Mission: Impossible Page #2

ETHAN:

If you're gonna do this again Claire,

It's not gonna be on my watch.

CLAIRE:

Oh yeah?

JACK comes into the room from the closet. He hands CLAIRE

her jewelry, including a watch and a wedding ring. ETHAN

stops what he's doing, noticing. She looks up at him,

questioningly.

JACK:

Claire.

ETHAN:

Jack.

She almost unconsciously slips the wedding ring onto her

finger. ETHAN notices. He turns and SHOUTS to the room at

large.

ETHAN:

IS THERE ANY PARTICULAR REASON WE'RE NOT

OUT OF HERE YET?!

JACK:

Just waiting for you, tubs.

He walks across the room and out the door. CLAIRE, worried,

clutches her hands together, glancing down at her wedding

ring.

We move in on it --

CUT TO:

INT. JET - DAY

-- and come out on another wedding ring, this one on a MAN's

finger. One of several he's drumming on an arm rest in the

plush first class cabin of a commercial airliner. He shoves

some money into his wallet, and as he does so we catch a

fleeting glimpse of a photograph of CLAIRE.

The pilot's voice makes an announcement.

VOICE (O.S.)

Ladies and gentlemen, we have leveled off

at our cruising altitude of thirty-eight

thousand feet-and we should be arriving

in Prague right on schedule.

A FLIGHT ATTENDANT makes her way between the seats, passing

out menus.

FLIGHT ATTENDANT

Would you like to watch a movie Mr Rosen?

A passenger takes one. The ATTENDANT continues on.

FLIGHT ATTENDANT

(CONT'D)

Would you like to watch a movie Mr

Phelps?

The MAN with the wedding ring looks up. JIM PHELPS is in his

mid-forties, good-looking, intense. He's a tired man, and

not just now, it's a profound fatigue. He looks up at the

ATTENDANT and smiles warmly.

PHELPS:

No, I prefer the theatre.

A look crosses the FLIGHT ATTENDANT'S face; her tone becomes

stilted.

FLIGHT ATTENDANT

Would you consider the cinema of the

Ukraine?

PHELPS:

Perhaps you'd choose one for me.

The ATTENDANT turns and walks away. PHELPS sits back, shakes

a cigarette out of a pack, and taps it nervously on the

armrest.

AT THE FRONT OF THE CABIN.

The FLIGHT ATTENDANT opens a case loaded with video 8

cassettes of feature films. She opens a panel in the top of

the case and withdraws a tape hidden back there.

BACK AT PHELPS' SEAT

The ATTENDANT returns with the tape and hands it to PHELPS.

He takes it without a word and she moves on.

PHELPS reaches down and turns a lever on the support between

his seat and the empty one beside him. He flips up a small

movie screen and angles it toward himself, away from the

other passengers. He puts on a headset, opens a door in the

armrest, and puts the tape in.

He presses play.

ON THE TAPE,

the image of a man comes on. EUGENE KITTRIDGE is fortyish,

but seems permanently stuck in the Nixon era -- horn rimmed

glasses, short short haircut, rather be caught dead than

tieless. But if he catches your eye, he will never, ever

look away. He's seated at a desk, looking into the camera.

KITTRIDGE:

(on the tape)

Good morning, Mr. Phelps. The man you're

about to see is Aleksander Golitsyn --

The screen winks and shows an image of GOLITSYN, a burly man

in his forties. The image is herky-jerky videotape,

presumably taken from a concealed camera as GOLITSYN walks

down a foreign street.

KITTRIDGE (O.S.)

-- a former KGB Line X officer now

working the international black market

selling intelligence. This morning, we

learned that Golitsyn has stolen one half

of a CIA NOC list, the list of our non-

official cover agents working in Eastern

Europe.

The screen shows an image of what such a list might look

like, code names and other information scrolling by on a

computer screen at high speed.

KITTRIDGE (O.S.)

For security reasons, the NOC list is

divided into two encoded halves.

Golitsyn already has the cryptonym

portion, which contains agent code names

and targeting areas. This portion is

useless unless combined with the second

half -- the true name list that is kept

in the CIA station in our Embassy in Prague.

The Embassy itself comes on screen, a beautiful old building

at the base of the Charles Bridge, which spans the Vltava

River.

KITTRIDGE (O.S.)

We believe Golitsyn plans to steal the

true name list at an Embassy function

tomorrow night. Your mission, should you

decide to accept it, is to obtain

photographic proof of the theft, apprehend

those involved, and return the stolen

list. I don't have to stress the

importance of this matter, Jim. We're

keeping it internally black. Because of

its urgency, I've already sent to Prague

a team selected from your usual group.

Still photographs come on screen, some of which we're already

seen -- JACK KIEFER, CLAIRE and ETHAN.

KITTRIDGE (O.S.)

Ethan Hunt will of course be your point

man, as usual. He's in Kiev; we're

getting word to him now.

INT. JET - DAY

PHELPS sits back in his seat, closes his eyes, and rubs his

tired brow. KITTRIDGE himself comes back on the tape.

KITTRIDGE (O.S.)

As always, should you or any member of

your IM force be caught or killed, the

Secretary will disavow all knowledge of

your actions. This tape will self-

destruct in five seconds. Good luck,

Jim!

Rate this script:4.0 / 4 votes