by Jeff Strand
Bobby replied with a look that said, Talk, dork!
“Hello, Alicia,” said Justin. “This is Justin Hollow. We’ve seen each other around school and talked a couple of times.” He didn’t tell her that it was eleven sentences because the fact that he knew the exact number might seem creepy.
“Yep, I know who you are.”
“Oh, good, that saves time. Anyway, I wanted to offer you the lead role in my new movie.”
Bobby seemed much happier about Justin blurting out this offer than Gabe did, so Justin decided to only look at Bobby for the remainder of the phone call.
“What’s the movie?”
“It’s a zombie movie.”
“Okay.”
Was that a pro-zombie-movie okay or an anti-zombie-movie okay? Justin couldn’t tell.
“It’ll be a feature film. Probably not three hours but way more than ten minutes.”
“What’s it called?”
“We don’t have a final title yet. The working title is Zombies with Flesh Stuck in Their Teeth.” Justin could tell that Gabe was frantically shaking his head, but he focused his attention on Bobby’s nose.
“It’s a comedy?”
“No, that’s just a temporary title. Doesn’t really reflect the movie. We may or may not have any shots of flesh stuck in a zombie’s teeth. That may not even be the final temporary title. This is all still in the early stages.”
“Okay. So what’s the character like?”
“Well, her name is”—Think! Think!—“Veronica Chaos, and she’s in a postapocalyptic world”—Gabe’s shaking head was a blur of motion in the corner of his eye—“with mutant zombies everywhere”—Gabe smacked him on the shoulder—“and she has to find the lost”—Medallion? Skull? Child?—“book that can save humanity. She carries a”—Sword? Chainsaw? Lightweight lawn mower?—“cat and wears a”—Cloak? Corset? Chain mail bikini?—“tattered white wedding dress.”
“That sounds pretty cool,” said Alicia.
“Oh yeah. It’s going to make Return of the Living Dead look like Return of the Living Dead, Part 5.”
“Is it going to play in theaters?”
“Of course. Maybe not in the summer but definitely a wide release.”
Gabe got up and walked out of the room.
“When does it start filming?”
“The shooting schedule is still being put together. We’re working on the final polish of the script, and I’ll have it to you on Monday.”
“Well, this sounds great, Justin! I’d love to be in your movie!”
“I’m very pleased to hear that,” said Justin. “My people will draw up the contract and get it to you ASAP.”
“Thanks! I’ll see you at school.”
“Good-bye.”
Justin disconnected the call.
He and Bobby stared at each other for a while.
“Okay,” said Justin. “I probably shouldn’t have told her that we were going to get a wide theatrical release.”
“Probably not.”
“Aside from that, it went fine, right?”
Bobby shrugged. “She took the part.”
“Yep. We’ve got our lead. That’s one big hurdle out of the way. How mad is Gabe?”
“His face was pretty red.”
“But his face is red a lot of the time. That doesn’t necessarily mean anything. He can’t help his complexion.”
“Nope.”
“Hey, Gabe?” Justin called out.
Gabe walked back into Justin’s bedroom. His face was still quite red.
“We’ve got our lead actress,” said Justin. “So that’s, y’know, one less thing you’ll need to worry about. We’re well on our way.”
“Our working title is not Zombies with Skin Stuck in Their Teeth.”
“It’s flesh, not sk… Actually I’m not going to correct you. You’re right. But what was I supposed to do? I didn’t call her! Bobby shoved the phone in my hand! He’s the one your face should be so red about!”
“I’m mad at Bobby too.”
“Why are you mad at me?” asked Bobby.
“Because you texted Alicia about the movie without clearing it with either of us! This is your fault!”
“But that’s the only thing you’re mad about, right?”
“Right.”
Bobby smiled. “I can live with that.”
“Don’t do it again,” said Gabe. “We can’t have crew members going rogue. But we’re not going to talk about that anymore. We’re going to talk about the greatest zombie movie ever, which apparently is going to get a wide theatrical release and feature Veronica Chaos.”
“Not a bad name off the top of my head, huh?”
“Be serious.”
“I am serious. I just…” Justin trailed off as the realization of what he’d done trampled over him like a mechanical rhinoceros. “I…I…I…I…I…I…I…”
“Go on,” Gabe prodded.
Justin lifted his shirt to wipe the perspiration off his forehead. What had he been thinking? They didn’t have a script or time or money, and he’d promised Alicia that she’d see herself up on the big screen. She was going to find out that he was a total fraud. Girls of her level of quality weren’t attracted to total frauds.
“I think I’m going to throw up,” said Justin.
“Go ahead,” said Gabe. “It’s your room.”
Justin mopped up more sweat. “Okay. So. Um. Yeah. I wanted to be fully committed to the project, and now I am. If we fail, none of us will have a girlfriend until we move to a new town, so this is exactly what we wanted, right?”
“I’m not sure it is,” said Gabe.
Justin said, “We have twenty-eight days to shoot this movie. Twenty-seven if you don’t count today. But we’ll count today, so twenty-eight. Lots of people have made movies in twenty-eight days. It’ll be fun.”
