https://www.geograph.ie/photo/147637
http://robmcelroyirelandramblertours.bl ... ument.html
https://web.archive.org/web/20050209053 ... films.html
We watch two film makers do a short film about US science fiction
writer Richard Shaver. Shaver wrote about the remnants of an ancient
civilization still living beneath the Earth called the Dero and how
they use their ancient ray technology to invisibly influence surface
dwellers in a negative way. The main difference between Shaver and
other SF writers was that he believed what he said was true.
During the course of filming their own short movie we learn the
outline of Shavers story and listen to them discuss their own
interpretations of his tales. By the end they have come to some
equally extreme and questionable conclusions about life. Or are they
right?
LIFE IS A SCREAM
The script for the Motion Picture by Stephen Rennicks.
Copyright 2005 Ancient Films
FIRST DRAFT 4th May 2005
DRAFT LAST UPDATED 12th October 2007
INTRODUCTION
1. INT. BEDROOM. AFTERNOON 1.
Elderly man on death bed. It is the American home of RICHARD SHAVER.
His wife at his side. Camera pans around room revealing clues to his
identity, copies of books he wrote, typewriter, paintings etc. The
room is very cluttered.
WIFE
Richard!
SHAVER
We are already dead.
He closes eyes and dies peacefully. His wife cries and looks out
window.
Camera pans through window to the yard, cluttered with more junk, old
car, comes towards a shed, inside is equally full of the debris of a
life, rocks and paintings. Camera fixes on large portable welder.
Zooms in and dissolves.
2. EXT. FOREST. DAY. 2.
Out of focus shot, gradually becoming clear. We hear low voices.
TITLE. 30 YEARS LATER.
Two twenty something men are standing and having a conversation.
STEPHEN and BARRY. Stephen holds a camcorder, Barry is reading a
script. They are about to start shooting the first scene of a short
documentary style film about the stories of Richard Shaver.
Stephen:
Ok Richard, time to get in character. Have you got your first line
worked out?
Barry:
Yes
Stephen
We'll just walk along this path, keep it loose, if it works this way
it works, we got 2 days.
Barry:
I'm ready, lets do it.
3. EXT. FOREST. DAY. VIEW FROM CAMCORDER. 3.
Begin walk.
Barry
So, 12,000 years ago the elders moved under the surface, into the
cavern world, there were vast cities down there. But even that wasn't
good enough, they vainly thought they could survive there but the dis-
radiation reached down there too. The elders then left the Earth but
some remained, the abandondero' s. That's in the ancient language man
tong. Dero for short. These Dero's degenerated more and more but they
were immortals as well so they have been living down there for
thousands of years. Now, we were once elders but we moved to the
surface, so we are pathetic creatures really and we are slowly
becoming dero's ourselves.
Stephen
Are you disappointed that your warning wasn't heeded?
Barry
Well you see the warning I had was that we should actually go under
there and attack the dero because they are tampering with our lives,
their beaming rays at us, they are damaging our brains. The reason we
can't hear them is because they have machines that are beaming rays
into our heads to stop us from realizing that their there. We have to
just tunnel under the surface and we have to destroy them because
there is a war going on.
Stephen
Have you any regrets about finding these people beneath the Earth?
Barry
Regrets? No, you can't regret the truth. Its had an effect on my
family of course because I've been a target of the Dero's.
Stephen
Did you feel it was perhaps your destiny to discover the Dero and to
tell the world?
Barry
Well, I'm practical really, that's kind of a label, labeling me as a
prophet, which I'm not. Although if somebody does something about
this then I'm a prophet. You asked me earlier if I was disappointed.
See, people are just living their lives, going to work, shopping,
whatever they do, they don't realize that life is a scream in the
face of a bright madness.
Snip ------------ ---------
Stephen:
Since you left the caves have you ever felt the influence of the
dero's, do you suspect them of disrupting your life?
Barry
Yeah, they've got a lot of technology invented in ancient times. For
instance, its just spiteful things, they make my cigarettes taste
like garbage. And its not just me. I got a letter from a man, they
torture him. The machines they used, he experienced the same year
over and over again, he was trapped in one year of his life, had to
live it 12 times or something. With their time ray or whatever they
call it. I do know they have what they call a ben ray. The elders
invented it to heal wounds but they use that to torture, so the
victim doesn't die, so physical torture can go on for years. In fact
there's one case where they dismembered a body but all the parts were
still alive thanks to this ben ray. So its not just me. There's
things they haven't done to me but that's probably because I'm less
susceptible to the rays.
Snip-------- --------- --------- -
Stephen
When did you first become aware of the Dero's?
Barry
I was working in an automobile factory, my job was to work a welding
gun and by some freak accident, something to do with the attunement
of the welder I began to hear thoughts of my co-workers. And then I
began to hear voices but they didn't seem to be from anyone around
and then I realized they were coming from under the ground. That's
when I became aware of the Dero's. Now their using rays to stop
people hearing them normally, but by an accident I became immune to
those rays.
Stephen
What evidence have you to support your claim of a lost civilization?
Barry
The evidence is all around us. What do you think these are?
Stephen
Rocks.
Barry
These are silica books. The elders of the original civilization of
surface dwellers, before the sun became harmful 20,000 years ago, this is their
art and literature, 3D books. We're sitting in a library here and
people just walk by, they don't realize how beautiful these are, they
don't realise every piece is a beautiful piece of art. If we can get
these Dero's and their rays out of our lives we will see the treasure
that lies all around us.
Stephen
What do you think the future holds for mankind.
Barry
Look, unless we go into the cavern world and seriously wage war on
the Dero then mankind has no future. Eventually the Dero will make
slaves of all of us. What people think life is it isn't, the way
people live their life, their experience of joy, whatever, its just
brain damage that makes people think that's life. Life is a silly
sound like a death rattle from a dying clown in the night.