Script

AN INVERTED COMA                            BY Alok N R

[Fade in]

INT.AN EMPTY OLD HOUSE – EVENING

We see the well furnished interior of an old house.

Slowly our view of the interior is inverted.

Upon the upside down ceiling we see a young woman lying unconscious.

Alice slowly opens her eyes. She gets to her feet. She is dressed in a hugely oversized shirt. She looks around at her surroundings.

ALICE (calls out)

“Hello?”

“Is anybody here? “.

(There is no answer)

[Pause]

ALICE (To herself)

“Where am I?”

Her voice echoes through the room. The place is quiet and looks deserted. With effort she takes off the huge shirt.

The light from the upside down windows cast strange shadows in the room. The ceiling fan blades swing noisily nearby. The upside down curtains moves slightly in the breeze. There are small pieces of paper with pictures drawn and painted hung about all over the room. There are papers scribbled on, floating about in mid air.

Alice looks at objects above her. There is an old mahogany bed, a dark wooden chair next to a wooden dressing table and mirror, an old almirah and a wooden bookshelf with thick glass paneling that had many books in it. Near the bed there was a small round side table which held the photo of a man, woman and a small girl.

Alice tries to reach up toward the bed side table above to have a better look at the photo, but it is just out of her reach.

To her right there stood an upside down wooden door. Alice makes her way to it. She struggles a bit but finally heaves it open. There is a sudden flood of light as the door swings open.

[Cut to]

INT.CORRIDOR OF A HOSPITAL WARD

A short bulky old man of around sixty walks slowly through the well lit corridor of a hospital ward. He has a slight limp on one leg and relies heavily on his cane. He looks clearly uneasy being there. He passes by the open doors of the ward room and seems determined not to look into them. Occasionally he halts to check the room number. He finally reaches the room he was looking for and reaches for the door.

[Cut to]

EXT.OF THE OLD HOUSE - EVENING

Alice is now standing at the door way of the house taking in the spectacular view of the upside down world outside. She peers over the façade of the house and down into the sky below.  

ALICE

(To herself)

“This must be a dream.”

Carefully standing at the edge, she extends her arm and tries to touch the grass that grew on the porch above. It is just out of her reach.

Suddenly a bird flies by from somewhere below where she was standing. Startled, she quickly pulls herself back inside and shuts the door behind her.

INT.OF THE HOUSE - DARK

Alice catches her breath and then looks around. The place has changed. Its no longer the well lit bedroom but someplace dark. She has to squint to see properly. She slowly takes a few tentative steps ahead when suddenly light shines in from a window high above, as if some powerful stage light was switched on.

STAIRWELL – SMOKY LIGHTING

Alice walks into a stair well where a bizarre number of intertwining stairways seem to begin, end and intersect. Bewildered Alice peers down the stairwell. There are scribbled pieces of paper floating about the stairs.

Just then she sees a glimmer of light dancing upon the steps. A small sparkling light that darts here and there across the wooden steps. As she tries to investigate it Alice suddenly hears voices from the floor below.

ALICE (Calls out)

“Hello!? Is anybody down there?”

Alice quickly scrambles down the topsy-turvy staircase. She can constantly hear two voices arguing with each other. The voices keep coming from just a flight of steps beneath. The stairs get colder and darker as she goes down. They finally lead her into a door. The arguing voices were coming from the room. They were loud but she couldn’t make out what they were saying. Then she heard a loud band as some door was slammed shut.

She hesitated, but then slowly pushed open the upside down door.

INT.THE LONG ROOM

The room is long and somber looking. Grey curtains, tapestry and dark wooden floor boards. In the middle of the floor of the inverted room, above her, was placed a half open funeral casket with lit candles on both sides.

Alice stands there at the entrances of the room for a few seconds. Her gaze is fixed on the oak casket above her. Slowly, she moves toward it. She sees the body of an older woman inside the casket, dressed in dark attire. It is the same woman from the photograph in the bedroom. She resembles Alice in her features but looks older.

A drop of tear rolls down the side of Alice’s cheek. She reaches up toward the casket and tries to touch the woman’s face. But it is just out of her reach.

Her eyes begin to fill up and a sob escapes her lips. She takes her eyes off the casket and runs away crying.

As Alice run out of the room the tears that fall from her eyes sparkle in the low candle light as they float up to floor above.

                                                           [CUT TO]

INT.HOSPITAL - EVENING

The old man stands at the door of the hospital room, hesitating to enter.

