- —四川最大高校综合门户网
Niki Wurster Visit our Movie Scripts Page screenplay 451: http://www.geocities.com/~screenplay451/ Mao Guangqin 2 0 2000-01-23T11:50:00Z 2000-01-23T11:50:00Z 24 17697 100874 Pumpkin Software 840 201 123880 9.2504 21 0 0 Barton Fink
CHARLIE
Seems
like I hear everything that goes on in this dump. Pipes or somethin'. I'm just
glad I don't have to ply MY trade in the wee-wee hours.
He laughs.
CHARLIE
...
Ah, you'll lick this picture business, believe me. You've got a head on your
shoulders. What is it they say? Where there's a head, there's a hope?
BARTON
Where
there's life there's hope.
Charlie
laughs.
CHARLIE
That
proves you really are a writer!
Barton smiles.
BARTON
And
there's hope for you too, Charlie. Tomorrow I bet you sell a half-dozen
policies.
CHARLIE
Thanks,
brother. But the fact is, I gotta pull up stakes temporarily.
BARTON
You're
leaving?
CHARLIE
In
a few days. Out to your stompin' grounds as a matter of fact – New York City.
Things have gotten all balled up at the Head Office.
BARTON
I'm
truly sorry to hear that, Charlie. I'll miss you.
CHARLIE
Well
hell, buddy, don't pull a long face! This is still home for me – I keep my
room, and I'll be back sooner or later...
Barton rises
and walks over to his writing table.
CHARLIE
...
And – mark my words – by the time I get back you're picture'll be finished. I
know it.
Barton
scribbles on a notepad and turns to hand it to Charlie.
BARTON
New
York can be pretty cruel to strangers, Charlie. If you need a home-cooked meal
you just look up Morris and Lillian Fink. They live on Fulton Street with my
uncle Dave.
We hear a
tacky, tearing sound.
Barton looks
toward the door.
Charlie rises
and walks over to the stand next to where Barton sits.
The two
staring men form an odd, motionless tableau – the slight, bespectacled man
seated; the big man standing in a hunch with his hands on his thighs; their
heads close together.
THEIR POV
A swath of
wallpaper in the entryway has pulled away from the wall. It sags and nods.
CHARLIE
(off)
Christ!
THE TWO MEN
Frozen,
looking.
CHARLIE
...
Your room does that too?
BARTON
I
guess the heat's sweating off the wallpaper.
CHARLIE
What
a dump...
He heads for
the door and Barton follows.
CHARLIE
...
I guess it seems pathetic to a guy like you.
BARTON
Well...
CHARLIE
Well
it's pathetic, isn't it? I mean to a guy from New York.
BARTON
What
do you mean?
CHARLIE
This
kind of heat. It's pathetic.
BARTON
Well,
I guess you pick your poison.
CHARLIE
So
they say.
BARTON
Don't
pick up and leave without saying goodbye.
CHARLIE
Course
not, compadre. You'll see me again.
Barton closes
the door.
He goes back
to the desk, sits, and stares at the typewriter. After a beat he tips back in
his chair and looks up at the ceiling.
We hear a loud
thump.
HIS POV
The ceiling –
a white, seamless space.
As we track in
the thumping continues – slowly, rhythmically, progressively louder – the
effect, it seems, of odd doings upstairs.
LOOKING DOWN
ON BARTON
From a high
angle, tipped back in his chair, staring at the ceiling.
We track
slowly down toward him. The thumping continues, growing louder, sharper.
HIS POV
Moving in on
the ceiling. We close in on an unblemished area and cease to have any sense of
movement.
With a blur
something huge and dark sweeps across the frame to land with a deafening crash,
and an instant later it is gone, having left a huge black "T" stamped
into the white ceiling.
We are pulling
back from the white, past the metal prongs of the key-strike area on a
typewriter. More letters appear rapid-fire, growing smaller as the pull back
continues. The thumpimg becomes the clacking of the typewriter.
BEN GEISLER
Is emerging
from his office.
As he enters
the secretary stops typing, glances down at a slip of paper, and murmurs
tonelessly, without looking up:
SECRETARY
Barton
Fink.
GEISLER
Yeah.
Fink. Come in.
The clack of
the typewriter resumes as Barton rises.
GEISLER'S
OFFICE
The two men
enter.
This office is
considerably smaller than Lipnik's, done in grays and black. There are pictures
on the wall of Geisler with various celebrities.
Geisler sits
behind his desk.
