THIN RED LINE, THE: THE ABRIDGED SCRIPT™
By David Faulkner
FADE IN:
EXT. JUNGLE
Shot of leaves. Trees. A LIZARD. Birds. More trees. More leaves. Birds. Lizards. Etc.
AUDIENCE Wasn't this on PBS last night?
EXT. PEACEFUL NATIVE VILLAGE
JIM CAVIEZEL is AWOL (whatever that stands for) and hanging around with native people. It is very PEACEFUL and PLEASANT, even though they are PRIMITIVE. This is contrasted later with VIOLENT, UNPLEASANT, but supposedly CIVILIZED people fighting their war.
JIM CAVIEZEL I sure do like it here. This symbolizes the existential metaphysical being of the essence of the human condition...
A big sinister American ship shows up. JIM CAVIEZEL is taken on board.
INT. SHIP
The ship is very lifeless, claustraphobic, and sinister seeming. This is a sharp contrast from the wonderful natural world outside.
SEAN PENN You were AWOL again. Guess I'll make you a medic.
JIM CAVIEZEL A medic, symbolizing my role as a healer within this horror of warfare, the dualistic nature of the...
SEAN PENN Shut up.
EXT. SHIP
JOHN TRAVOLTA (with a silly looking) mustache) Wanna join the Church of Scientology?
NICK NOLTE Uh, no thanks. Oh, by the way, I'm a fanatical war-loving type of guy.
JOHN TRAVOLTA (not so subtly) Some people in wars do stupid things to try to increase their prestige and stab people in the back. I wonder if that is a foreshadowing. Oh, I'm only in this movie briefly as an awkward cameo.
EXT. JUNGLE
More trees and jungles. A simple native man looking for food walks by as the scared ****less American soldiers march through the jungle.
DIRECTOR TERRENCE MALICK It's symbolic!
Soldiers find a mutilated American soldier.
NICK NOLTE Damn Japs. Let's go shoot some of those yellow Nazi-loving evil squinty- eyed Japanese so they make TVs and Walkmans instead of trying to take over half the world. Har har har.
battle starts. JAPANESE SOLDIERS shoot at AMERICAN SOLDIERS.
NICK NOLTE stays a safe distance away.
NICK NOLTE (into radio) Go lose your life with a frontal assault on their base, even though you're outnumbered and being slaughtered, but I want to be a big war hero.
ELIAS KOTEAS (through radio) No, they'll all die.
NICK NOLTE Who cares, ****ing coward. God bless America.
AMERICAN SOLDIERS kill JAPANESE SOLDIERS in a bunker, take some captive. JAPANESE captives are all half- starved boys, trembling and praying in terror.
DIRECTOR TERRENCE MALICK See! They're not really faceless evil monsters!
STEVEN SPIELBERG Damn you, people might compare that to SAVING PRIVATE RYAN, where the EVIL GERMANS were just faceless EVIL NAZI enemies. Then again, people are idiots, so they probably won't.
Battle is over. AMERICANS beat crap out of JAPANESE prisoners, pull out their teeth, torture them, etc.
JIM CAVIEZEL War is bad, takes away people's humanity, the essence of their lives, ripped away, their souls torn as the very fabric of consciousness is torn with a barbaric blood lust, the transcendent flow of their being rippled across the jagged terrain of the symbolic human struggle...
JIM CAVIEZEL goes back to the native village, where he sees people arguing, children fighting, and a child dying from disease.
DIRECTOR TERRENCE MALICK You see, we idealize even nature, but in reality, there is no such thing as a perfect place. Get it?
AUDIENCE Duh...huh...what?
BEN CHAPLIN daydreams about fondling his wife.
BEN CHAPLIN My wife sure is hot, I can't wait till this war is over so I can go back and **** her. That's the only thing giving me hope to keep on going.
BEN CHAPLIN gets a letter from his WIFE, saying she fell in love with another man and wants a divorce.
BEN CHAPLIN Aww ****.
Suddenly, hordes of JAPANESE attack. People DIE. It is very SAD. The LIZARD that was shown in the beginning is DEAD.
DIRECTOR TERRENCE MALICK Get it? Isn't this deep and meaningful?
TEENAGE BOYS IN AUDIENCE What the ****'s he talkin' ÁÃout, yo? Let's see some Japanese bellybutton get kicked, otherwise they'll never become pacifists and just make consumer electronics, like my crappy SONY PLAYSTATION and my NINTENDO 64 that I waste vast amounts of time playing, when I'm not listening to music on my SONY DISCMAN or watching my SONY TELEVISION.
TEENAGE GIRLS IN AUDIENCE Where's MATT DAMON?! I thought he was supposed to be in this! He's SO CUTE, almost as cute as LEONARDO DICAPRIO.
WAR VETERANS IN AUDIENCE Damn, when I was in the war, I just remember wanting to go home alive. I guess I should've noticed all that symbolism and the philosophical side to it. Now where are my dentures?
STAUNCH REPUBLICANS IN AUDIENCE THIS MOVIE REALLY SHOWS WHY AMERICA RULES! USA IS THE BEST. WE HAVE THE BEST MILITARY IN THE WORLD, NOW WE RULE THE WORLD INSTEAD OF THOSE JAPANESE ****ERS! I CAN'T BELIEVE THOSE ****ING HIPPIES IN THE 60'S DIDN'T WANT TO GO INTO ANOTHER JUNGLE AND FIGHT MORE ASIAN PEOPLE FOR THEIR COUNTRY! GOD BLESS THE USA, THE LAND OF THE FREE!
CRITICS This movie sucks, SAVING PRIVATE RYAN was much better, because it had TOM HANKS, and WE LOVE TOM HANKS.
More leaves, trees, birds, etc.
FADE OUT:
GEORGE CLOONEY Hey, wait, let me make my cameo before you end!
GEORGE CLOONEY shows up for some unnecessary part tacked on the end.
END
