                    PHONE BOOTH IN ANTARCTICA


Open with a scene of snow-covered hills
With absolutely no signs of life
And only enough gently moaning wind
To let us know we have sound
And to call attention to the silence.

Then
Behind the title we see a map of Antarctica.
All through the opening credits the camera zooms slowly in
To the place on the White Continent
Closest to no place
While all we hear
Is the gently moaning wind:
The only thing ever to be at home here.

Dissolve to
A view of a broad snowy valley:
Not a tree,
Not a bush,
Not a footprint
Has rumpled that white blanket.

Although the day is gloomy
We can see
Off in the distance
A small building.
The camera moves slowly in
Until we can make it out
To be a phone booth.

We see inside the booth
Close-ups of details
Like a light dusting of snow
In the corners,
On the shelf,
And on the phone.
It is obvious that
No one ever comes here
Except now and then the wind
To flip through the directory.

There are directions for long-distance only
Since from here there is no such thing
As local.

Inspection finished, the camera pulls away.
It leaves no footprints.

We pause a few hundred feet off.
The day looks a little gloomier
And all we hear
Is gently moaning wind.

Then,
Faint in the distance,
We hear the phone ring...
And ring...
And ring...
And ring...
And ring...
And ring...
And ring...
And ring...
And ring...
And ring...
And ring...
And ring...
And ring...

And not ring again.



                                     Thomas G. Digby
                                     Entered 2245hr  3/06/84
                                     Format  13:38 12/22/2001
