(a black & white gnovel for film)
Wehrmacht refugees struggle out from gloom.
Step from the desert into Las Vegas Game Show.
Flip into numbers and cross time as compucard data in bubble memories.
Information transfer and retrieval.
Home viewer (nuclear unit head) enters desired program. Pushes PLAY.
Hendrix at Monterey Pop.
Stutterframe transition to a pompous greed-head telling us Jimi was an anarchist bent on the damnation of America’s children through LSD and drugs and other forms of immorality! / quick cut of Majors and Generals looking real scared / That each and every one of us has sin in his heart / quick cuts of man’s furtive shoplifting; rack focus from leering man to tart / That we are damned to Hell eternal.
Home viewer (nuclear unit head) exercises his option. “You go to hell, Preacher!” and he switches to another channel.
“Rob!” Laura’s shocked reply.
He, laughing: “Come on, Laura, that’s all just social control bullxit to keep us in fear and servitude.”
“Wha— Rob! What’s gotten into you?”
“Laura.” says he, “I denounce you for a witch! Fall on us oh Wrath of God!”
And the screen erupts as nuclear annihilation renders New Rochelle, NY, uninhabitable for 2.4 million years.
A brief period of snow. Then the signal resumes. Nature sequences and pastoral music.
Network Sign-on.
A harried reasoner struggles before a microphone. Order has prevailed. There is a central Authority. Steps are being taken. Stay in homes. DON’T MOVE!
Home viewer (nuclear unit head) switches channels.
Close-up of car radio. Sound over: “This has been a test of the Emergency Broadcast System. If this had been an actual emergency, you would have been told—/
Bruce Dern; a man just struggling to make sense of his own two feet, driving.
A white-sheet soldier stands in his way.
“I’m sorry, Sir. You can’t come this way.”
“Well, what route can I take? Where are the detour signs?”
Soldier moves uneasily: “Sir—”
“I’ve gotta be in New York in an hour. How do I get around this?”
“Uh, Sir. You can’t Sir.”
“What?”
“New York City’s off limits, Sir. All the roads are closed.”
“Well, what the Hell’s gone wrong?”
“You don’t know, Sir?”
“No.”
Soldier breaks down completely: “N- Neither do I …”
Actually, nothing. Life as always, goes on in the Big Apple. People meet, have lunch, even enjoy themselves. Death, where is thy sting?
Fade to grey and exuent all.
