The Manchurian Candidate Page #15

MARCO:

I didn’t have anything to do with

Corporal Melvin’s death.

AGENT JONAS:

Yeah, well, that’s your opinion, but

judging from your file here, apparently

you don’t know your sh*t from your

oatmeal, my friend --

Marco snaps, spins out of his chair and lunges at Jonas --

Lt. Col. Howard and the other agents step between the two

men -- pull them apart --

LT. COL. HOWARD

(re:
Jonas)

Get this man out of here.

AGENT JONAS:

(taunting Marco)

Go ahead, nutball. Try it.

Marco PUNCHES the agent so hard it knocks him down to the

floor between the other two.

AGENT JONAS:

-- He hit me! F***!

8/18/03 74.

MARCO:

He said I could.

Colonel Garret shoves Marco back into a chair, stays in the

middle of the fracas, while --

LT. COL. HOWARD

Okay, OKAY --! That’s enough.

Gentlemen, I need a moment with Major

Marco. Now.

The Federal Agents retreat with their bloodied-nose, cold-

cocked colleague, door slamming behind them.

ELLIE (V.O.)

Evidently this has been going on for

years ...

Only Agent Volk remains, unmoved by what just occurred.

CLOSE ON - MARCO, catching his breath.

ELLIE (V.O.)

... Sad little Tin Soldier.

124 INT. ELEGANT RESTAURANT - PRIVATE ROOM - DAY 124

Ellie eats, while Raymond flips through Marco’s extensive

file:
cross-agency surveillance, Army psychological

profiling, FBI updates. Repeated buzzwords like: "mentally

unstable," "obsessed with Raymond Shaw," "delusional,"

"borderline functional," "acute stress disorder ..."

ELLIE:

Isn’t it disgraceful the way troubled

individuals are allowed to simply walk

around with the rest of us until

something horrible happens? Another

failure of the HMOs. I’m thinking of

sponsoring a bill, with Senator Friedman

of Rhode Island -

RAYMOND:

-- I don’t care.

ELLIE:

Well, imagine how terrified your people

were yesterday when Major Marco showed up

at the airport and you invited him -- my

God, invited him -- to tag along.

Knowing what they knew.

RAYMOND:

I know him. I served under him. He was

a good man.

8/18/03 75.

ELLIE:

That’s what the neighbors always say

about serial killers.

Raymond stares at an old PHOTOGRAPH OF MARCO: curled up in a

fetal position, on a V.A. hospital bed.

ELLIE:

(sighs)

Perhaps we could arrange a promotion to a

less stressful posting. Somewhere

tropical.

125 INT. FEDERAL BUILDING - CONFERENCE ROOM - DAY 125

Marco with Howard, who’s visibly upset. He likes Marco, it

breaks his heart to watch him unravelling like this. Agent

Volk remains in her chair, on the other side of the room:

The door opens, and Col. Garret comes in, with Agent

Goldring, who gives Marco back his personal effects, and:

AGENT GOLDRING:

Goodbye.

(to Marco)

Get out of here.

LT. COL. HOWARD

He’s free to go?

AGENT GOLDRING:

Shaw won’t press charges, and he’s got

juice with important friends. It’s

today’s daily double.

Agent Volk closes her notebook and moves past Goldring as he

picks up the tape recorder. She glances at Howard, and

leaves the room.

COLONEL GARRET:

Someone from Senator Eleanor Shaw’s

office called and intervened on your

behalf.

A beat. Marco, trying to process all this:

COLONEL GARRET:

Major, you have reached the terminal end

of the Army’s patience. You’re relieved

of duty, effective immediately.

LT. COL. HOWARD

There’s a young neurologist at Walter

Reed. Zahn. He’s had considerable

success with GWS -- I want you to get

your affairs in order and report to him

(MORE)

8/18/03 76.

LT. COL. HOWARD (CONT’D)

for evaluation and treatment first thing

Monday morning.

MARCO:

Sir, I know all about Dr. Zahn.

Remember? He’s that guy who --

(catches himself)

Sir. Yes sir.

(beat)

I’m sorry.

LT. COL. HOWARD

Me too, Ben.

126 OMITTED 126

127 SERIES OF X-RAYS 127

micro-circuitry, neat as a pin --

DELP’S VOICE

I thought you said you lost this.

TIGHT - THROUGH A STEREOSCOPIC MICROSCOPE - THE IMPLANT

falls into focus, smooth and etched with integrated circuits

as intricate and beautiful as a henna tattoo ...

MARCO’S VOICE

I found it again.

128 INT. DELP’S LAB - SKYBOOTH - NIGHT 128

Delp looks up from the microscope, at Marco.

DELP:

These are not supposed to exist, man.

These are only theoretical.

-- leaves the statement hanging --

129 INT. DELP’S LAB - MAIN FLOOR - MOMENTS LATER 129

Delp freaked and hyper, gathering wires and whatnot from

shelves -- a veritable armload, as:

DELP:

You sure you want to do this man?

MARCO:

Yes.

DELP:

-- because I don’t.

MARCO:

I’ll owe you one.

8/18/03 77.

Delp rounds a corner -- monkeys scrambling around their

cages as he comes to the clearing where

MARCO:

sits on one of the experimental gurneys, using a pen to

write on his arm.

DELP:

No. I’ll still owe you for getting my

sorry ass out of Albania.

MARCO:

-- Talk to me about the implant.

DELP:

Manchurian Global. Heard of ’em?

(off Marco:
)

Private equity fund, specializes in

military support services and weapons

research ... including a certain Army

implant project that went belly-up in the

early 90s.

MARCO:

You said the Army implants were for

medical emergency data.

DELP:

The ones they publicized were. But, oh

man, there was a parallel project of all

kinds of scary implantable sh*t the

Clinton watchdogs finally freaked out

over, and closed down.

MARCO:

How do you know all this?

DELP:

Cuz they funded me to make some of their

scary sh*t.

MARCO:

What does it do?

DELP:

I don’t know. I don’t want to know. You

don’t want to know -- sh*t -- it’s out of

you, and you’re still alive. That’s the

good news.

(off his arm)

What are you doing?

INTERCUT - MARCO’S FOREARM

He’s scrawling words on his palm, with a ballpoint pen:

ROSIE. RAYMOND SHAW. MANCHURIAN-GLOBAL ...

8/18/03 78.

MARCO:

Back-up in case this makes me forget some

stuff I want to remember.

DELP:

eases Marco back on the gurney, deftly puts some I.V. taps

into his arms. Marco’s legs hang over the edge.

DELP:

These are built for monkeys, so bear

with me, man.

SERIES OF SHOTS:

He’s putting thread-thin electrodes INTO Marco’s head, just

beneath the skin.

DELP:

I’m putting you on a cocktail of

methohexitol to take the edge off.

MARCO:

Edge off what?

DELP:

’Getting clarity.’ Or whatever you want

to call it -- ECT not being the precise

science that, say, leeching is.

Wires snake across the floor to the ECT [Electro-Convulsive

Therapy] unit.

MARCO:

You don’t think this is going to work.

DELP:

It’s the desperation move, man. But,

hey. There is a school of thought, says

a victim of induced abreaction -- or

ultra-paradoxical brain activity, if

you’re at all correct about what happened

to you -- can have it effectively

dispersed by electroshock. Unscrambled.

MARCO:

-- But?

DELP:

But the legions of naysayers will tell

you that if the initial work’s done

correctly -- if the brain’s been not just

washed, but dry-cleaned --

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