The Time Machine Page #21

BACK TO TIME TRAVELLER 272

As he goes after them to the edge of the flagstones

and calls out angrily.

TIME TRAVELLER:

Stop!

BACK TO ELOI 273

Featuring the Man in White in the f.g. They halt

and stare back. The Time Traveller's voice comes

over like a whip.

TIME TRAVELLER (o.s.)

What are you running from?

None of the Eloi answer.

TOWARD THE SPHINX - FULL SHOT 274

Beyond several Eloi the Time Traveller stands in

the shadow of the white sphinx. He steps slowly

forward onto the lawn, looking around the big

semi-circle of his audience.

TIME TRAVELLER (sharply,

gesturing back toward the panel)

Where have they gone?

(no answer)

What happens to them?

(no answer)

Don't stand there like a fatted

cattle grazing contentedly in lush

pastures. - Answer me! What's

wrong?

MAN IN WHITE (calmly)

There is nothing wrong. It is all

clear.

TIME TRAVELLER:

What do you mean, all clear?

MAN IN WHITE (repeating)

All clear!

TIME TRAVELLER (thinking

rapidly, talking to himself)

Once....in the middle nineteen

hundreds I heard a man...

(it bursts upon him)

The falling bombs!

(to the Man in white

and the crowd)

That's over. Gone. Dead for

hundreds of thousand of years.

There are no more flying machines.

No bombs. No wars!

MAN IN WHITE:

Yes, the rings have told us that

story.

TIME TRAVELLER - MED SHOT 275

TIME TRAVELLER:

But you didn't listen. You didn't

learn anything. All that is left

is fear...a blind animal fear.

Ages ago men were taught to hide in

the ground when the sirens blew...

taught to run from a raining death...

but those men are dead! And so are

the men who slaughtered them. Don't

you understand?

(looks around pleadingly)

You are slaves of a dead past... You

don't even own your souls. You're

led to slaughter like sheep!

MAN IN WHITE (o.s.)

But there is nothing to fear now,

it's all clear.

TIME TRAVELLER:

What about those who went below?

How are they to come back?

MAN IN WHITE 276

He looks ominously at the Time Traveller.

MAN IN WHITE:

They never come back. Nobody can

bring them back.

Unimpressed, the crowd begins to disperse, the Man

in White following them.

BACK TO TIME TRAVELLER 277

Calling after them.

TIME TRAVELLER:

You can try. Won't any of you

even try?

He sees that the situation is hopeless.

TIME TRAVELLER (almost

to himself)

Well, someone has to try!

He runs off.

SERIES OF SHOTS 278

The Time Traveller running through the forest. (a)

He is laboring up the open hillside. (b)

The Eloi in a semi-circle silently watch. A few (c)

of them hesitantly start after the Time Traveller.

EXT. THE WELL - FULL SHOT - (DAY) 279

Arriving, the Time Traveller pauses to catch his

breath, picks up a piece of wood that could serve

as a torch, then jumps over the wall and starts

to descend.

Over this a faint THROBBING OF MACHINES can be

heard.

SHOOTING INTO SHAFT - HIGH ANGLE 280

The Time Traveller climbs down, gripping the walls

with his hands and feet. The depth beneath him is

dizzying. THROBBING LOUDER.

IN THE WELL - FULL SHOT 281

As the Time Traveller descends, the CAMERA FOLLOWS

him, step after step. The deeper he goes, the darker

it becomes and the THROBBING OF MACHINES INCREASES as

well.

Suddenly a rock gives beneath his weight. He barely

saves himself. Not without fear he pauses to rest,

glancing upward.

FROM THE THROAT OF WELL - LOW ANGLE 282

A couple of the curious Eloi peer downward, watching

the Time Traveller's progress.

BACK TO TIME TRAVELLER 283

A metal ladder affixed to the wall brings him finally

to the opening of a transverse passageway. In almost

complete darkness he steps from the ladder into the

tunnel and pauses to take the piece of wood from his

belt, but decides not to light it. He bends and peers

ahead.

INT. GREAT CAVERN - FULL SHOT 283X1

The Time Traveller emerges onto the bridge in the b.g.,

pausing for a moment to survey the surroundings, then

starts slowly down the staircase carved along the wall.

The gloom is relieved only by puffing smoke and waver-

ing lights, revealing occasionally vague shapes and

grotesque shadows.

(NOTE:
DRIPPING WATER from the walls and THROBBING OF

MACHINES punctuate the desolation of this

scene as well as the following sequence.)

CLOSE ON T.T. - MOVING SHOT 283X2

Walking, he notices an opening ahead and cautiously

moves toward:

INT. ENTRANCE TO FEASTING ROOM - FULL SHOT 283X3

At the threshold of this dark, silent cell the T.T.

pauses, then slowly enters. Behind him, across the

cavern, an indistinct figure watches, but quickly

disappears as the T.T. strikes a match. The sight

that the T.T. beholds fills him with revulsion and

horror.

THE FEASTING ROOM - T.T.'S P.O.V. 283X4

This is obviously a feasting place of the Morlocks.

In the flickering light we see stone tables and

scattered around the floor far below the unmistak-

able remains of human bones after the flesh has been

carnivorously picked away.

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