Silver Bullet Page #19

HALLER:

That's just about the craziest damn story

I've ever heard, Al.

UNCLE AL:

I know. I could have edited out all of the

completely crazy stuff, but I thought you

deserved to hear it with the bark on.

HALLER:

I appreciate that. Now, the next question:

Do you believe any of this? You do, don't you?

UNCLE AL:

Let's just say I believe Lester Lowe should

be checked out.

HALLER rises.

HALLER:

That can be arranged.

They shake hands.

EXT. THE RECTORY NIGHT

A Chevrolet with TARKER'S MILLS CONSTABLE painted on the

side in gold leaf pulls up. JOE HALLER gets out, and as he

does there's a business of pulling his pants legs down over

his boots- nice stitched cowboy boots, not black cop's

shoes. We want the audience to notice these boots, remember

them- probably HALLER should wear them all through the

picture. He goes up the walk.

HALLER rings the doorbell.

No one comes. HALLER rings the bell again. Waits. No one

comes. He leans down and looks through a side window.

INT. THE RECTORY HALL AND SITTING ROOM, HALLER'S POV

No one there.

EXT. HALLER

He goes down the steps, stands on the path for a moment, and

then goes over to the shed-garage. He opens the door and

looks in.

EXT./INT. THE GARAGE, HALLER'S POV

LOWE'S coupe is in there. There's just room for it amid the

shadowy piles of bottles and cans.

INT. THE GARAGE, WITH HALLER

He goes around to the front of LOWE'S coupe and squats down.

In the b.g.:
a heaped mountain of aluminum beer and soda

cans.

HALLER feels in his breast pocket and brings out a Zippo. He

lights it and looks at:

INT. THE COUPE, CU

One of the turn-signal lamps is broken. There's a scratch in

the paint and a dent in the bumper. HALLER'S fingers come

into the frame and touch the scratch. They stop, and THE

CAMERA ZOOMS IN to a small streak of silvery paint. As MARTY

has a scrape of blue car paint on his wheelchair, so does

LOWE have a scrape of silver wheelchair paint on his car.

INT. HALLER

His eyes widen.

SOUND:
SHATTERING ROAR and the CLINK AND TUMBLE of about

nine thousand cans as LOWE erupts from under the aluminum

scrap heap behind HALLER. He is a mixture of man and

werewolf, and quite clearly a beastial version of LOWE. In

one hand he holds the remains of OWEN KNOPFLER'S peacemaker.

HALLER starts to turn; LOWE strikes him with the bat. CAMERA

CLOSES IN ON LOWE as the bat rises and falls... rises and

falls. We can't see HALLER, and that is probably a mercy,

but we can hear the THUD of the bat as it strikes again and

again and again.

EXT. THE REST AREA AT AUGER FALLS, WITH MARTY, AL, JANE

DAY:

UNCLE AL has taken the Coslaw family station wagon today.

The three of them are sitting in the grove of trees.

MARTY:

Mr. Haller said he'd check him out, and

guess what? No one sees him again!

UNCLE AL:

And what do you suggest I do about it,

dear boy?

MARTY slips off his St. Christopher's medallion and hands it

to UNCLE AL.

MARTY:

I want you to turn this into a silver

bullet.

UNCLE AL:

You're not going to let it go, are you?

MARTY:

I saw what I saw.

UNCLE AL:

Marty, the moon wasn't even full!

JANE (quietly)

In the made-up stories, the guy who's the

werewolf only changes when the moon is full.

But maybe he's really that way almost all

the time, only as the moon gets fuller...

MARTY (finishes)

...the guy gets wolfier.

JANE (hands AL her crucifix)

Here. Take mine, too.

MARTY:

Jane... you don't have to do that.

JANE:

Don't tell me what I have to do and what I

don't, booger-brains.

MARTY:

Will you marry me, Jane?

UNCLE AL:

Would you kids mind telling me how this guy

Lowe became a werewolf to begin with?

JANE:

I don't know. Maybe he doesn't know, either.

MARTY:

No one knows how cancer begins, either- or

exactly what it is- but people still

believe in it.

UNCLE AL:

The kid is eleven years old and already

he sounds like a Jesuit. A French Jesuit.

MARTY:

I think he's going to come for me. Not

just because I know who he is, but

because I hurt him. Only I don't think

he'll try again as Lowe.

UNCLE AL:

Dear boy, you have gone right out of

your mind.

MARTY:

Will you do it?

UNCLE AL only looks at him, confused and unsure.

EXT. A COUNTRY ROAD, WITH THE COSLAW STATION WAGON DAY

UNCLE AL is taking the kids home- THE CAMERA TRACKS the

wagon for a moment, and then we are looking up the short

lane and into a gravel pit.

THE CAMERA ZOOMS IN, FAST, on the sandy rear wall. We can

see one cowboy boot sticking out of a wall of sand. It's

bloody and chewed.

EXT. THE COSLAW DRIVEWAY DAY

The wagon pulls in.

INT. THE CAR, WITH MARTY, JANE, AND UNCLE AL

MARTY:

Please, Uncle Al.

JANE:

Will you?

The St. Cristopher's medal and the crucifix are hanging from

the rearview on a fine silver chain. UNCLE AL takes down the

medal and looks at it.

UNCLE AL:

All right. I give up. Yes.

MARTYJANE:

All right! Thanks!Thank you, Uncle Al!

UNCLE AL:

If either of you ever tells anyone I even

bought a piece of this story, werewolves

will be the least of your problems.

EXT./INT. SILVER BULLET MONTAGE

a.) UNCLE AL pulls up to a city store front with a sign

reading MAC'S GUNS AND AMMO. He takes out the St.

Cristopher's medal, looks at it, and shakes his head, as if

still ruing his own credulity and stupidity. He goes inside.

JANE (voice-over)

Uncle Al's friend Mac was more than a

gunsmith; he was, Uncle Al said, an

old-world craftsman, a sort of wizard

of weapons.

b.) In the gun shop interior, we see UNCLE AL talking to

MAC, who really should look like an elderly white wizard- a

kind of Gandalf figure. In the b.g. window we see a paper

skeleton and paper jack-o'-lanterns: our first clue that All

Hallow's Eve is nearing. UNCLE AL is speaking animatedly,

using his hands a lot; we don't know exactly what the tale

is, but it must be a whopper. In the course of it, he hands

the medal and the crucifix to MAC, who tents the silver

chains over his fingers and looks at them.

JANE (v-o continues)

God knows what sort of story my uncle

told him, but I think that for men who

have been married as often as Uncle Al,

invention on short notice becomes

something of a specialty.

c.) In his workroom, we see MAC spilling boron over the

medal and looking closely at the stain.

JANE (v-o continues)

The gunsmith confirmed the high-grade

silver content of my crucifix and Marty's

medallion...

d.) In a dim shot which makes MAC look more like a sorcerer

than ever, we see him light an acetylene torch and begin

melting the medal and the crucifix in the crucible. THE

CAMERA MOVES SLOWLY IN as JANE'S contribution and MARTY'S

melt together; they are becoming on and indissoluble.

JANE (v-o continues)

...melted them down...

e.) We see MAC pouring molten silver into a bullet mold.

JANE (v-o concludes)

...and molded them into a silver bullet.

INT. MAC'S GUN SHOP, WITH MAC AND UNCLE AL DAY

MAC comes out of the back with a small inlaid wooden box. He

puts it down on the glass counter top.

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