GEISLER
Wuddya
got for me – what the hell happened to your face?
BARTON
Nothing.
It's just a mosquito bite.
GEISLER
Like
hell it is; there are no mosquitos in Los Angeles. Mosquitos breed in swamps –
this is a desert town. Wuddya got for me?
BARTON
Well
I...
GEISLER
On
the Beery picture! Where are we? Wuddya got?
BARTON
Well,
to tell you the truth, I'm having some trouble getting started –
GEISLER
Getting
STARTED! Christ Jesus! Started?! You mean you don't have ANYthing?!
BARTON
Well
not much.
Geisler leaps
to his feet and paces.
GEISLER
What
do you think this is? HAMLET? GONE WITH THE WIND? RUGGLES OF RED GAP? It's a
goddamn B picture! Big men in tights! You know the drill!
BARTON
I'm
afraid I don't really understand that genre. maybe that's the prob-
GEISLER
Understand
shit! I though you were gonna consult another writer on this!
BARTON
Well,
I've talked to Bill Mayhew-
GEISLER
Bill
Mayhew! Some help! The guy's a souse!
BARTON
He's
a great writer –
GEISLER
A
souse!
BARTON
You
don't understand. He's in pain, because he can't write-
GEISLER
Souse!
Souse! He manages to write his name on the back of his paycheck every week!
BARTON
But...
I thought no one cared about this picture.
GEISLER
You
thought! Where'd you get THAT from? You thought! I don't know what the hell you
said to Lipnik, but the sonofabitch LIKES you! You understand that, Fink? He
LIKES you! He's taken an interest. NEVER make Lipnik like you. NEVER!
Some
puzzlement shows through Barton's weariness.
BARTON
I
don't understand-
GEISLER
Are
you deaf, he LIKES you! He's taken an interest! What the hell did you say to
him?
BARTON
I
didn't say anything-
GEISLER
Well
he's taken an interest! That means he'll make your life hell, which I could
care less about, but since I drew the short straw to supervise this turkey,
he's gonna be all over me too! Fat-assed sonofabitch called me yesterday to ask
how it's going – don't worry, I covered for you. Told him you were making
progress and we were all very excited. I told him it was great, so now MY ass
is on the line. He wants you to tell him all about it tomorrow.
BARTON
I
can't write anything by tomorrow.
GEISLER
Who
said write? Jesus, Jack can't read. You gotta TELL it to him-tell him SOMEthing
for Chrissake.
BARTON
Well
what do I tell him?
Geisler rubs a
temple, studies Barton for a beat, then picks up a telephone.
GEISLER
Projection...
As he waits,
Geisler gives Barton a witherng stare. It continues throughout the phone
conversation.
GEISLER
...
Jerry? Ben Geisler here. Any of the screening rooms free this afternoon?...
Good, book it for me. A writer named Fink is gonna come in and you're gonna
show him wrestling pictures... I don't give a shit which ones! WRESTLING
pictures! Wait a minute- isn't Victor Sjoderberg shooting one now?... Show him
some of the dailies on that.
He slams down
the phone.
GEISLER
...
This ought to give you some ideas.
He jots an
address on a piece of paper and hands it to Barton.
GEISLER
...
Eight-fifteen tomorrow morning at Lipnik's house. Ideas. Broad strokes. Don't
cross me, Fink.
SCREEN
Black-and-white
footage. A middle-aged man with a clapstick enters and shouts:
"CLAPPER
DEVIL ON THE CANVAS, twelve baker take one."
Clap! The
clapper withdraws. The angle is on a corner of the ring, where an old corner
man stands behind his charge, a huge man in tights who is a little too flabby
to be a real athlete. His hair is plastered against his bullet skull and he has
a small mustache.
VOICE
Action.
The wrestler
rises from his stool and heads toward center ring and the camera. He affects a
German accent:
WRESTLER
I
will destroy him!
He passes the
camera.
VOICE
Cut.
Flash frames.
The clapper
enters again.
CLAPPER
Twelve
baker take two.
Clap! He
exits.
The wrestler
moves toward the camera.
WRESTLER
I
will destroy him!
VOICE
Cut.
The clapper
enters
CLAPPER
Twelve
baker take three.
Clap!
WRESTLER
I
will destroy him!
SLOW TRACK IN
ON BARTON
Seated alone
in a dark screening room, the shaft of the projection beam flickering over his
left shoulder.
As we creep in
closer:
