisting the body off the slab via

block-and-tackle mounted on a ceiling track. The body rises

limply into the air, spinning slowly, arms and legs

dangling, long black hair covering its face.

ARCTIC VICTOR (V.O.)

a patchwork man of my own devising.

Victor reaches up with one hand to stop the body spinning.

He pushes it down the length of the lab, rolling it along

its ceiling track like a side of beef in a meat locker.

INT - VICTOR'S GARRET - NIGHT

The Creature lies on an improvised bier of crates,

surrounded by shadows and clutter, draped/sprawled like

Christ taken from the cross in Michelangelo's "Pieta."

Beakers bubbling and dripping. Intravenous lines seeping and

secreting. A misty chemical haze in the air. Victor is

watching his patchwork man. Glowering. Waiting.

ARCTIC VICTOR (V.O.)

It took nutrients like a child receiving milk ...

blushed like a young girl with the blood I forced

through its veins ...

A FLASH OF LIGHTNING rips through the skylights, bathing the

scene purple/white. Eerier and eerier.

ARCTIC VICTOR (V.O.)

... all in preparation.

(CONTINUED)

47

VICTOR'S GARRET - DAY

We find Victor passed out in a chair. His creation is still

taking fluids. Gray daylight streams through the windows.

There's commotion in the street outside: shouting, horses'

hooves clattering on cobblestone, an occasional scream or

wail. Victor doesn't stir. Dead to the world. Somebody

starts POUNDING on the door. Victor rouses, takes a moment

to remember where he is. He lurches from his chair, grabs a

canvas tarp, throws it over his "patchwork man."

STAIRWELL - DAY

Henry is pounding. Finally the latch is drawn. The door

swings open a crack. Victor peers out. Gaunt and furtive.

Suspicious. Henry is stunned at his dissipated appearance.

HENRY:

God's sake, what is that stench?

Henry peers past him.

Victor shifts, blocking his view

VICTOR:

This is a bad time, Henry. I'm busy just now.

What do you want?

HENRY:

Things have gone worse with this cholera

outbreak. Thousand new cases a day now. Classes

have been suspended. University's shut down.

VICTOR:

Yes? And?

HENRY:

Listen to what I'm saying. The militia's arriving

to quarantine the city. Most of us are getting out

while we still can.

VICTOR:

You'll be leaving then.

(beat)

Just as well. You never were cut out for this,

Henry. Goodbye.

And the door slams shut. The bolt is thrown. Henry pounds.

HENRY:

VICTOR! OPEN THE DOOR! LISTEN TO REASON!

(CONTINUED)

48

Nothing. Stunned and hurt' Henry turns from the door and

heads back down the stairs.

EXT - VICTOR'S BUILDING - STREET - DAY

Henry exits into a nightmare. REFUGEES are streaming from

the city, horses and wagons, people on foot, carrying their

possessions. Henry steps into the street and is nearly run

down by a carriage.

VOICE (O.S.)

OUT OF THE WAY!

Henry glances up to see Schiller at the reins, struggling to

control the animals as the carriage eases past.

HENRY:

Schiller? You're leaving? Where's all that high

talk about treating the sick?

SCHILLER:

(icy)

To hell with them. And you.

He snaps the reins, not caring who he runs down. The

carriage lurches away, scattering refugees before it.

Henry keeps walking. Jostled by the hostile crowd. Looking

around. Dazed. Dead bodies are stacked along the street like

cordwood, waiting for the death carts. ANGLE WIDENS as Henry

stumbles along through utter despair and devastation,

stunned at the human suffering around him as we

FADE TO:

INT - VICTOR'S GARRET - NIGHT

Victor glances at the clock. Scribbles in his journal:

VICTOR:

Time running out. Rate of decay accelerating.

Must strike now ... or start again from scratch.

He gazes down at his creation, lying once again on the slab

before him ... but now the Creature lies on a full body-

length steel grate. Steel chains with hooks dangle from the

ceiling above ... along with long coils of thick copper wire

tipped with glittering needles big enough to knit with.

Victor glances up at the Da Vinci. The Study of Man has been

daubed with red paint at key acupuncture points. Victor dips

a huge cotton swab in a bowl of iodine, starts dabbing

identical marks on the body before him ...

(CONTINUED)

49

Now he's ramming the huge wire-fed needles deep into these

spots, brutally working them around in the flesh to get good

contact. The forearms, the neck, the rib cage ...

Now he's attaching the steel chain-hooks to the four corners

of the steel grate ...

Now he's pulling on a rope, straining to hoist the whole rig

into the air. It lifts slowly from frame: body, needles,

wires and all ...

HIGH WIDE ANGLE:

... and we get our first spectacular look at Frankenstein's

gloriously low-tech and stupendously arcane 2LicU the

Creature dangles below us from the ceiling-hoist, lying

full-length and horizontal on its steel grate, spinning

slowly, thick copper wires trailing from its arms and legs,

rib cage and neck, armpits and groin. The copper cables

trail upward, coil along the ceiling like garden hose to

provide necessary slack, meander down the wall to culminate

in a splendiferous array of galvanic batteries, steam

engines and generators.

Frankenstein reaches slowly up, fingertips straining toward

the ceiling as if worshipping the creation revolving

endlessly above his head in a perfectly-described circle not

at all unlike the Da Vinci ...

Rate this script:2.5 / 11 votes