House on Haunted Hill

                           PRICE
                It works.

                           SCHECTER
                Maybe it was just its time to finally
                fall apart.

                           PRICE
                No. Somehow -- I don't know how --
                she did it.

                           SCHECTER
                Pretty amazing feat: all that shit
                down the basement and your wife's
                up in the bedroom the whole time.

                           PRICE
                Don't take your eyes off her for a
                second. I think she just declared War.

     INT. MAIN SALON - SIMULTANEOUS

     Evelyn, a huge drink in her hand, holding forth to a not
     terribly interested Dr. Blackburn. Melissa Marr's oblivious,
     Camcorder to her eye, slowly dollying herself out of the
     room.

                           EVELYN
                We'd've been splitsville years ago, with
                me the richest single woman in recorded
                history -- but Steven doesn't "believe"
                in divorce.

                           BLACKBURN
                Not too big on it myself -- but then
                again, not on marriage either.

                           EVELYN
                Oh, he's got no problem with that:
                I'm his fourth.

                           BLACKBURN
                I'm confused.

                           EVELYN
                No need for divorce and that messy
                division-of-assets thing when they kick
                before you do.

                           MELISSA
                All three of his previous wives
                just up and died?

                           EVELYN
                Damnedest thing: each one, freaky little
                "accidents" --

     INT. BASEMENT CORRIDOR - SIMULTANEOUS

     Sara, Eddie and Pritchett continue searching.

                           SARA
                You should really open this place to the
                public, Pritchett -- a spa for people
                without enough stress in their lives.

                           PRITCHETT
                I said we shouldn't come down here. Very
                treacherous -- physical and metaphysical
                levels, both. There've been no
                refurbishments to this part of the house
                -- it's exactly as it was in 1931.

                           VOICE (O.S.)
                Is that a fact, Mr. Pritchett?

     They all whip around -- spooked to the max. Pritchett shakily
     trains the flashlight on who or what's behind them: Price.

                           PRICE
                Sorry.

                           SARA
                Good way to get your head blown off.

                           PRICE
                I'll try not to remember to warn Evelyn.

     They soon pass a broken wall. Rubble and debris litters the
     floor. Pritchett moves them quickly past the spot. This
     doesn't go unnoticed.

                           EDDIE
                What's in there?

                           PRITCHETT
                     (too quickly)
                Nothing.

     Sara takes the flashlight from Pritchett's hand and aims it,
     into the dark hole beyond.

     ANGLE ON THE DOOR

     The light glints on a HUGE STEEL DOOR. A grime-covered
     WINDOW is set at eye-level. A black mold corrodes away the
     edges.

                           SARA
                Nothing? That seems like quite a door
                to hold back "nothing".

     Pritchett just stares at the door for an uncomfortably long
     moment...

                           EDDIE
                What is it? What's in there?

                           PRITCHETT
                     (finally)
                The Soul of the House. Everything that's
                corrupt about it... My father trapped it
                in there just before he died. You see,
                he purchased the house to restore it...
                We were going to live here... Nothing
                can live here. I was just a kid... The
                first time I saw it, I thought it was
                beautiful... It was just a dark mist
                turning into the corner of the room...
                then it started to move... then death
                started to happen... First the workers..
                six in all... then my father...

                           SARA
                Ghosts killed your father?

                           PRITCHETT
                Not ghosts... at least not what you're
                thinking... Vannacutt used to dump the
                bodies of his failed experiments
                somewhere in the house...

                           SARA
                And you think it's in there?

                           PRITCHETT
                Accumulated evil... festering for
                decades...
                     (switching gears)
                But I'm a drunk... so don't listen to
                me.

                           EDDIE
                So you're saying as long as that door
                stays locked, we're okay?

                           PRITCHETT
                Hell NO!! The House will kill ya!

     Pritchett's oblivious: he's shining his light back down the
     corridor -- at its terminus it splits into four new
     corridors.

                           PRITCHETT
                I think we go down there and take a
                right.

     The trio follow Pritchett. WE remain staring at the STEEL
     DOOR. Almost imperceptibly -- or is it the darkness playing
     tricks on us? One of the streaks of mold seems to have grown
     longer.

                                                            CUT TO:

     INT. CORRIDOR - CONTINUOUS

     Pritchett leading the three others down a new corridor,
     clearly clueless as to where the hell they are. Shines the
     flashlight up to find they're in --

     INT. ELECTRO-SHOCK ROOM

     a small room containing a large leather table with a myriad
     of mildewed buckle-straps attached. Behind the table: a
     monolithic brass and wood DYNAMO that looks powerful enough
     to keep Orange County lit for a year.

                           PRITCHETT
                Electro-shock therapy. There's several
                of them hooked together... Dr. Vannacutt
                liked to zap his patients in multiples
                of ten. More enerqy-efficient or
                something. Let's try a left.

     They turn left. A small, barely noticeable arc of electricity
     zaps from a dangling, half-severed wire.

                                                            CUT TO:

     INT. SATURATION CHAMBER ROOM

     Pritchett dead-ended in another room.

                           PRITCHETT
                Damn-it-all! This is the Saturation
                Chamber! Left again!

     He all but yanks Price along with him, Price blurting as he
     disappears from frame:

                           PRICE
                What's a "Saturation Chamber"?

     EDDIE and SARA linger, staring at the big, cast-iron capsule-
     shaped contraption. We hear Pritchett's Voice in the
     distance, explaining:

                           PRITCHETT (O.S.)
                New wrinkle on an old theory for
                treating schizophrenia. 19th Century, I
                think: what would drive a sane man mad
                should make a madman sane. The Vannacutt
                version was: bombard the patient with
                aural and visual stimuli far more
                frightening than any hallucination they
                could ever produce, it'd traumatize 'em
                back to "normalcy."

                           EDDIE
                Did it work?

     Eddie looks up: Pritchett and Price are nowhere to be seen.

                           EDDIE
                Hey! Where'd you guys go?

                           PRITCHETT (O.S.)
                Left, goddamnit!

                           SARA
                     (grabbing Eddie's arm)
                C'mon -- I've got like zero interest
                in getting lost down here.

     He guides her out of the room and down --

     INT. BASEMENT CORRIDOR - CONTINUOUS

      -- to his left.

     PULL BACK -- And we see, simultaneously, Pritchett, Price
     and flashlight walking down the corridor that was to their
     left -- Eddie and Sara walking down the one that was to
     their left: a long, snaking passage going in the completely
     opposite direction.

                                                            CUT TO:

     INT. BASEMENT CORRIDOR - CONTINUOUS

     Eddie and Sara navigating the various twists and turns in the
     darkness.

                           EDDIE
                Hey, Price! Pritchett!

     Sara's gaze falls on: A RAGGED HOLE above their heads,
     broken into the wall of the corridor. CABLES and WIRES can
     be seen inside the hole.

                           SARA
                Lemme try something. Gimme a boost.

     Eddie grabs her by her butt. She bristles.

                           SARA
                 -- hey, pal, that wasn't code for --