“I’m in,” said Gabe. “Completely in. I want to make that clear because I’m about to say a bunch of negative things.”
“All right. Let’s hear them.”
Gabe stood up and walked over to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers calendar that was on the wall. Justin didn’t like football or any other sports. But his dad had bought him the calendar, and displaying it was a small price to pay to make Dad happy.
“We have twenty-eight days before I leave,” said Gabe. “But only three weekends, if you don’t count this weekend.”
“Let’s count this weekend.”
“Fine. Three and a half weekends. So technically we only have seven full days. We’re not skipping school to make this movie.”
“I never would have suggested such a thing,” said Justin.
“That doesn’t count work. I don’t know my schedule yet, but I’ll probably have to work two or three of those seven days. Bobby works Tuesdays and Thursdays. You work Thursdays and Saturdays. What are we going to do about that?”
“I’ve thought about that,” said Justin, even though he really hadn’t, “and I figured we could call in sick.”
“For a full month?”
“Not every day of the month necessarily.”
“What happens when they find out we were making a movie?”
“Then they’ll know it was a noble cause.”
“No way will my mom let me call in sick,” said Bobby.
“Does she have to know about it?”
“If we’re trying to make a giant epic spectacle, then yeah, the news will probably get back to her.”
“And also you’re forgetting one big thing,” said Gabe.
“What?”
“Finals week.”
“Okay. Yes, that’s a pretty big thing. We’ll work around it.”
“We have to study.”
“I know. I’m not saying that we have to flunk our exams
for our art. We’ll figure it out.”
Justin went over to the easel, turned over a new page on the pad, and wrote Things to Worry about Later at the top. Under that, he wrote Schedule.
“What about money?” Gabe asked.
Justin wrote Money underneath Schedule.
Gabe shook his head. “As the producer, I say we stress about money now.”
“We’re going to keep this cost-effective. We’ve already got the camera. Cast and crew will work for a screen credit obviously. We’ll use locations that we can get for free like the school. We take it for granted, but our school has tons of production value. What about product placement? If we show the Monkey Burger logo up close, they might give us free food.”
“Would they want their restaurant featured in a movie called Zombies with Flesh Stuck in Their Teeth?” asked Bobby.
“That’s not the name of the movie! That was never going to be the name of the movie! For now, let’s call it Untitled Epic Zombie Movie. Does that work for everybody?”
“If this is just a temporary title, how about The Greatest Zombie Movie Ever?”
“No, that sounds egotistical.”
“UEZM isn’t a very good acronym,” said Bobby.
“Then don’t acronym it. We’re getting sidetracked.”
“Right,” said Gabe. “Let’s get back to money.”
“If we can get free food, then really we wouldn’t have to pay for much except makeup and explosives.”
“We need machine guns,” said Bobby.
“Right, right,” said Justin. He looked at Gabe. “Prop machine guns, Mr. Oh No, We’re Gonna Accidentally Kill Somebody.”
“I knew that you meant props.”
“If it were up to me, we’d do all old-school practical effects, but that’s not realistic at our current budget level of zero. So our rule is no CGI blood, but helicopter crashes and giant cracks in the earth and stuff will be computer-generated. Everybody okay with that?”
Gabe and Bobby nodded.
“Good. Now we just need a story.”
4
Justin stared at the screen of his laptop. Eight in the morning came pretty quickly when you were up until four thirty brainstorming ideas, and he’d almost hit the wonderful, wonderful snooze button…but no. He had a lot of writing to do today. It was time to use the skills he’d perfected over all these years of waiting until the night before to write essays.
They’d divided the story into three parts. Justin had wanted to write the third part, which had the most carnage, but they drew straws (well, pretzel sticks) to decide who got to write what. Gabe got the second part, and Bobby got the third. They’d both spent the night at his house and were asleep on the floor. He’d tried to rouse Gabe, but then he was politely told to die. He knew better than to try to poke Bobby. That was a good way to lose a finger. They’d just have to write faster to catch up.
He continued to stare at the screen. Look how blank I am!, the screen seemed to say.
Maybe he’d write better if he got some more sleep.
No. Sleep was a luxury he could not afford if he was going to achieve his goal. Sleep was for losers who weren’t trying to make the greatest zombie movie ever. Maybe he’d have permanent dark circles under his eyes. Maybe he’d start hallucinating bloodthirsty orangutans, and maybe he’d become so delirious that he’d forget how to blink. But those were the sacrifices of a true artist.
Then again Alicia might like him better if he didn’t spend all day twitching and babbling incoherently.
He’d worry about his never-gonna-happen relationship with Alicia later. For now he had to focus entirely on the movie. It was time to write.
FADE IN:
INT. CITY STREET – NIGHT
A helicopter crashes to the ground, crushing dozens of zombies. It rolls down the street, leaving a thick smear of squished zombies in its path, until it finally hits a tall building, which crashes to the ground.
As the cloud of dust clears, we hear only the sound of zombies moaning. They’re everywhere. The apocalypse has not been kind to this city.
But then, impossibly, the helicopter door opens! VERONICA CHAOS, 15 and stunningly beautiful even with all of the lacerations covering her body, crawls out, wearing a shredded white wedding dress. She’s holding a cat.
