Anna Broinowski - Aim High in Creation! - A One-of-a-Kind Journey Inside North Korea's Propaganda Machine

SALLY (whispering) :Mum. Don’t. Please…!

MITCH:Yes, ma’am?

KAREN (standing) :I hear coal seam gas is destroying the farms.

The Villagers look at Karen, surprised. Sally, mortified, shrinks into her seat.

KAREN:There’s a farmer up north whose soil is turning to salt. His kids are getting nosebleeds. There’s methane in his water, and he’s not getting any answers! I’m just a gardener; I’m no expert. But are you selling us something we don’t need?

The Villagers murmur, alarmed. Mitch is smoothly reassuring.

MITCH:Thank you, ma’am. I hear your concern. There’s a lot of anxiety about fracking—delicious word, isn’t it? Fracking.

Sally giggles. Riccard hands a jar full of clear fluid to Mitch.

MITCH:This is frack fluid: 95 percent sand; the rest is just guar gum and water. We’re only building a test well here—we’d never frack anywhere before a proper safety report is done. But you know what? It’s completely safe.

Mitch drinks the fluid.

VILLAGERS (impressed) :Ooh.

Riccard grins and jumps off the stage.

RICCARD: He can be so scientific sometimes. Seriously, folks, I love your country. My grandkids were born here. I have koalas on my bush block. If I thought CSG was harmful in any way, I would not be here.

Riccard moves confidently through the crowd, giving Karen a malevolent look.

RICCARD:So let’s forget the fearmongers and doomsday soothsayers. The fact is, you will all be warming your tootsies in front of eco-friendly, gas designer fires within a year. And this village—your village—will be the envy of the world.

The Villagers clap, won over. Karen looks at Al, troubled. He smiles and pats her hand.

AL:They’re the experts, love.

Karen bends in the reeds, pulling weeds. Muttering angrily to herself.

RICCARD (off-screen) :SIS Drill One runs under here.

Karen, surprised, peers over the reeds. Riccard and Mitch study a drill map of the park.

RICCARD:Eight horizontal drills in total, running beneath the village back to the main hub. It’s the illusion I find so beautiful—from the surface, a toothpick. Underneath, a five-kilometre river of gold.

Mitch and Riccard move closer. Karen ducks.

RICCARD:We’ll start phase one now. We’ll have everything extracted before they know we’ve begun.

MITCH:What about the safety report?

RICCARD:Stuff the safety report.

MITCH:But… that’s chemicals, compressor ponds… that’s a full-scale frack!

RICCARD:Fact one. Fact two? We’re legal, remember? Those NIMBY idiots own five centimetres of the soil under their poxy houses. The rest belongs to me, the minister, and China. Got it?

MITCH:Got it.

The men walk off. We stay on Karen, grim with rage. Military music starts.

Karen, carrying secateurs, strides up the moonlit hill. Determination in her eyes. Close-ups of secateurs, flashing back and forth. Dirt flying through the air. Sweat, forming on her brow.

The music surges as Karen, secateurs raised high, stands heroically against the sun. We crane above her. In the grass, Karen’s made a sign out of flowers: STOP CSG. A camera flashes. Karen blinks.

It’s Riccard .

RICCARD:Very pretty. You’re a vandal.

KAREN:You come here, you destroy our land, you send your profits overseas, and you call me a vandal? I’ll shed my own blood before I let you harm one inch of this beautiful place!

RICCARD:Sweetie, that’s not going to stop me.

KAREN:The people will, in their thousands!

RICCARD (walking off) :Invite me when they show up.

SALLY (off-screen) :Mum!

Sally runs over the hill. Riccard, amused, stops and photographs her. Sally clocks Karen’s CSG sign.

SALLY:What is that?

KAREN:They’re drilling under the park.

RICCARD:I’ve no idea what she’s talking about.

KAREN:He’s lying! Sally, he’s —

SALLY (interrupting) :I’m sick of it, Mum! Your pathetic stunts, your stupid old ideas! Not everyone is evil!

MITCH (off-screen) :Shall I call security?

Mitch, running up to Riccard, sees the sign and laughs. Sally’s appalled.

KAREN (to Mitch) :Tell her you’re using chemicals! You’re going to frack this park!

MITCH:I think your mother needs a nice warm bath.

SALLY (quietly) :She is not my mother.

Sally walks off with Mitch and Riccard. Karen is devastated.

Karen, full of pain, walks through the park, singing. She passes a turtle on a rock. A kookaburra in a tree. A pelican in the reeds. Cygnets in the pond.

KAREN:A tender love binds creatures in the wild, the love of mother for her child. Her strength and care guides all from soil to sky, she works and fights so her babe may fly. I plant seeds in the spring, I water them in summer. I prune in the autumn, defend them in the winter.

Karen stops by the pond. As she sings, we see Al—sewing a button on his jacket, alone. And Sally and Mitch sparring together in the dojo, in love.

KAREN:I seed and water tending for my daughter even though she cannot see, the bond is torn that once linked her to me, I fight for her but must set her free.

Karen sinks in the mud and stares at her reflection in the pond. The water flickers red. Karen looks up. A gas plume shoots into the sky. The pelican flies off, screeching in fear .

The park is dying. The needle mine shoots toxic flames into the dirty sky. A dead bird lies tangled in reeds. Dead fish drift in the pond. The flowers in Karen’s sign wilt and die. Zoom out from Karen, alone on the hill, to a huge wide shot of the desolate park.

Sally walks through the village. The shopkeepers give her rotting tulips, some wilted corn.

FLOWER SELLER:For your mother.

GROCER:Tell her we miss her.

Sally, upset, crosses the road. Mitch is waiting. She brightens, grabs his hands.

SALLY:It’s safe, right?

Mitch won’t meet her gaze.

SALLY:Mitch…?

MITCH:I’m leaving. Come with me.

Sally stares at him with dawning horror. Then she lets go of his hands, and runs off.

MITCH:Sally!

Sally doesn’t look round.

Music surges as Sally, sobbing, runs up to Karen on the hill. They embrace.