The Omega Man Page #7

MED. SHOT - MATTHIAS

He LAUGHS, walks around the dark room.

MATTHIAS:

Yes, you were a scientist. The kind of man who understood nothing until there was almost nothing left to understand.

NEVILLE:

(surly)

I'm getting along...

MATTHIAS:

You're getting dead, Mr. Neville -- or doctor or colonel, whatever they called you. I have responsibility for the last tiny remnant of mankind ... I have that responsibility.

NEVILLE:

Then why the hell don’t you live up to it? Why don't you throw away the costumes and get these people organized, try to work on a cure...

Matthias turns on him angrily.

MATTHIAS:

Oh. we are organized. You know that well enough. A cure? There is none. In the early days ... Have you seen the ruins of the general hospital? Thousands of bodies littering the corridors, rooms jammed with the dead ... and finally... those pitiful few who were left, hopeless, going mad, lynching the doctors, the technicians who had betrayed them... By the way, why weren't you there... Doctor?

REACTION SHOT - NEVILLE

NEVILLE:

I tried. There was a crash...

TWO SHOT - MATTHIAS AND NEVILLE,

MATTHIAS:

It doesn't matter. There was no cure. Is none. The curse you people created, couldn't stop, is... forever. So I've turned that curse into a blessing.

CLOSE SHOT - NEVILLE'S REACTION

MATTHIAS (O.S.)

No. now the Family has found its way. It can bear the burden -- the only curse left is -- you.

NEVILLE:

You are insane. And before very damn long, you’ll be dead -- can't you see that?

CLOSE SHOT - MATTHIAS

MATTHIAS:

(angrily)

last night you killed how many? Three of us? And today We don't know yet. And before that? You've killed dozens...You’re the messenger of death, Doctor, not us.

TWO SHOT - NEVILLE AND MATTHIAS

OTHERS come INTO the room now, and Matthias manner changes. Once again he adopts the portentous pose of judge-prophet.

NEVILLE:

I was defending myself ... You lunatics came after me...

MATTHIAS:

He's confessed all, Brothers. Murder, use of forbidden tools, practice of proscribed rites. He admits 'science, medicine, weapons, machines, electricity. He has not shared the Punishment; he does not bear the Marks...

CLOSE SHOT - NEVILLE

NEVILLE:

What is the Punishment? The Marks?

WIDE ANGLE GROUP SHOT - MATTHIAS AND GROUP OF FAMILY

As Neville speaks, the group stares at him. This is the first group appearance of the Family. WE SEE that they are of both sexes and all races. Some seem fairly young, however there are no children. In addition to the hoods, we find some wearing goggles, some helmets with dark visors, etc. Obviously, all these forms of eye guards have been scavenged in the empty city.

SERIES OF CLOSE SHOTS - INDIVIDUAL FAMILY MEMBERS

As CAMERA PANS from one to another, each removes his or her glasses, goggles, etc. revealing blank white eyes. CAMERA completes pan, stops on Matthias. He removes glasses, shows his own white eyes. For the first time, WE SEE the OPAQUE EYES of the Family.

MATTHIAS:

(quietly)

These are the Marks, Mr. Neville ... The Punishment is what you and those like you brought upon us...

CAMERA CLOSES on Matthias, closes slowly on his face, eyes, as he talks.

MATTHIAS:

In the beginning, we tried to help one another, those that were left. We tried to clean things up, set them straight. We buried and burned. And it came to us that we were spared for just that work...

PAN SHOT - FAMILY MEMBERS LISTENING TO MATTHIAS

MATTHIAS (O.S.)

... to bury what was dead, to burn what was evil, dangerous...

Neville's VOICE breaks in harsh, angry.

NEVILLE (O.S.),

So you burned libraries, laboratories...You wrecked computer centers, engineering facilities ... a herd of insane barbarians. Every night you go on burning.

PAN SHOT ENDS ON MATTHIAS. He still speaks very quietly.

MATTHIAS:

You call us barbarians, Neville'. Very well, it's an honorable name. We mean to cancel the world you made. We will simply erase history from the time that machinery and weapons began to threaten more than they offered.

CLOSE SHOT - NEVILLE

NEVILLE:

You'll play hell...

CLOSE SHOT - MATTHIAS

MATTHIAS:

No, you've played hell you and your dead kinsmen of the car and the plane and the tank and the bomb ... and when you die, the-last living reminder of hell will be gone ... forever.

As he speaks, CAMERA PULLS OUT TO GROUP SHOT. The Family RS assent.

Matthias turns to Zachary.

MATTHIAS:

Brother Zachary?

ZACHARY:

We got everything ready.

MED. SHOT - EXT. - NEVILLE, MATTHIAS, ETC.

An alley or narrow street. There, a cart has been brought. It has high sides and two solid wooden wheels about five feet in diameter. It is filled with old newspapers, books, files, broken pieces of wooden furniture, etc. SHOT is made BETWEEN Neville and Matthias. Matthias and Family have glasses or shields back on. Zachary comes over, jerks Neville roughly toward cart. Matthias stops him.

MATTHIAS:

One thing, Neville, now that its over...

Neville stares back at him.

MATTHIAS:

why didn't you leave? Why didn't you get out of the city...?

NEVILLE:

I wasn’t sure about that ... until now.

MED. LONG SHOT - NEVILLE IN CART

On his head is a conical cap obviously made of computer printout paper. This scene echoes the burning of heretics. Again, if it is done tastefully, it will gather still another fragment of the past which haunts us. Neville is bound in the small cart. It is pulled by members of the Family. HOWLING members of the Family throw rubbish at him -- scientific debris -- and curse him. The cart is in the midst of a dense crowd, each member of which carries a candle. The lighting is weak, bizarre.

CLOSE SHOT OF OLD WOMAN in hood, eyes opaque, LAUGHING insanely, throwing objects at Neville.

CLOSE SHOT - HANDS

trying to reach through the slats of the cart to scratch Neville. They are dead white.

MED. CLOSE - NEVILLE

over a wave of candles, the flames flickering Insanely.

LONG SHOT - THE CROWD

filling a narrow street from Neville's POINT OF VIEW.

CAMERA TRANSITION TO NEVILLE

who stands tied to the cart, wood and paper and books piled around him. CAMERA PULLS BACK to WIDE ANGLE LONG SHOT. We find that we are in a VAST EMPTY STADIUM. In the midst of the field, THE FAMILY, all

carrying candles, are gathered around the stand from which Matthias preaches. The cart has been turned upside-down

and the technological debris it contained is piled below one of the wheels, to which Neville Is bound, spread-eagled. It stands in a large circular burned area. This is where Matthias and the Family have burned bodies after the plague's onslaught.

MED. LONG SHOT - MATTHIAS - NEVILLE'S POINT OF VIEW

MATTHIAS:

Here Is evil...

MATTHIAS past Neville's profile. As Matthias speaks, CAMERA FOCUS ALTERS FROM MATTHIAS to NEVILLE.

MATTHIAS:

Is this not the place where all the dead burned? And this

(pointing to Neville)

Is the last of the dead...And what will we do with this corpse?

As Matthias asks his question and the Family HOWLS for Neville’s death, CAMERA PULLS OUT VERY QUICKLY TO WIVZ ANGLE LONG SHOT as stadium LIGHTS COME 0N. At first flickeringly, then with a BURST of fall power. All the lights do not come on. Some bulbs ate burnt out or have failed over the past year or so, but still the field la flooded with light.

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