PEARL HARBOR

                      PEARL HARBOR   

                              by

                        Randall Wallace

                          EARLY DRAFT

Out of BLACK we hear the sound of an airplane roaring by.

EXT.  POV OF AN AIRPLANE

Flying over American heartland.  We see the earth through the
pilot's perspective as sky and ground swap positions, the
plane swooping down and storming over the ground.

THE PLANE

is a biplane, racing over a field lush with young plants.  It
releases a trail of crop spray, and climbs again...

Up into a crystalline blue sky where sunshine pours like
honey over family farms stretching to the horizon.  Maybe
it's not heaven, maybe it's just Tennessee.  But as long as
there's been an America, men have fought and died for this
place -- as volunteers.

Far off, but visible from the plane is

A BARN - DAY

The barn is unpainted except for hand lettering that says
"McCawley Crop Dusting." Another plane noise, this one made
by kids, brings us to TWO BOYS, sitting in the shell of an
old plane propped on crates, scavenged of it's engine, seats,
and wheels.

The boys sit in it's cockpit, butts crowded onto the nail keg
they've replaced the seat with.  They've even attached a 2x4
as propeller, as if their imaginations needed any help.  They
wear overalls and have bowl haircuts:  RAFE and DANNY, 10
years old.

                     RAFE
          Bandits at 2 o'clock.

                     DANNY
          Power dive!

They buzz their lips in a flying noise and work the controls,
Rafe's bare feet on one pedal, Danny's on the other.

                     RAFE
          It's Germans!

                     DANNY
          Kill the bastards!

Rafe looks at Danny in shock -- then they both laugh and go
right back into their game, manufacturing their own machine
gun and engine sounds.

                     RAFE
          Good shooting, Danny!

                     DANNY
          Good shooting, Rafe!

                     RAFE
          Land of the free...

                     DANNY
          Home of the brave!

                     RAFE
          There's another one!

Their vocal motors roar again... But a man's hand grabs Danny
by the straps of his overalls and jerks him from the cockpit.

It's Danny's FATHER and he's a fearsome sight; drunk, his
hair uncombed, his face unshaven, his teeth -- those still
left -- are rotting.  He's also missing an arm; but the one
that's left is potent, and he's shaking Danny with it.

                     DANNY'S FATHER
          You no count boy!  Johnson come lookin',
          said he'd pay a dime for you to shovel
          his pig shed, and I can't find you no
          place.

                     DANNY
          Daddy, I told you I was comin' here.

His father slaps him off his feet.  Rafe is so horrified he
can't get a sound out.  Danny isn't even surprised.  But when
his father snatches him up again, twisting the overall straps
so tight they choke him, he struggles.  It does no good; his
father starts marching across the field, dragging and
strangling Danny.

                     DANNY
          Da!... Dad...

The father's drunken anger makes him oblivious -- until
CRACK!  The 2x4 propeller slams him across the back, knocking
him to the ground and making him drop Danny.

The father rolls over to see 10-year-old Rafe, holding the
2x4 like a bat.

                     RAFE
          Let him alone!

The father's eyes bulge in rage; he struggles to his feet.

                     DANNY
          Rafe... Daddy... No!

The man looks murderous, but Rafe draws back the board.

                     RAFE
          I'll bust you open, you...German!

The words ring something deep in the man's booze-broken
brain.  He begins to cough, convulsively; it brings a blossom
of blood to his mouth.  He wipes it with his hand, but blood
clings to his teeth.  He chokes out --

                     DANNY'S FATHER
          I fought the Germans.

He looks at Danny in shame, with the realization of what he's
just done.  He turns and staggers away.

Danny looks at Rafe -- a communication between boys joined by
something deeper than blood.  Then Danny runs off after his
father.

                     DANNY
          Daddy!  Daddy!  Wait.

Danny catches him, takes his father's hand, and walks away
with him.

The crop duster we saw in the air has just landed, behind
Rafe.  The pilot, RAFE'S FATHER, shuts off the engine.

                     RAFE'S FATHER
          What's goin' on, son?

                     RAFE
          Nothing.  Danny's Dad just come to get
          him.

Rafe turns back to the ramshackle plane and replaces the 2x4
propeller.  His father looks toward Danny and his father,
walking away, then looks at his own son.

                     RAFE'S FATHER
          Hey, boy -- you wanna go up?

Rafe can't believe it; he runs to the plane and hops into his
father's lap.  As his father cranks the engine and tucks him
into the harness, Rafe says --

                     RAFE
          Daddy, sometime will you take Danny up
          too?

                     RAFE'S FATHER
          Sure will, son.

The engine races to life...and we --

                                                 DISSOLVE TO:

EXT.  NEW JERSEY AIR BASE - DAY

American P-40 fighters blast through the air, props screaming
and wind singing by their wings.

There are eight pilots in their individual seats, and we
focus on two:  RAFE MCCAWLEY has grown lean and handsome.
And DANNY WALKER is very much the same.

Their planes start swapping positions in the formation; while
the other guys are flying along in a tight line, Rafe and
Danny are playing, one of them gunning his engine to go high,
the other diving and coming back up in his place,
leapfrogging.

It scares the other guys, having their planes flashing in and
out, so close.  The TRAINING CAPTAIN, watching through
binoculars on the ground, talks into his RADIO --

                     TRAINING CAPTAIN
          McCawley!  Walker!  Cut that out!

                     RAFE
          I thought this was a training flight.
          I'm just trying to give Danny some
          training.

                     DANNY
          Not on your best day, boy!

Rafe grins and guns his plane low, in the opposite direction
he was moving before.  Danny reacts almost instantly...
leapfrogging in the opposite direction, scaring the piss out
of everybody else.

