Scene Description Spotlight: “Zombieland”
One of the most important things a writer wants to do when they begin a script is establish the story’s tone — and this is nowhere more important than with a cross-genre movie. A great example is Zombieland (2009). Written by screenwriters Rhett Reese & Paul Wernick, the movie crosses two genres: horror and comedy. And Reese & Wernick let the reader know straightaway their screenplay has heaping gobs of both:
We begin with a SONG: WOODY GUTHRIE’S ‘THIS LAND IS YOUR’
LAND.’ CATCHY. PATRIOTIC. WARM. Recorded in mono, played
on a scratchy old phonograph…
The following is shot gritty. Kinetic. Fast. Scary. Very
’28 Days Later,’ ‘Saving Private Ryan,’ ‘Children of Men.’
FADE UP ON:
An AMERICAN FLAG, filling the screen, flapping. A male
voice, belonging to FLAGSTAFF, a witty, anxiety-ridden
EVERYMAN, late-twenties, (THINK SETH GREEN), narrates:
FLAGSTAFF (V.O.)
This land is your land.
The camera rotates on its axis until the flag is UPSIDE DOWN,
then pulls back to reveal that it is one of those flags
flying on the hood of a PRESIDENTIAL LIMOUSINE, which itself
is upside-down, crashed and overturned ON TOP of another car.
The further we pull back, the more we see of a destroyed,
burning Washington D.C.
FLAGSTAFF (V.O.)
This land is my land.
Suddenly, rapid FOOTSTEPS! The camera jiggles nervously,
trying to find their source. Rapidly, the footsteps become
LOUD, like someone running on sheet-metal
BOOM-BOOM-BOOM! A ZOMBIE, bleeding from the eyes, runs UP
the other side of the tangled mess of automobiles, plants a
foot on the underside of the limo, and LONG-JUMPS, arms
flailing, down onto the ground in the direction of the
camera.
It lands on its STOMACH, then scrambles up to its hands and
knees.
The camera jiggles, backing up quickly. The ZOMBIE regains
its footing and sprints spastically, aggressively toward the
lens.
The CAMERAMAN has seen enough. He turns and RUNS, his P.O.V.
bouncing wildly. Then the camera WHIP-PANS to face the
Zombie as it WAILS and ATTACKS.
The zombie engulfs the screen, TACKLING the Cameraman.
The camera FALLS to the ground, askew, shooting nothing but
treetops and sky. Offscreen, the CAMERAMAN SCREAMS and
SCREAMS and SCREAMS, accompanied by ripping, cracking,
CRUNCHING.
Something just God-awful is happening to this guy. Then he
gacks and falls SILENT.
We hear munching.
The zombie’s superbly frightening FACE comes into frame
again, at an angle, staring into the camera lens as though
it’s a bathroom mirror. The zombie curiously looks at its
reflection, twitching, trembling, smacking its lips.
The zombie BELCHES, long, loud, and animal-like, FOGGING the
LENS with its breath.
Okay, so with the zombie attacking and killing the cameraman, the script pretty much gets across the horror theme of the movie. But what about the comedy?
* “This Land Is Your Land” and the upended Presidential limousine — a funny contrast
* “The CAMERAMAN SCREAMS and SCREAMS and SCREAMS, accompanied by ripping, cracking, CRUNCHING” — the redundancy of the “screams” and the visceral sounds of the zombie assault, one we can only imagine, not see
* “Then he gacks and falls SILENT” — use of the word gacks
* “We hear munching” — that’s just funny
* The zombie belches which fogs the camera lens — zombie belch and a humorous visual touch by the writers re fogging the camera lens
So with their opening, the writers have (A) established the post-apocalyptic nature of things in the United States, (B) introduced the presence of zombies, © conveyed that this is a horror story, and (D) gotten across that it is also a comedy.
Not bad for 1 1/2-pages
A good lesson in using scene description to establish the tone upfront of a cross-genre script.
Here is a trailer from the movie where you see how they marketed both the movie’s horror and comedy: