Strange Days

Synopsis: Former policeman Lenny Nero (Ralph Fiennes) has moved into a more lucrative trade: the illegal sale of virtual reality-like recordings that allow users to experience the emotions and past experiences of others. While the bootlegs typically contain tawdry incidents, Nero is shocked when he receives one showing a murder. He enlists a friend, bodyguard Mace (Angela Bassett), to help find the killer -- and the two soon stumble upon a vast conspiracy involving the police force Nero once worked for.
Genre: Action, Crime, Drama
Production: Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment
  2 wins & 4 nominations.
 
IMDB:
7.2
Rotten Tomatoes:
63%
R
Year:
1995
145 min
460 Views


A burst of bright white static exploding across the

darkness. A high whine on the audio track gives way to

street sounds and rapid breathing.

AN IMAGE wavers and stabilizes: A nervous POV. We're in a

car, sitting in the backseat, and we're nervous, the view

swinging around, showing the street rolling by outside the

windows, then whipping back to the two guys in the front

seat.

Our POV looks down at a SMALL RECORDING DEVICE in "our"

hands. A red LED is flashing. We slip the recorder into

a coat pocket.

OUR VOICE:

Okay. It's goin'. I'm recording.

The guy riding shotgun, LANE, is just pulling a pantyhose

over his head, smearing his features into a pig-like mask.

He turns, DIRECTLY TO THE LENS, pissed off.

LANE:

Good one, d*ckhead. Thanks for

waitin' till I get this f***in thing

on. You tryin' ta I.D. me, or

what?

He tosses another pantyhose right at us and we catch it.

Our POV looks down, into the pantyhose, which comes up

over our field of view.

We realize:
this is not some ride-along verite video.

WE ARE ONE OF THESE GUYS. Real honest-to-God point of

view, with no cuts, no music. This is not film, it is

human experience.

The driver is a Hispanic guy named "SPAZ" DIAZ. Lane is a

white guy who looks very strung out. Couple of

crackheads. The car is a mid-seventies barge, piebald

with primer.

LANE:

Next alley... just pull in slow.

(turning to us)

Hurry up will ya. Here.

He hands us a big stainless steel revolver. The POV looks

down as our shaky hands snap open the cylinder, check the

rounds, snap it closed.

Diaz pulls the barge into an alley. The headlights

illuminate overflowing dumpsters. A Chicano busboy is

making trash runs out the back door of a restaurant, which

he has chocked open. The busboy goes back inside.

LANE:

Let's go.

Out of the car, quickly, our own breathing loud in our

ears. We even hear our own heartbeat, racing now.

Through the door, after Lane, moving fast.

Into the kitchen. Fluorescent glare. The busboy turning,

surprised, Lane putting the shotgun in his face. Freezing

him. Lane puts a finger to his lips: "quiet" in any

language.

Our hand puts the magnum in the THAI COOK's face. We get

them down on the greasy floor, Lane controlling them with

the shotgun. He looks at us, snaps his eyes toward the

front room.

We hear voices as we approach the swing door. Go through.

Whip pan left, then right. Scoping the layout. Low-rent

THAI place. Red wallpaper. Closing time. Middle-aged

Thai OWNER, by the cash-register, counting money. Young

Thai WAITRESS, cleaning up. They look up, stunned, as we

put the gun on them.

OUR VOICE:

(shouting, edgy)

Don't move, don't talk, don't do

nothing.

Our POV is whipping around, from the front door to the

owner to the kitchen where Lane is standing in the doorway

covering the cook and busboy, back to the owner as he

steps back from the cash-register.

We scoop up the big wad of bills: seven, eight hundred

bucks in tens and fives.

Now yelling, herding the owner and the waitress into the

kitchen, the owner trying to calm the girl in singsongy

Thai, Lane shouting at him to shut up.

Into the walk-in cooler. The steel door closes on four

scared pair of eyes. POV looking around, seeing... a

dish-rack. Our hand pulls out a spoon, drops the spoon

handle through the hole in the cooler door-latch. Locking

them in.

Lane heading out the back door. Laughing, as he looks at

the wad of cash our hand is waving in front of him.

We follow Lane to the car. Snap a look down the alley one

way, then the other.

Sh*t! Cop Black-and-White pulling into the far end of the

alley. Heartbeat goes triple time. Scrambling into the

car.

Door not even closed and SPAZ has it in reverse, burning

rubber as he launches back down the alley.

SCRUNCH! The car grinds along one wall as SPAZ steers

wildly backward. Sparks right next to us. Then--

KBOOM! As we slam into a dumpster and push it right out

into the street.

The cop has his lights and siren on, and is roaring at us

as SPAZ cranks the wheel and punches it down the street.

He curses in English and Spanish as he weaves between

cars. We pull off the stocking to see better.

The cop car surges onto the street behind us.

Looking ahead. A red light. Cars stopped, blocking the

way. Cutting to the right, onto the sidewalk, around the

cars, into the intersection.

A near miss with cross traffic, then accelerating.

Another red light ahead.

LANE:

Don't stop!

Truck entering the intersection. Everyone yelling. SPAZ

cuts the wheel but too late...

Clipping the truck and spinning.

The street outside smearing past like the view from a

Tilt-a-whirl.

Then KBLAM! Hitting something, God-knows-what, and

launching up and over, and--

KRUNCH! Crushing metal and an explosion of broken glass.

It gets quiet and still. Tinkling glass as Lane moves.

Then SPAZ is screaming. The car is upside down.

Crawling out of the side window. A frenzy now.

Whip pan to see the cops pulling up.

Then whipping back to the wreck. The engine is burning.

Flames spreading rapidly. SPAZ inside, pinned, upside

down, blood pumping across his face.

Our hands pulling Lane out. He comes up running.

We run after him, sprinting toward the welcoming darkness

of an alley.

Panting breath and heartbeats and sirens and somebody

yelling.

Gunshots. Looking back. Cops next to their car, firing.

Ahead, Lane running into shadow.

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James Cameron

James Francis Cameron is a Canadian filmmaker, director, producer, screenwriter, inventor, engineer, philanthropist, and deep-sea explorer. He first found major success with the science fiction action film The Terminator. more…

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Submitted by aviv on November 15, 2016

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    "Strange Days" Scripts.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 28 Mar. 2024. <https://www.scripts.com/script/strange_days_628>.

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