The Crazies Page #12

EXT. SILO - CONTINUOUS

As they come out the hatch:

RUSSELL:

Why aren’t they telling anybody

what’s going on down here?

David pauses, Russell’s question hanging.

DAVID:

(indicates)

That’s why.

THE BURNING CORPSE. They just stare, the firelight playing

across their haunted faces.

DAVID:

Let’s get to the house.

They set off and we see the farmhouse from a distance. Alone

on the prairie. A plume of smoke rising up ghostly pale in

the moonlight.

EXT. FIELD BEHIND DUTTON HOUSE - DAYBREAK

They come up through the back acres. David with the M-16 on

his shoulder. Judy offering a grave assessment.

JUDY:

This wasn’t a chemical spill.

(off their looks)

They’re burning the bodies. It

must be bacteriological, viral.

Something that spreads by human

contact. Or the air.

BECCA DARLING:

The air? -- it was in the water.

59.

Judy gives a grim nod.

JUDY:

It was. It must have more than one

mode of transmission. Or mutated

or something, who knows.

RUSSELL:

(to Judy)

How come I’m not crazy yet?

DAVID:

I told you why.

RUSSELL:

(to Judy)

Besides the fact that your husband

officially forbade it.

JUDY:

Expose a group of people to

something, there’s always a handful

who aren’t affected. I don’t know,

Russell, maybe you’re naturally

immune.

RUSSELL:

Nah, I’m not that lucky.

They walk on. Judy’s face darkens as THEIR HOUSE comes into

view at the top of the field. Curtains sway in shattered

windows. The cruiser, gutted by fire, smolders in the

driveway. Caught up in her emotions, she dashes toward the

house with David, Russell and Becca playing catch up.

DAVID:

Judy, wait!

CUT TO:

ALTERNATE POV (STATIC) - Through a lace-curtained upstairs

window, we see them run across the field to the house...

INT. DUTTON HOUSE - CONTINUOUS

Judy runs in the front door and slows, shocked

THE HOUSE IS DESTROYED. Holes smashed through the walls.

Sofas and chairs slashed open. The upright piano decimated.

David enters and surveys the destruction with Judy as Russell

checks the other rooms to make sure there's nobody here.

60.

Judy turns and walks out, past Becca who has stopped at the

front door out of simple respect. David lingers a moment

then follows.

EXT. DUTTON HOUSE - CONTINUOUS

Judy at the clothesline taking down the laundry. David walks

over.

DAVID:

What are you doing?

(no reply)

Stop.

He catches her hands. Judy breaks down, dropping clothes.

David holds her beside the fluttering white sheets.

DAVID:

(re:
house)

None of this matters. You know

that.

JUDY:

(crying)

I don't care about the house...

it's everything. Everybody.

Everybody we know... I don't see

how we recover from this... I don't

see how this town ever comes

back...

Neither does David. He holds her close.

CUT TO:

ALTERNATE POV - Through a downstairs window, we see David and

Judy outside by the clothesline. LOW RASPY BREATHS.

Someone, inside the house, is watching.

EXT. DUTTON HOUSE - CONTINUOUS

Judy walks away from the house to clear her head. Becca

following, hoping to console. David comes up the steps past

Russell who sits at the top, wiping sweat from his brow with

a handkerchief. Russell nods at the smoldering cruiser.

RUSSELL:

Sheriff-mobile's seen better days.

DAVID:

(nods)

We'll have to take our chances on

the highway. Power lines will take

too long.

61.

Tosses Russell the M-16.

DAVID:

Stay with them, I'll be right back.

Russell nods and goes off across the lawn to catch the girls.

INT. KITCHEN, DUTTON HOUSE - CONTINUOUS

Overturned appliances. Food spilled on the floor. David

grabs some BOTTLED WATER and tosses it in a dufflebag.

INT. HALLWAY / STAIRS - CONTINUOUS

With a bowling motion he slides the dufflebag the length of

the hall to the front door as he heads upstairs.

INT. UPSTAIRS HALLWAY - CONTINUOUS

Cresting the stairs, David comes down the hall to the INT.

BEDROOM - CONTINUOUS

He stops in the doorway, shocked. It’s a bloodbath.

A BLOOD-SOAKED SHEET

covers two corpses on the bed. Who's under there? David

steps closer, draws back the sheet TWO

SLAUGHTERED PIGS

Their severed heads on the pillows suggest a husband and

wife. David places his hand on a carcass, checking for

warmth. His face darkens. Fresh kills. He tenses at a

sudden scary thought.

IS THERE SOMEONE UNDER THE BED?

He backs slowly away, angling his gaze underneath.

BARE FLOOR.

A moment of relief and then with renewed dread he slowly

turns to face the doorway, realizing the killers are more

likely behind him, hiding in the house, perhaps somewhere

down this dark upstairs hallway.

INT. HALLWAY - CONTINUOUS

David steps into the hall. Tense breath and then he starts

down it. Very slowly. Trying not to make a sound.

Sensitive to the slightest CREAKS of the floorboards.

62.

Halfway to the stairs he STOPS ABRUPTLY, thinking he heard

something. Listens.

Nothing. The house is eerily still. Silent except for the

curtains billowing in the broken windows.

He continues on. Heel to toe. Heart pounding. Each closed

door a potential hiding place. Ten feet in front of him on

the left, that door looks particularly suspicious.

THE CLOSET:

open a crack. David’s eyes are riveted to it as he

approaches, convinced it will fly open any second. But the

attack comes from an open door to his right, from the half-

painted nursery. As he passes

A GARBAGE BAG IS YANKED OVER HIS HEAD and he is hit - WHAM! -

flat across the chest with a pipe.

The blow sends him flying backwards. Bag on his head, David

is kicked in the gut and dragged into the master bedroom by

his feet, the plastic sucking back into his mouth as he gasps

for air.

INT. BEDROOM - CONTINUOUS

He is thrown across the room into the bureau. CRASH!

EXT. DOWN THE ROAD - CONTINUOUS

Judy, walking away, looks back at the house. The windblown

grass drowning out b.g. noises.

JUDY:

Did you hear that?

Becca shakes her head. Russell too. They walk on.

INT. BEDROOM - CONTINUOUS

Staggering to his feet, David claws at the plastic bag

covering his face, ripping it away to finally see his

attackers.

JAKE AND CURT HAMILL

Faces half paralyzed, half in spasm, wrenched into hideous

lopsided sneers.

Jake grabs the knife he used to slaughter the pigs and makes

a lunging stab. David's hand flies up in a reflexive block.

63.

THE KNIFE POINT COMES OUT THE BACK OF DAVID’S HAND!

In and out, a flash of steel. David recoils clutching his

hand, blood pouring down. Curt swings a pipe at his head.

Barely misses. David stumbles backwards onto the bed,

sandwiched between the slaughtered pigs.

Jake jumps astride him, drives the knife two-handed at

David's chest. David catches him by the wrists, sends him

tumbling off the side of the bed, and rolls off the other

side as Curt brings the pipe down like a sledgehammer at his

face. The pipe hits the pillow instead.

FEATHERS EXPLODE EVERYWHERE.

David climbs to his feet, fumbling for something to fight

with. Grabs the phone book. A poor choice. The Hamill boys

back him into the corner. Feathers swirling. Curt unleashes

another swing of the pipe. WHAM!

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