Raising Arizona Page #20

He clears his throat and turns to the door. His tone is harder

again:

NATHAN:

...You can go out the way you came

in...

He snaps off the lights.

NATHAN:

...And before you go off and do

another foolish thing, like busting

up, I suggest you sleep on it...

He has disappeared into the hall. We hear his voice receding:

NATHAN:

...at least one night.

HIGH SHOT:

Looking straight down at Hi, asleep in the trailer bedroom.

We start to crane down.

VOICE OVER:

That night I had a dream...

EXTREME WIDE SHOT

A beautiful dusk landscape. We are floating in over the field,

abutting the prison, that Gale and Evelle popped out of.

In the middle background of the extreme long shot two men

are walking across the field.

VOICE OVER:

...I dreamt I was as light as the

ether, a floating spirit visiting

things to come...

BACK TO HIGH SHOT BEDROOM

Craning down toward Hi.

VOICE OVER:

The shades and shadows of the people

in my life wrastled their way into

my slumber.

BACK TO FIELD:

Still floating forward but now much closer to the two walking

men. We see that they are Gale and Evelle. Both are still

dyed blue.

They are approaching the hole in the ground.

VOICE OVER:

I dreamt that Gale and Evelle had

decided to return to prison...

Evelle is starting to climb into the hole.

VOICE OVER:

...Probably that's just as well. I

don't mean to sound superior, and

they're a swell couple guys, but...

Evelle has disappeared and Gale starts climbing in.

VOICE OVER:

...maybe they weren't ready yet to

come out into the world.

FLOATING UP THE WALK OF THE ARIZONA HONE

The front door has a holly wreath on it.

VOICE OVER:

And then I dreamed on, into the

future, to a Christmas morn in the

Arizona home...

DISSOLVE THROUGH TO

ARIZONA LIVING ROOM

Five three-year-olds in their pajamas are opening presents

around a tree as Nathan and Florence look on.

VOICE OVER:

...where Nathan Jr. was opening a

present from a kindly couple who

preferred to remain unknown.

We have been isolating in on one of the children peeling the

wrappings off a package marked to Nathan Jr. Inside is a

shiny red plastic football.

FLOATING IN TOWARD A STATION WAGON

Pulled over on the state highway in the middle of the desert,

a police motorcycle parked behind it. Glen is leaning out

the driver's window of the car talking to the state trooper

who stands facing him.

VOICE OVER:

I saw Glen, a few years later, still

havin' no luck gettin' the cops to

listen to his wild tales about me'n

Ed...

Glen is grinning and talking with his hands cupped in front

of him, as when he told Hi about the Pollack who almost

stepped in the pile of sh*t.

The trooper, in crash helmet and dark sunglasses, is listening

tight-lipped and stone-faced as Glen finishes his story and

slaps his knee.

VOICE OVER:

...Maybe he threw in one Pollack

joke too many...

The trooper is clicking open his ballpoint pen and reaching

his citation book from his breast pocket. The name tag on

the pocket says "SGT. KOWALSKI."

VOICE OVER:

...I don't know.

FLOATING IN TOWARD A FOOTBALL

It sits on a tee in the middle of a football field.

VOICE OVER:

And still I dreamed on...

A cleated foot boots the football out of frame.

VOICE OVER:

...further into the future than I'd

ever dreamed before.

HIGH SCHOOL FOOTBALL PLAYER

Looking up, arms out at his sides, waiting to receive the

kicked ball.

VOICE OVER:

...Watching Nathan Jr.'s progress

from afar...

He catches the ball and starts running.

VOICE OVER:

...Taking pride in his accomplishments

as if he were our own...

He is skillfully eluding and stiff-arming tacklers.

VOICE OVER:

...Wondering if he ever thought of

us.

He reaches the end zone and triumphantly spikes the football.

He whips off his helmet and we track in on the face of the

rosy-cheeked high-school bruiser.

VOICE OVER:

...and hoping that maybe we'd

broadened his horizons a little,

even if he couldn't remember just

how they'd got broadened.

BACK TO BEDROOM:

Still craning down, now very close to the sleeping Hi.

VOICE OVER:

But still I hadn't dreamt nothin'

about me'n Ed. Until the end...

DISSOLVE THROUGH TO

A COUPLE:

The man and woman are sitting on a sofa in the foreground

with their backs to the camera. They are in the living room

of Hi and Ed's trailer, which is suffused with a warm golden

light.

As they face the trailer's front door, all we see of the

couple is the backs of their heads. They both have white

hair, the woman's pulled into a bun. The old man wears a

cardigan, the woman a shawl.

VOICE OVER:

...And this was cloudier 'cause it

was years, years away.

The front door bursts open. Two young couples are entering

as their kids - about a dozen of them - stream in around

them.

The old couple on the couch raise their arms to embrace their

visitors. The children boil onto the couch.

VOICE OVER:

...But I saw an old couple bein'

visited by their children - and all

their grandchildren too. And the old

couple wasn't screwed up, and neither

were their kids or their grandkids.

And I don't know, you tell me. This

whole dream, was it wishful thinking?

Was I just fleein' reality, like I

know I'm liable to do?

FLOATING IN TOWARD A LONG DINING TABLE

In the trailer. The table is all laid out with a Thanksgiving

dinner, a huge turkey sitting at the far end.

Cut-out letters at the other end of the room say: "WELCOME

HOME KIDS!"

The grandchildren are running into frame and taking their

seats at the table, accompanied by their parents.

VOICE OVER:

...But me'n Ed, we can be good too...

The elderly couple enter from either side of the camera and

stand in the foreground, backs to us, facing the table.

VOICE OVER:

...And it seemed real. It seemed

like us. And it seemed like well...

our home... If not Arizona, then a

land, not too far away, where all

parents are strong and wise and

capable, and all children are happy

and beloved... I dunno, maybe it was

Utah.

The elderly man drapes an arm around his wife's shoulder and

draws her close. She rests her head against his shoulder,

and we:

FADE OUT:

THE END:

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