Inside the room there is a nurse tending to the patient on the bed. The patient is Alice. Her face is pale and her eyes are fast shut. Her eyelids quiver occasionally. She lies facing the ceiling as if in a deep sleep. There are numerous tubes and wires that run through her body connecting her to the many types of medical equipment surrounding her.

THE DOCTOR

“Good evening Mr.Narona.”

“Please have a seat.”

Daniel Narona walks in slowly and quietly sits by Alice’s bedside.

THE DOCTOR

“She is in a coma.”

Narona doesn’t answer. He quietly holds her hand in his. His hands are slightly trembling. He begins to sob faintly.

NARONA

“I shouldn’t have let her go...”

”..I shouldn’t have…”

He breaks down and cries into his daughters’ hand. There is a bandage wrapped around her left wrist. His tears moisten the dried red stains.

NARONA

“I brought this on you...”

INT.EMPTY ROOM – MOONLIT NIGHT

Alice sits alone crying. She picks up a floating paint brush and tries to paint something on a piece of paper. But she soon gets frustrated and scribbles off whatever she’d painted and throws away the paper. The crumpled paper floats away. She curls up and continues to cry.

Alice’s shadow slowly sits up beside her and tenderly places a hand on her shoulder. Her tears slowly stop. She wipes her cheeks and raises her head and looks at the shadow through the curls of her hair. The shadow has taken the silhouette form of a tall slim man and is knelt beside her. He helps her to her feet and hugs her.

She gazes into his face for a while then leans over and kisses him. The embrace slowly tightens and they kiss passionately in the dim moonlight that cascades in through the inverted window.

    [Fade out] 

[Fade in]

INT.EMPTY ROOM – NIGHT – LATER

Alice wakes up and finds herself lying alone on the floor. The moonlight falling through the window grill casts shadows on her naked body. She gets up and looks around. The room is empty.

Her eyes well up.

Just then she sees the tiny dancing light on the floor a few feet from her.

INT.HALL – DIMLY LIT

Following the light Alice opens yet another wooden door. The door creaks open and Alice enters a Hall of Mirrors.

Hundreds of glass mirrors of varying sizes are arranged in a maze like manner in a huge dark hall. All that is visible are the reflections in the mirrors. The bizarre arrangement makes the perspective of the room seem ambiguous.

Alice walks inside. As she passes by the mirrors, something on the ground touches her feet .She looks down to find many masks lying on the floor. Curious, Alice picks one up and wears it over her face and watches herself in the mirror as her reflection bends and distort in them. She tries another one.

As she removes the last mask, her reflection removes its face with it. In place of her nose eyes and mouth there was now just skin.

Horrified Alice stumbles back. The mask in her hand now has her face on it and begins to laugh.

The laughter becomes louder and more maniacal as one by one the mirrors begin to crack and soon the whole gallery begins to collapse. Alice turns around and tries to run but her feet sink into the glass floor. Shards of broken glass are showered onto her, cutting her in many places. The floor starts to ripple and turn into water and her body plunges down into the cold dark water.

[INTER CUT TO]

INT.HOSPITAL ROOM - EVENING

The cardiogram rings an offbeat. Narona who was sleeping in the chair next to Alice’s bed lifts his head up. He looks at the pulsating line of the cardiogram.

Narona

“Alice!” (Quietly)

“ALICE!”(Louder this time)

He sees her pupils moving fast beneath her eyelids and her eyebrows furrow in spasm. There is panic in his eyes.

The cardiogram begins to flat line.            

 [INTER CUT TO]

UNDERWATER - DARK

Alice bleeds and sinks deeper into the dark abyss. Her eyes begin to close slowly.

Suddenly there is a small glint of light just above her. It catches her eye just as they are about to shut.

The light rejuvenates her. With renewed will she opens her eyes.

With all her might she paddles upward against the current toward the gleaming light. Straining hard she reaches out for it with her arm. With one final thrust of her legs she finally breaks the water surface.

Exhausted she loses consciousness and just then a hand grabs hers. There is light everywhere.

[White out]

[Fade in]

INT.HOSPITAL ROOM - EVENING

Alice opens her eyes. She sees her father beside her bed.

Her eyes well up as she smiles weakly at him.

 ALICE

“Daddy!”

“You came back.”

The sunlight reflected from the man’s watch dances on her face. The same light that she had followed.

[Fade out]

XXX