Titanic Page #14

ROSE:

(looking up from the drawings)

You have a gift, Jack. You do. You see people.

JACK:

I see you.

There it is. That piercing gaze again.

ROSE:

And...?

JACK:

You wouldn'ta jumped.

CUT TO:

74 INT. RECEPTION ROOM / D-DECK - DAY

Ruth is having tea with NOEL LUCY MARTHA DYER-EDWARDES, the COUNTESS OF

ROTHES, a 35ish English blue-blood with patirician features. Ruth sees

someone coming across the room and lowers her voice.

RUTH:

Oh no, that vulgar Brown woman is coming this way. Get up, quickly before

she sits with us.

Molly Brown walks up, greeting them cheerfully as they are rising.

MOLLY:

Hello girls, I was hoping I'd catch you at tea.

RUTH:

We're awfully sorry you missed it. The Countess and I are just off to take

the air on the boat deck.

MOLLY:

That sounds great. Let's go. I need to catch up on the gossip.

Ruth grits her teeth as the three of them head for the Grand Staircase to

go up. TRACKING WITH THEM, as they cross the room, the SHOT HANDS OFF to

Bruce Ismay and Captain Smith at another table.

ISMAY:

So you've not lit the last four boilers then?

SMITH:

No, but we're making excellent time.

ISMAY:

(impatiently)

Captain, the press knows the size of Titanic, let them marvel at her speed

too. We must give them something new to print. And the maiden voyage of

Titnaic must make headlines!

SMITH:

I prefer not to push the engines until they've been properly run in.

ISMAY:

Of course I leave it to your good offices to decide what's best, but what a

glorious end to your last crossing if we get into New York Tuesday night

and surprise them all.

(Ismay slaps his hand on the table)

Retire with a bang, eh, E.J?

A beat. Then Smith nods, stiffy.

CUT TO:

75 EXT. A DECK PROMENADE - DAY

Rose and Jack stroll aft, past people lounging on deck chairs in the

slanting late-afternoon light. Stewards scurry to serve tea or hot cocoa.

ROSE:

(girlish and excited)

You know, my dream has always been to just chuck it all and become an

artist... living in a garret, poor but free!

JACK:

(laughing)

You wouldn't last two days. There's no hot water, and hardly ever any

caviar.

ROSE:

(angry in a flash)

Listen, buster... I hate caviar! And I'm tired of people dismissing my

dreams with a chuckle and a pat on the head.

JACK:

I'm sorry. Really... I am.

ROSE:

Well, alright. There's something in me, Jack. I feel it. I don't know what

it is, whether I should be an artist, or, I don't know... a dancer. Like

Isadora Duncan.... a wild pagan spirit...

She leaps forward, lands deftly and whirls like a dervish. Then she sees

something ahead and her face lights up.

ROSE:

...or a moving picture actress!

She takes his hand and runs, pulling him along the deck toward--

DANIEL AND MARY MARVIN. Daniel is cranking the big wooden movie camera as

she poses stiffly at the rail.

MARVIN:

You're sad. Sad, sad, sad. You've left your lover on the shore. You may

never see him agian. Try to be sadder, darling.

SUDDENLY Rose shoots into the shot and strikes a theatrical pose at the

rail next to Mary. Mary bursts out laughing. Rose pulls Jack into the

picture and makes him pose.

Marvin grins and starts yelling and gesturing. We see this in CUTS, with

music and no dialogue.

SERIES OF CUTS:

Rose posing tragically at the rail, the back of her hand to her forehead.

Jack on a deck chair, pretending to be a Pasha, the two girls pantomiming

fanning him like slave girls.

Jack, on his knees, pleading with his hands clasped while Rose, standing,

turns her head in bored disdain.

Rose cranking the camera, while Daniel and Jack have a western shoot-out.

Jack wins and leers into the lens, twirling an air mustache like Snidely

Whiplash.

CUT TO:

76 EXT. A DECK PROMENADE / AFT - SUNSET

Painted with orange light, Jack and Rose lean on the A-deck rail aft,

shoulder to shoulder. The ship's lights come on.

It is a magical moment... perfect.

ROSE:

So then what, Mr. Wandering Jack?

JACK:

Well, then logging got to be too much like work, so I went down to Los

Angelas to the pier in Santa Monica. That's a swell place, they even have a

rollercoaster. I sketched portraits there for ten cents a piece.

ROSE:

A whole ten cents?!

JACK:

(not getting it)

Yeah; it was great money... I could make a dollar a day, sometimes. But

only in summer. When it got cold, I decided to go to Paris and see what the

real artists were doing.

ROSE:

(looks at the dusk sky)

Why can't I be like you Jack? Just head out for the horizon whenever I feel

like it.

(turning to him)

Say we'll go there, sometime... to that pier... even if we only ever just

talk about it.

JACK:

Alright, we're going. We'll drink cheap beer and go on the rollercoaster

until we throw up and we'll ride horses on the beach... right in the

surf... but you have to ride like a cowboy, none of that side-saddle stuff.

ROSE:

You mean one leg on each side? Scandalous! Can you show me?

JACK:

Sure. If you like.

ROSE:

(smiling at him)

I think I would.

(she looks at the horizon)

And teach me to spit too. Like a man. Why should only men be able to spit.

It's unfair.

JACK:

They didn't teach you that in finishing school? Here, it's easy. Watch

closely.

He spits. It arcs out over the water.

JACK:

Your turn.

Rose screws up her mouth and spits. A pathetic little bit of foamy spittle

which mostly runs down her chin before falling off into the water.

JACK:

Nope, that was pitiful. Here, like this... you hawk it down... HHHNNNK!...

then roll it on your tongue, up to the front, like thith, then a big breath

and PLOOOW!! You see the range on that thing?

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