Youth Page #17

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PALE GIRL:

There was a bit of dialog I really

liked, when your son says, "Why

weren't you a father to me?" and

you say, "I didn't think I was up

to it." At that moment I understood

something really important.

JIMMY TREE:

What?

PALE GIRL:

That no one in the whole world

feels up to it. And so there's no

reason to worry. Bye. See you at

the hotel.

And the girl walks away, her stride natural and easy.

Jimmy just stands there, immobile, at the counter, staring

into space. He’s stunned. Instinctively, he puts on his

sunglasses.

Fred, standing still behind him among the shelves, must have

heard everything, because he merely stares at Jimmy's back.

He is as overcome as Jimmy is, and doesn’t say a word. He

just looks at back of the actor who is probably deeply moved

right now.

76.

44. EXT. COUNTRY LANE. DAY

Jimmy and Fred walk along the beautiful lane that skirts the

mountain village.

They walk in silence, wrapped in perfect sounds: cicadas and

distant cowbells.

JIMMY TREE:

What do you do all day, Fred?

FRED BALLINGER:

They tell me I’m apathetic. So I

don’t do anything.

JIMMY TREE:

Don’t you miss your work?

FRED BALLINGER:

Not at all. I worked far too much.

JIMMY TREE:

So what do you miss?

FRED BALLINGER:

My wife. I miss my wife Melanie.

JIMMY TREE:

I read on Wikipedia that you hung

out with Stravinsky for a while

when you were young.

FRED BALLINGER:

True.

JIMMY TREE:

What was he like?

FRED BALLINGER:

He was a very placid man.

JIMMY TREE:

Placid? That’s all? Be generous

with me, Fred. I need a generous

friend. Tell me about Stravinsky.

FRED BALLINGER:

One day he said to me,

“Intellectuals don’t have any

taste.” So from that day on, I did

everything I could not to be an

intellectual. And I succeeded.

Jimmy doesn’t say anything. They walk on in silence.

FRED BALLINGER (CONT’D)

And you? What do you miss?

77.

JIMMY TREE:

Nothing, I’d say. Luckily.

FRED BALLINGER:

Be generous with me, Jimmy.

Jimmy smiles, as if caught red-handed.

JIMMY TREE:

What I missed I discovered four

months ago reading Novalis.

Fred is surprised.

FRED BALLINGER:

You read Novalis?

JIMMY TREE:

(playful) Even actors from

California, when they’re not

getting drunk, snorting coke, or

hanging out with anorexic models,

occasionally read Novalis.

FRED BALLINGER:

You're right, sorry. I'm an old man

and full of prejudices. And what

does Novalis say?

JIMMY TREE:

"I'm always going home, always

going to my father's house."

45. EXT. GARDEN HOTEL. NIGHT

Mark Kozelek presses play on an iPod, and the sweet notes of

a synthesizer float out the speakers. It’s a slow, hypnotic

track. The camera moves slowly around the room; it takes in

Kozelek and Jimmy Tree's friends, who are listening

seriously, attentively to the music. The camera glides out

onto the terrace and takes in Jimmy Tree, lying on a chaise

lounge and listening very intently to the music. He smokes a

cigarette, which he then puts out in a cup of herbal tea.

Mark Kozelek comes out and joins him. He lies down on the

chaise lounge next to Jimmy’s.

MARK KOZELEK:

How do you like it? I wrote it

yesterday. It’s called “Ceiling

Gazing.”

Jimmy listens and then says sincerely.

JIMMY TREE:

It’s fabulous, Mark.

78.

On the track, Mark’s voice joins in and blends with the

synthesizer. A voice so romantic it gives you the chills.

46. INT/EXT. REAR GARDEN HOTEL/ MASSEUSE’S ROOM. NIGHT

The beautiful music continues, extra-diegetic now. It’s

really moving.

Softly, as if in slow motion, the tiny, timid masseuse comes

into the camera’s eye. In close-up now, she’s dancing. She’s

playing with Kinect again, but a different dance now.

47. INT./EXT. SOUTH AMERICAN’S SUITE/REAR GARDEN HOTEL. NIGHT

The beautiful music can be heard here as well.

The South American is on the terrace, in his underwear. He’s

half-reclining on a chaise lounge. His wife is at the foot of

the lounge, massaging his massive, aching legs.

He stares out across the valley. And then, suddenly, it’s

like he has a vision. Bright lights come on, like the

floodlights at a soccer stadium, and he sees twenty-two men,

divided into two rows of eleven. One row is wearing the

Argentina national team jersey, and the other that of

England. The twenty-two players clamber up the steep field

and arrive at the hotel garden. They merge into a single row

and wave to a crowd that is not there. It seems like the lead

up to an important soccer match.

Overcome with emotion, the South American stares at this

vision.

His wife looks up at him sadly. She sees he is moved and asks

in Spanish.

SOUTH AMERICAN’S WIFE

What are you thinking about?

The stadium floodlights suddenly go out.

SOUTH AMERICAN:

The future.

48. INT. FRED BALLINGER’S SUITE. NIGHT

Kozelek’s music dies down here. It’s instrumental now, which

makes it seem remote and discreet.

Lena is asleep in the bed. Half-light.

Fred is in the little living room, sitting in the middle of

the couch. From here he can see Lena asleep in the distance.

He looks away, and stares into space.

79.

He’s thinking, his thumb and index finger rubbing a candy

wrapper imperceptibly at irregular intervals, creating a

beautiful, elementary melody.

And that slight sound is what awakens Lena. She opens an eye.

Without moving, she studies her father from the bed as he

sits motionless on the couch.

49. INT. HOTEL RECEPTION. NIGHT

The lights are dimmed for the night. Two concierges are

checking in a group of six guests who have just arrived.

They’re all about forty years old, four women and two men,

normal faces. But they have some unusual baggage: rigid metal

suitcases. Two other women arrive, wheeling metal racks from

which hang dozens of outfits, covered in garment bags.

They all seem really tired. Kozelek’s music caresses them...

50. INT. SALINE GROTTO. NIGHT

... and flows here.

A fake underground grotto with papier-m.ch. walls made to

look like the Alps.

A long spiral staircase in the center goes down and down,

finishing right in a large round pool full of dark water with

so much salt that you can do the dead man’s float without the

least effort.

And in fact, Mick Boyle and his five screenwriters are

floating naked on their backs in a studied darkness.

They’re brainstorming about the ending of “Life’s Last Day.”

FUNNY SCREENWRITER

He’s on his deathbed, and murmurs

to her, “I should have devoted

myself to you, and to our love,

instead of wasting my life trying

to become the king of insurance

policies.”

SCREENWRITER IN LOVE

Or maybe he just says something

banal to her, real simple, like

“Take care of yourself.”

INTELLECTUAL SCREENWRITER

No, we have to stay with the

physical pain right up to the end.

How about if he says, “Not even

morphine can help me now.”

80.

FEMALE SCREENWRITER

What if he focuses on some

insignificant detail? If he said

something like, “I wonder whatever

happened to that key ring you gave

me twenty-five years ago, the one

shaped like a horseshoe?”

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