                     TRAINING CAPTAIN
          That's it, get into a wedge!

The squadron responds, forming up into a tight V, Rafe and
Danny just behind and on either side of the center.

                     RAFE
          Didn't you say test the limits?

                     DANNY
          Hey, you wanna test my limits, you better
          line up a couple dozen women on the
          GROUND...cause I got NO limits in the
          air!

Rafe grins, loving the challenge.  Then he and Danny do the
leapfrogging maneuver laterally, swapping sides in the V.

                     TRAINING CAPTAIN
          Everybody down!

EXT.  NEW JERSEY AIRFIELD - DAY

The planes land in tight order and taxi off the runway; shut
down their props, slide back the canopies and hop down.  We
see young pilots we'll get to know:  ANTHONY, BILLY, RED.

                     TRAINING CAPTAIN
          Where are McCawley and Walker?

EXT.  RAFE AND DANNY - STILL IN THE AIR - DAY

They've circled to opposite ends of the airfield and are now
heading right at each other, like two bullets playing
chicken.

                     TRAINING CAPTAIN
          Aw shit...

INT.  THE COCKPITS

From Rafe and Danny's POV, the rush is awesome.

THE PILOTS ON THE GROUND watch in awe as the P-40's get so
close they can't possibly get out of each other's way.
Billy, the most boyish-faced of the pilots, yells to drown
out the sound of the collision...

At the last instant, both planes snap a quarter turn so that
their wings are vertical, and they shoot past each other
belly to belly.

IN THE COCKPITS

Rafe and Danny burst out laughing.

THE PILOTS ON THE GROUND

laugh and congratulate each other.

                     TRAINING CAPTAIN
          You know what they say... You can take the
          crop duster out of the country -- but
          don't put him in a P-40.

Rafe banks to land, and Danny tucks in behind him.  Danny has
Rafe's plane in his sights.

                     DANNY
          If I had guns I'd be chewing up your --

Rafe feints left, banks right, and appears behind Danny.

                     RAFE
          If you had guns, you'd be pissin' on 'em.

They're almost to the landing strip, Rafe behind Danny.  But
as Danny's wheels are about to touch, he guns his engine and
snaps the nose of his plane straight up.

THE OTHER PILOTS stop laughing.

                     ANTHONY
          He's doing an inside loop!

                     TRAINING CAPTAIN
          Aw, shit...

Danny pulls it off, just barely making a full circle to come
in behind Rafe and bounce to a stop on the runway.

                     DANNY
          Yee-hawww!!!

Danny taxis his plane over to join the others.  He's grinning
as he slides back his cockpit cover; then --

                     DANNY
          Where's Rafe?

Red, tall with flaming orange hair, tips his chin toward the
air.  Seeing Rafe's plane still in the air, Danny starts to
refasten his harness.

                     TRAINING CAPTAIN
          You're down, Walker!  That's an order!

                     DANNY
          What about him?

                     TRAINING CAPTAIN
          He's not taking my orders anymore.

Danny's just about to ask what the hell that means, when he
notices Rafe climbing in a deliberate spiral.

                     DANNY
          He's gonna do it.

                     BILLY
          Do what?

                     DANNY
          It.
               (beat)
          Aw, shit.  Aw shit shit shit...

RAFE'S PLANE reaches two thousand feet, just a speck above
them, and seems to pause in the air.

                     DANNY
          I shouldn't'a done an inside loop.
          I shouldn't'a done an inside loop.

                     BILLY
          Why?

                     DANNY
          Cause now he's gonna do an outside loop.

                     TRAINING CAPTAIN
          Aw shit.  Aw shit shit shit...

Anthony and Billy join in, like an involuntary chant --

                     ANTHONY & BILLY
          Aw shit shit shit...

RAFE, IN HIS COCKPIT, is tightly controlled, yet serene.  He
noses the plane into a power dive.

The P-40 screams toward the ground, picking up speed, going
so fast it begins to shudder.

THE OTHER PILOTS are transfixed.  Red is so nervous he can't
get the words out.

                     RED
          Aw sh- sh- sh- sh-

                     BILLY
          Shit.

                     RED
          Yeah.

                     DANNY
          You can do it, Rafe.  You can do it.

The P-40, hurtling toward the ground at nauseating speed,
snaps into a half roll, streaking upside down over the
runway.  Rafe hangs inverted in his flight harness, the
asphalt of the runway shooting past, ten feet beyond his
head.

He pushes the plane into a climb, his cockpit on the outside
of the circle.  The plane reaches the top of its arc, and
almost stalls; but Rafe noses it over again, toward the
earth, only this time he has very little altitude.  The plane
hurtles down, still with it belly on the inside of the
curve...

And makes it full circle.  Rafe's head now is barely a foot
off the asphalt as the plane shoots past, still inverted.

THE OTHER PILOTS burst into cheers.

RAFE, IN HIS COCKPIT permits himself a smile.

He lands, and the guys run out to meet him...all except for
the Training Captain, who stands there shaking his head.

Danny jumps on the wing, as Rafe stops and slides back his
canopy.  Danny grabs him by the harness and shakes him.

                     DANNY
          You could've killed yourself, you stupid
          bastard!

He dives into the cockpit, hugging Rafe.

                     DANNY
          That was the most beautiful thing I ever
          saw.

INT.  COLONEL DOOLITTLE'S OFFICE - DAY

COLONEL JIMMY DOOLITTLE, mid-forties, is commander of the
base.  He's as tough as he is good in the air.  And right now
he's frowning at Rafe McCawley, standing at attention before
him.