Schindler's List Page #23

SCHINDLER:

Thank you.

He kisses her on the mouth. The smiles on the faces around

them strain. Stern glances to heaven. Amon c*cks his head

like a confused dog. The kiss is broken, finally, and

Schindler smiles again with impunity.

SCHINDLER:

Thank them for me.

The girl backs away nodding anxiously; all she wants now is

out before someone -- her, Schindler, both of them -- gets

shot. Henry Rosner nudges Leo and they begin another song.

And the party tries to resume.

EXT. APPELLPLATZ - PLASZOW - DAWN

Were they not asleep in their barracks, the prisoners would

no doubt shudder at the sight: the clerks are setting up

their folding tables.

Other figures move around the parade ground in the murky

dawn light:
these raising a banner, those wheeling filing

cabinets across the Appellplatz, this one wiring a phonograph,

that one saturating a pad with ink from a bottle.

Goldberg, Lord of Lists, moves from table to table handing

out carbons of lists and sharing morning pleasantries with

the clerks.

Some men in white appear like ghosts. A doctor's kid is

opened, a stethoscope removed. Another cleans the lenses of

his glasses. Someone sharpens a pencil.

EXT. DEPOT - PLASZOW - DAWN

A trainman waving a lantern guides an engineer who's slowly

backing an empty cattle car along the tracks. It couples to

another empty slatted car with a harsh clank.

EXT. APPELLPLATZ - PLASZOW - DAY

The needle of the phonograph is set down on a pocked 78. The

first scratchy note of a Strauss waltz blare from the camp

speakers.

EXT. BALCONY - GOETH'S VILLA - DAY

In his undershirt and shorts Goeth calmly smokes his first

cigarette of the morning as he listens to the music wafting

up from down below.

Down there on the Appellplatz, the entire population of the

camp has been concentrated, some fifteen thousand prisoners.

EXT. APPELLPLATZ - PLASZOW - DAY

Though the music and banners struggle to evoke a country

fair, the presence of the doctors belie it. A sorting out

process is going on here, the healthy from the unhealthy.

A physician wipes at his brow with his handkerchief as several

prisoners run back and forth, naked, before him. He makes

his selections quickly: this one into this line, that one

into that, and Goldberg moves them recording the names.

Other groups of people run naked in front of other doctors

and clerks. Notations are made and lines are formed. The sun

beats down and the music lies.

EXT. DEPOT - PLASZOW - DAY

Some still pulling their clothes back on, the first wave of

the "unfit" is marched onto the platform. A guard slides

open the gate of a cattle car and this first unlucky group

climbs aboard.

EXT. APPELLPLATZ - PLASZOW - DAY

Behind the camouflage of other women prisoners, Mila

Pfefferberg rubs a beet against her cheeks in desperate hope

of adding a little color to her skin.

Amon Goeth, his shirtsleeves uncharacteristically rolled up,

chats with one of the doctors as another group strips.

Whether the topic is this Health Aktion or the unseasonable

weather is unclear, but he nods approvingly.

PFEFFERBERG (O.S.)

Commandant, sir.

Goeth glances up, finds Poldek among the group taking off

their clothes. Pfefferberg appeals to him with a look that

asks, Do I really have to go through this, and Goeth turns

to a clerk.

GOETH:

My mechanic.

Pfefferberg is motioned away from the others; he's okay, he

doesn't have to be put through this indignity. He calls out

to the Commandant again --

PFEFFERBERG:

What about my wife?

Goeth thinks about it a moment before he nods, Yeah, okay,

sure. A clerk accompanies Pfefferberg and, making a notation

on the way, finds Mila.

EXT. DEPOT - PLASZOW - DAY

The sun is higher, the cattle cars hotter. Prisoners' arms

stretch out between the slats offering diamonds in exchange

for a sip of water.

EXT. PLASZOW - LATER - DAY

The needle of the phonograph is set down on another record,

a children's song, "Mammi, kauf mir ein Pferdchen" (Mommy,

buy me a pony).

Children are yanked from the arms of their parents. Wailing

protests quickly escalate to brawls with the guards.

Revolvers and rifles aim at the sun and fire. Music, shots,

wails.

INT. BARRACKS - SAME TIME - DAY

Guards traipse through a deserted barracks peering up at the

rafters, pulling planks from the floor, upending cots, looking

for some children.

EXT. BARRACKS - SAME TIME - DAY

A small figure in red sprints across to another barracks,

past it, to a crude wooden structure beyond it.

INT. MEN'S LATRINES - SAME TIME - DAY

An arm held out to either side, the small girl lowers herself

into a pit into which men have defecated. She works her way

slowly down, trying to find knee and toeholds on the foul

walls, ignoring the flies invading her ears, her nostrils.

Reaching the surface of the muck she lets her feet submerge,

then her ankles, her shins, her knees, before finally

touching harder ground. As she struggles to slow her

breathing, her racing heart, she hears a hallucinatory murmur --

BOY'S VOICE

This is our place.

Rate this script:5.0 / 3 votes