The Ice Rink

The assistant hasn’t given up on the locked door.

He ends up looking through the keyhole.

In the dark garage, he catches a glimpse of the naked, joined bodies of the actor and the actress who make love against the surfacing machine.

The assistant stands up, turns on his walkie-talkie.

The assistant( in the talkie-walkie)

Lead actor found, lead actor found!

40. INT. RINK.-DAY

On the rink, the crew waits next to the camera.

In the walkie-talkie the assistant hears suddenly: lead actor found, lead actor found!

The assistant (in the walkie-talkie)

Roger. We’re waiting for you, over and out. (to the director) That’s it, they found him, he’s coming.

The director

Where was he?

The assistant

I don’t know, he must’ve been reading in his dressing room.

The cinematographer (deadpan)

Sylvester’s always reading.

41. EXT. GARAGE - SURFACING MACHINE

In front of the door of the garage, the assistant turns off his walkie-talkie.

Very softly, he knocks on the door ( tap, tap, tap).

He looks at the ceiling, being discreet, while waiting.

A long pause.

The door opens and the actor appears, stripped to the waist, the bathrobe tied hastily around his waist.

The actor (as if he had been disturbed in his hotel room)

Who is it?

The assistant (obsequiously)

We are waiting for you. If you will please follow me. You have to get dressed.

The actor

I have to get dressed? Hold on... YOU (he points to him) are telling ME (he points to himself) that I have to get dressed.

The assistant

Yes... For the film I mean. As a goalie. We are ready, we are going to shoot, we need you. To shoot.

42. INT. RINK - DAY

The main actor slowly enters the rink in a goalie's outfit, looking put out, and takes up his position in the net, holding his helmet.

He puts on the goalie helmet.

The director

Roll camera.

The sound engineer

Rolling!

The cinematographer

Mark it.

The assistant skates to the center of the rink and claps the slate, comes back at full speed toward the camera, jumps over the tracks and crashes onto the ground on the other side.

She gets up as best she can, gets behind a Plexiglas shield.

The director

Action!

The referee drops the puck in the center of the rink.

The match starts, the puck flies at full speed over the ice, followed by the frenzied players who rush after it in hot pursuit.

The grips, helmeted and protected, wearing skates, start pushing the dolly on the tracks.

There are two grips in front and two electricians behind the dolly, and they follow closely the progression of the match.

They push and pull the dolly in one direction and in the other to follow the puck, slide and brake to a halt at each change of direction, take off in the opposite direction to the best of their ability. Sometimes they fall and are dragged on their stomachs over the ice for a few meters before letting go.

They then race after the dolly, catch up with it and keep pushing it along the tracks.

The sound engineer, who started by taking sound in front of the dolly, running as fast as he could in his skates, is rapidly overtaken by the tracking shot and very courageously jumps to the other side of the tracks so as not to be caught in the picture.

Bruised, his elbow badly hurt, he now follows the tracking shot as best he can, almost at a walk, with his boom and his nagra.

The script-girl skates gracefully behind the tracking shot, all the while consulting her stopwatch. She skids elegantly in the turns and takes off in the other direction on the ice, letting herself slide a few meters, one leg lifted in the air behind her.

Each time that the puck changes direction the grips stop short on the ice, skid in a huge spray of ice crystals, and start off pushing the dolly like mad in the other direction.

The assistant and the make-up artist do not move behind their shield, putting their heads out now and then to follow the course of the match.

On the rink, the match continues to be very rapid and very violent.

The players hurtle into each other, jabbing each other in the stomach and in the head with their sticks, slam each other against the boards.

Sometimes they evade each other, dodge by.

Sometimes they can not avoid each other.

One of them, for example, fooled by a superb feint by one of his opponents, crashes with full force into the director and the camera and blasts them against the boards.

A deathly silence reigns over the ice rink.

The writer-director lies in a heap on the ice, inanimate, his arms sprawled.

The camera lies on the ground, the dolly is overturned.

43. EXT. PARKING LOT OF THE ICE RINK - DAY

An ambulance screeches to a halt on the parking lot of the ice rink.

44. INT. ICE RINK - DAY

Two attendants come running onto the rink with a stretcher, slip on the ice, fall flat on their faces.

They get up, advance more slowly, more prudently, over the ice.

They carefully lift the director onto the stretcher.

The members of the film crew, wearing helmets and pads, surround the director, look at him.

The inanimate director is carried away on the stretcher.

The assistant accompanies him.

The director, lying on the stretcher, finally, painfully, opens one eye.

The director (in an inaudible voice)

Cut.

The assistant strokes his hand, soothes him.

The assistant

There, there, it's done, it's done.

4

45. EXT. PARKING LOT OF THE ICE RINK - DAY

The trucks of the Flemish technicians pull up on the parking lot of the ice rink.

They get out, start unloading equipment, cables, lamps, go into the ice rink.

The TV reporter waits at the front door of the rink, pacing, his camera in one hand.

Several of the crew members' cars arrive on the parking lot.

The cinematographer gets out, greets the script girl.

They go into the ice rink together.

A gloomy atmosphere.

46. INT. ICERINK - DAY.

On the ice, two grips busy themselves around a big sled.

The cinematographer and the assistant watch them.

They attach the camera on top of the sled, fasten it with straps.

The cinematographer explains that he will not be able to film under those conditions, that a small place on the sled will have to be made for him.

The straps are undone, the camera is freed.

47. EXT. PARKING LOT. - DAY

On the parking lot, a siren can be heard in the distance.

The sound of the siren approaches.

Siren blaring, an ambulance pulls up in the parking lot.

The ambulance attendants get out, go around the ambulance and open the doors at the back.

The reporter quickly jumps into the back of the ambulance to film inside.

He comes out again a few seconds later, backwards, preceding the director’s rolling bed.

The director’s head is bandaged, he has a cast on his arm.

The ambulance attendants cautiously take the bed out of the ambulance.

The reporter accompanies them, filming.

They enter the rink.

48. INT. ICE RINK - DAY

In the rink the director is slowly slid out onto the ice on his rolling bed.

The grips stop work momentarily to watch.

The actress gets out of her chair and comes across the ice to meet the director in a sumptuous red dress.

The actress

You gave us quite a scare. What a collision, I heard. But you seem to be doing much better already. If it wasn’t for the bandage, I’d say nothing had happened to you.

The director

You’re sweet, Sarah. But you look a little pale, I think. You slept well last night? You weren’t too worried? (to the assistant) Okay, let’s get going, I want to do a rehearsal with Sarah’s double.

The actress's double is called for by walkie-talkie.

By walkie-talkie, the make-up artist replies that the double isn't ready, that he won't be ready for another hour.

The actress (considerate, coming over to the director)

Maybe I could try to stand in for my double...

The director

No, Sarah, it's nice of you, but it's too dangerous, the scene's too dangerous.

The assistant

It’s the scene where you die.

The director