Beetlejuice

EXT:
WINTER RIVER, CONNECTICUT -- DAY

A bucolic New England town, but rather too clean and neat to be

entirely real. There is no visible population.

Ominous, vibrating music.

On Main Street, a banner proclaims:

COME TO THE:

INDEPENDENCE DAY PICNIC

ON THE GREEN:

WINTER RIVER, CONNECTICUT

The camera, flying over downtown and several different

neighborhoods, sweeps over a rickety bridge crossing a rapidly

flowing stream, and then up a hill to a large old-fashioned

house. The house stands alone on this prominence, overlooking

the rest of the town. The camera lingers.

SUDDENLY A GIANT DADDY LONGLEGS SPIDER --

mounts the crest of the hill behind the house, pauses for a

moment, and then starts to climb over the Victorian house in a

very menacing manner.

ADAM (v.o.)

You're a big fellow.

A HAND --

perfectly stupendous -- reaches down out of the sky, lies flat,

palm up, in the yard next to the house, and the Daddy Longlegs

climbs into it. The hand rises into the sky again.

INT:
ATTIC AND MINIATURE TOWN -- DAY

A new angle reveals Winter River as a miniature town, while the

Daddy Longlegs and the hand holding it are perfectly normal in

size. Above the model are a complicated mechanism of sun, moon,

clouds, and stars -- a whole, tiny mechanical universe to track

the hours of the day.

The hand belongs to ADAM MAITLAND, who is in his early forties,

solid-looking and easy-going. Frank Capra used to make movies

about him.

ADAM and the miniature town are in an attic room of a Victorian

house. The attic roof slopes on either side, and there are a

couple of windows, quite small and low down toward the floor at

either end of the long room. Almost the entire space is taken up

by the miniature town. A single door leads to a landing and

staircase to the lower part of the house.

ADAM carries the spider to the window, kneels on the floor, and

pushes open the window. The spider crawls away outside.

ADAM's POV --

The real Winter River lies spread out at the bottom of the hill.

BACK TO SCENE --

ADAM, whistling, goes back to the model. He takes a pair of

tweezers in which he grips an extremely small sign, whose

lettering is so tiny we can't make it out.

He reaches into the model and places the sign on the window of

MAITLAND'S APPLIANCE STORE on Main Street.

INSERT -- THE SIGN

It reads:

ADAM AND BARBARA

ARE:

ON VACATION:

HOORAY!

BACK TO SCENE --

ADAM:

Hooray!

ADAM smiles down at the town as he's about to leave the room. He

turns off the lamp that acts as sun to the miniature Winter

River.

INT:
THE HOUSE -- DAY

A tracking shot from the top of the Maitland's house to the

bottom.

ADAM leaves the attic room, and trips softly down the stairs,

humming a merry tune.

On the walls as he passes are photographs of himself and BARBARA

standing beside impossibly large and silly-looking appliances.

ADAM passes down the second floor hallway. The doors of the

rooms are open, and we pass the master bedroom, a sewing room, a

couple of guest rooms, bathrooms, and so-on. It's a big, old

rambling house, and it's decidedly old-fashioned, homely, and

comfortable. It also looks as if three generations of the same

family have lived in it.

Down the stairs into the living room, which is decorated in the

same fashion -- big console television, Barcalounger, a living

room set from 1961. Through the dining room, with homilies in

needlepoint on the wall: BLESS THIS HOUSE O LORD WE PRAY / MAKE

IT SAFE BY NIGHT AND DAY / BLESS THE FOLKS WHO DWELL WITHIN /

KEEP THEM SAFE FROM HARM AND SIN. Through the dining room door

and into the kitchen:

INT:
KITCHEN -- DAY

ADAM's wife BARBARA is in the kitchen.

BARBARA has a kind of wholesome beauty that is mellowing well, as

she approaches middle age. There's a hint of unfulfillment in

BARBARA that gives her a little more of an edge than ADAM. We

will come to see that the only thing missing to complete the

Maitland's happiness is a child.

On the table in the center of the kitchen is a large cake about

three feet by two. BARBARA is decorating it to look just like

the American flag.

ADAM:

It's the first day of

our vacation, and you

haven't been out of the

kitchen since five a.m.

BARBARA:

(Proudly) I always make

the flag cake.

ADAM:

Fifty stars, thirteen

stripes. Did you get it

right this year?

BARBARA thinks for a moment, during which pause there is the

SOUND OF A CAR DRIVING UP TO THE HOUSE.

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