Dana Spiotta - Lightning Field

“The flow is really strong this month.”

“Really? Smooth or clotty?”

“Stringy, stranded.”

“Pain or no pain?”

“Aches, good aches.”

“Cravings? Mood swings? Emotional disintegration?”

“No, not with the beetwort tea, the dong quoi, the hemp oil, the sage-burnt incense, and the daily affirmations. Just rapturous orgasms at the drop of a hat.”

Thanks for that detail, girlfriend of Jack.

“Mina, have you ever heard of St. John Solutions?”

“No.” Mina smiled.

“I took ‘Understanding Menstruation, the Advanced Seminar’ there.”

“It changed your life.”

“You’d be surprised.”

VIDEO # 1

TITLE: FIRST TIMEAUDIO IN:

MAX (OFF SCREEN)

It’s not on.FADE IN:

Extreme close-up of a GIRL on a bed, youngish, long hair, looking slightly off camera.

MAX (O.S.)

It’s not on.

MINA

Is that why the red light is on?

MAX (O.S.)

Grainy, black-and-white, cinéma vérité girl.

Open your pretty mouth and talk to me.

MINA

Is this a sort of foreplay?

MAX (O.S.)

It’s a video of a girl on a bed. It’s the girl. It’s the girl being filmed by someone who finds her interesting.

MINA

I don’t think it’s interesting. I don’t think I like it much.The GIRL has her head down. Her long hair blocks her face. She has her legs crossed and her arms crossed over her legs. She stares at her toes. The camera moves closer. It moves to a close-up of her bowed head and long hair.

MAX (O.S.)

Close-up on girl. Handheld, wobble-fisted. Is it home movies? Is it art? She’s shy, she doesn’t look up. She doesn’t speak. We move in close to her long blond hair. But it’s such pretty hair. I wish it were in brightest Technicolor. I think you should be in brightest yellow, reddest red.Rainbow-painted fifties American Technicolor. You could dazzle us with your long blond hair.GIRL pushes her hair behind her ears, looks at the camera. Her face is pleasant, symmetrical, round. Her eyes are large and her mouth is serious. She shakes her head.

MAX (O.S.)

Lovely. The face in view. The eyes, the lips. Those full girl-next-door lips. Reddest red. Can they speak?

MINA

This is not amusing me. This annoys me.GIRL looks away. The camera pulls back, to show her on the bed, body folded into itself.

MAX (O.S.)

Tell me why you’re annoyed. No, tell me something else. Something I don’t know. Tell me about when your uncle came into your room at night and made you promise never to tell. Tell me about when you and your college roommate got drunk and kissed each other’s breasts among CliffsNotes and fingernail polish and you both swore never to mention it. Tell me about when you first cheated on your husband and wrote a confessional note, which you tore up, swearing to yourself it never really happened. Tell, tell, tell.

MINA

Nothing like that to tell.

MAX (O.S., FIRMLY)

Then make it up.

MINA

No.

MAX (O.S.)

Tell me about the fantasy you have of being tied up by a stranger. He blindfolds you and makes love to you while your parents are in the next room. Or your husband. Or the man you saw on the street that you imagined unzipping and feeling against a wall as his hands undid the buttons on your dress. Tell me.GIRL starts to laugh, shaking her head. She takes her handbag from the side of the bed and pulls out a pack of cigarettes. She puts one in her mouth, tosses her head back a bit and strikes a match, lights it, inhales. She blows smoke in the camera’s direction.

MINA

It’s to be one of those movies, is it?She smirks a bit, shaking her head.

MAX (O.S.)

To light a cigarette while you’re being filmed.

It’s poetry, it’s the American gesture. It’s what Jean-Paul Belmondo died for in Breathless , his exhale on camera, his hopeless European envy. The fulfillment of a thousand film noir fantasies, blowing out smoke on camera. It’s the

true American dream.

MINA

I don’t smoke. I don’t have secrets to reveal. I don’t have sexual fantasies to reveal. I’m an unsuitable subject for this game.GIRL takes another drag on her cigarette. The camera is static on her.

MINA

I think I’ll just bore you into turning the thing off. Not out of resistance, but a genuine inability to do or say anything worth filming.There is a pause. She looks at the camera. She is waiting. The camera is static. A minute elapses.

MINA

It’s a waste of film. Or video, or whatever it is.Another minute elapses. GIRL looks down, purses lips, indicates annoyance.

MAX (O.S.)

You could leave. You could get up and leave.

MINA

What did the other women do?

MAX (O.S.)

What makes you think there have been other women?

MINA

What did the other women do?

MAX (O.S. LAUGHING)

They usually take off their clothes. They do. Put a camera on a woman, and sooner or later, she starts to take off her clothes.

MINA

Liar.

MAX (O.S.)

Nine out of ten.

MINA

What did the tenth one do?

MAX (O.S.)

I don’t know. You’re the tenth.GIRL starts to laugh. There is another pause. A real-time dead space.

MINA

Say something. Ask me something. Anything.There is silence. Just video drone. The sound of breath. She keeps looking at the camera. She stops smiling.

MINA

What else? What else happens? Do you ever turn it off, or does the tape run out?Silence.

MINA

How long does it take for the tape to run out? Max.Silence. Mechanical whirring.

MINA

How long?Silence. Static, unmoving on her. She looks weary. A minute passes, she sits on the bed, examines her toes. She looks off camera, stares hard to her left at something unseen. She doesn’t move.

MINA

I can’t stand this. It’s not funny. I’m going to leave.GIRL looks up at the camera. She looks at her toes. She looks back up. She looks directly into the camera, unsmiling. Shemoves her hands to her dress. She closes her eyes. She starts to unbutton. She opens her eyes. Fade to black.

TITLE: END“ Is this Mrs. Delano?”

“Who is this?”

“Is this Mrs. Delano?”

“Who wants to know?”

“This is Bill. I’m an old friend of your husband, Jack Delano. I’ve been trying to reach him.”

“You’re lying. And I’m not his wife.”

“Oh, I thought—”

“You’re not a friend. You work for a collection agency.”

“It’s crucial I speak with your father.”

“I’m late for work.”

“It’s crucial I speak with your father.”

“My father lives in Landgrove, Vermont. His name is Mitchell Howe. He is the high school football coach.”

“You are not related to Jack Delano?”

“Do you mean biologically? Or legally? Or spiritually? I have no aesthetic relation to the man.”

“Do you know how to reach him?”

“I have no knowledge of his whereabouts. He disappeared, didn’t you hear? It’s a great mystery. I have not seen nor heard from him in five years.”

“If you hear from him, can you tell him to call Bill at 1-800-627-1818, extension 24, reference number p as in Peter, dash 4590?”