She gazes up at the sky and howls in primal anguish.
The TITLE appears on-screen: UNTITLED ZOMBIE MOVIE.
[Note to self: Add real title when we know it.]
Perfect! This could not be flowing any better. At this rate he’d be done with his third of the script by lunchtime. In fact, it was going so well that he could get in a quick game of—
No! No games. Famous filmmakers didn’t have time for video games. If you showed up at Peter Jackson’s house, he wouldn’t be sitting there playing Minecraft. The only thing he had time for was to check Reddit and—
No! No Reddit. He needed to remain completely focused on this script until he’d written his thirty to thirty-three pages. Especially since he might have to pick up some of Gabe’s and/or Bobby’s slack. Bathroom breaks were acceptable if they weren’t too frequent, but aside from that, Justin needed to maintain laser focus. Cyborg focus. Nothing existed in his world except for this screenplay.
Veronica walks down the street, limping a bit because she was just in a helicopter crash. A pair of zombies runs toward her.
“Fast zombies or slow zombies?” Justin had asked last night, early in the story development discussion.
“Slow zombies,” said Gabe.
“Fast zombies,” said Bobby.
“Slow zombies are scarier.”
“No, they’re not. Fast zombies are scarier because they’re fast.”
“Fast zombies aren’t realistic.”
“Zombies aren’t realistic.”
“If you were a corpse that came back to life, you wouldn’t be moving fast,” Gabe insisted. “It doesn’t make any sense. Decomposed muscles are slow.”
“You can just walk away from slow zombies,” said Bobby. “Just la-di-da, strolling along. Oops, that one is kind of close. I’d better veer slightly to the left. Uh-oh, there’s another one. I suppose I’ll have to shove it over.”
“Until you’re overwhelmed by their sheer numbers,” said Gabe. “That’s the whole point of zombies. They don’t seem like a huge threat until suddenly you’re surrounded and there’s no way to escape. You’re doomed.”
“You’re more doomed if you’re surrounded by fast zombies.”
“Shaun of the Dead has slow zombies.”
“Zombieland has fast zombies.”
“Lucio Fulci’s Zombie has slow zombies.”
“28 Days Later has fast.”
“Those aren’t zombies. Those are the infected.”
“They’re zombies.”
“They’re the infected.”
“Stop being such a zombie snob.”
“I’m not being a snob. I’m being accurate.”
“Dawn of the Dead has fast zombies.”
“No, Dawn of the Dead has slow zombies.”
“It has fast zombies,” said Bobby. “I watched it last week. We’ll put in the Blu-ray.”
“Which one are you talking about?”
“Dawn of the Dead.”
“No, which version?”
“I’m talking about the remake.”
“Well, I’m talking about the original.”
“The remake was better.”
“Get out of my house,” said Gabe. “I mean Justin’s house.”
“I’m allowed to express my opinion. You can’t tell me that if you were walking down the sidewalk and somebody said, ‘Hey, dude, I’m going to release a dozen zombies to chase after you. Would you prefer that I release the fast-moving variety or the slow-moving variety?’ you wouldn’t
request the slow-moving ones.”
“That’s real life. This is a movie.”
“You’re the one who was talking about realism.”
“Okay,” said Gabe. “If we’re going to try to make the greatest zombie movie ever, then we need to pay homage to the original classic, Night of the Living Dead. Therefore, we need to go with slow zombies. Case closed.”
“The first zombie in Night of the Living Dead chased after Barbara in her car, so technically it had both fast and slow zombies. Ha! Logic fail!”
“That’s it!” said Justin. “We’ll have the best of both worlds. Our movie will have both fast and slow zombies. Guaranteed mass appeal!”
“What about talking zombies?” asked Bobby.
“No talking zombies,” said Justin and Gabe, almost simultaneously.
“Return of the Living Dead had talking zombies.”
“Shut up,” Justin and Gabe said.
Veronica watches the zombies, her expression unreadable. But then she…smiles.
VERONICA
Sorry, guys. Not today.
She takes out a machine gun [Note to self: Figure out where she was keeping the machine gun.] and opens fire. The zombies’ heads turn to goopy mush, and they drop to the ground. [Note to self: It would be cool if the mush formed the shape of something that symbolizes our movie’s theme.] [Note to self: Discuss theme with Gabe and Bobby.]
More zombies begin to run toward her! She puts the cat on her shoulder and takes out a second machine gun.
VERONICA
You wanna play, huh? Consider it playtime.
With a machine gun in each hand, Veronica pulls the triggers and spins in a circle, mowing down zombies like crazy. She’s like a zombie-slaying ballerina.
Justin wondered what the record was for the most zombies killed in a single movie. Maybe he’d try to break that record in the opening scene.
Well, no, the story had to come first. If his plot naturally lent itself to setting the world record for the most zombies ever splattered in a single movie, he’d go that route.
Bobby rolled over onto his back and began to snore. When he snored, it sounded like he was choking to death on his own tongue. Usually Justin was able to ignore it, but not while he was trying to be a genius. “Hey, Bobby,” he said. “Roll over.”
