Mission: Impossible Page #3

PHELPS inhales deeply --

-- the tape in the armrest starts to smolder, sending up a

plume of wispy smoke --

-- and PHELPS exhales, concealing the plume in a cloud of

cigarette smoke.

CUT TO:

EXT. PRAGUE SAFE HOUSE - DAY

SARAH and HANNA, a German woman in her mid-thirties enter.

Another legend:

PRAGUE:

INT. SAFE HOUSE - PRAGUE - DAY

The IMF team's safe house is a sparsely furnished Prague

apartment with a panoramic view of the city.

The IMF team is scattered around the room. Sketches, pads,

overfilled ashtrays and equipment are strewn everywhere.

JACK and SARAH seated next to each other - JACK demonstrating

the VISCO glasses to her. CLAIRE is seated opposite JACK at

the computer. JIM and ETHAN are in the kitchen. HANNAH

taking a roll of black-out curtain through the room.

JACK:

Look to your right, then back to me.

There's a camera built right into the

bridge. Whatever you see it sees and

transmits it back here. Can you hear me?

SARAH:

Of course I can hear you.

JACK:

No, in your...ear piece. You have a

lovely smile (eyes). Can you hear me

now?

SARAH:

Loud and clear.

JACK:

What's going on?

SARAH:

I don't know.

JACK:

Why don't you take a look?

SARAH:

Jack...that's spying.

JACK:

That's what we do isn't it?

SARAH:

Jack you're so wicked.

JACK:

Too wicked to have a drink later?

SARAH:

I think I might just take that look.

ETHAN and JIM PHELPS are in a heated conversation.

ETHAN:

Yeah, well, Jim, fact is I've got more

than ninety days leave coming.

PHELPS:

A hundred and sixty-seven, I think it is.

Take it all, if you want. After this one.

ETHAN:

I thought I'd take some now.

PHELPS:

(quietly, to Ethan)

What the hell's made you decide to take

your leave at the worst possible time?

Claire's in a weird mood too.

ETHAN:

Oh? What's the problem?

PHELPS:

I don't know, I had to go to Chicago

again. You were in Kiev. You tell me.

ETHAN:

Tell you what?

PHELPS:

When you started noticing your short term

memory loss. What the problem was you

and Claire had in Kiev?

ETHAN:

What problem?

PHELPS:

(laughs)

Ah, God, forget it. What are we talking

burnout here?

ETHAN:

I guess.

PHELPS:

Ethan, you can't burn out.

ETHAN:

Why not?

PHELPS:

Because I can't afford it. And because

you'd burn up before you'd burn out.

CLAIRE, who is at the computer behind them, somehow seems to

be the reference point in the following exchange:

ETHAN:

How was Chicago?

PHELPS:

Wonderful. Ran into a convention of auto

dealers at the Drake Hotel. You hear the

one about the astronaut who comes back

from the first manned flight to Mars

after two years? His wife's got a year

old kid. So he says "All right. Who was

it? My friend Harry?" She says no. "Oh,

it was my friend Sammy." She says it

wasn't Sammy. "Oh, I suppose it was my

friend Lou." "No, what's the matter,

don't you think I have any friends of my

own?!"

PHELPS laughs. ETHAN doesn't. The back of CLAIRE'S head is

in his line of sight.

PHELPS (CONT'D)

Boy, you really are grim. Come here,

take a look.

He leads ETHAN to the window, which overlooks the city.

EXT. PRAGUE - DAY

ETHAN's POV of Embassy.

INT. SAFE HOUSE - DAY

ETHAN nods.

PHELPS (CONT'D)

Beyond Charles Bridge there is our

Embassy. See it? Tomorrow night, if

anything goes wrong, this guy will steal

the names of our agents in every country

all over Eastern Europe. Up for grabs to

the highest bidders -- third world

terrorists, arms dealers, drug lords --

any and everybody who'd love to get rid

of long term coverts like us, and some

very dear friends among them. If they're

exposed, they'll be executed. Come over

here. Take a lock at this.

CLAIRE, who is working at a computer, has pulled up a

quicktime video image in a box on her screen. In it, an old

edition of the McLaughlin Report, the PBS news show, is

playing.

ETHAN is distracted by it.

INSERT - TELEVISION

SENATOR WALTZER, a bearded, bespectacled man in his forties,

is holding forth:

SENATOR WALTZER:

I'll go you one further. I say the CIA

and all its shadow organizations have

become irrelevant at best and

unconstitutional at worst. It's time we

throw a little light on the whole concept

of the Pentagon's "black budget." These

covert agency subgroups have confidential

funding, they report to no one -- who are

these people?! We were living in a

democracy the last time I checked.

BACK TO SCENE:

ETHAN looks back at JIM.

ETHAN:

You're going to use Walter?

Rate this script:4.0 / 4 votes