Raising Arizona

Suddenly, with a soft pthunk! the Huggies box pops forward, out from under Hi's arm – hit by a bullet. Still running, Hi reaches forward, tries to catch it on the fly, bobbles it, tips it – loses it. He overruns it a couple steps before he can bring himself up short.

He turns and reaches to pick up the box but – PING-PING – bullets chew up the road near his hand.

Leaving the Huggies, Hi takes off through a well-manicured yard.

The police car is proceeding on down the street to catch him around the corner, the driver still drawling over his loudspeaker:

SPEAKER

That's private property, son. Come back out to the street and reveal yourself to Officer Steensma and Officer Scoft – that's me.

YARD

Hi vaults a fence to land in the backyard.

As he straightens to his feet we hear a horrible snarling and barking.

A huge black Doberman is bounding across the lawn. It looks like it means to rip Hi's throat out.

LOW TRACKING SHOT TOWARD HI

The dog's racing POV as it bounds toward the paralyzed Hi .

The dog leaps – camera flying up toward Hi's face – and:

CLOSE SHOT HI'S FROZEN PROFILE

The dog's slavering muzzle flies into frame and – stops, bare inches from Hi's nose, and the dog falls back, having reached the end of his chain.

Hi resumes running.

CLOSE

On the dog, snarling and straining against the end of his chain.

TRACKING

Down along the chain toward the spike mooring it to the ground. As the dog strains, the spike starts to stir in the ground.

Other dogs can be heard barking now, the Doberman having started a sympathetic wave.

ED'S CAR

Her jaw set, she takes a hard turn, looking this way and that.

ED

That son of a bitch...

The police car approaches and roars by, the Passenger Cop still hanging out his window.

ED

... Lookie Nathan, a police car...

She is looking in her rearview mirror.

ED
... Say, that looks like Bill Steensma.

LOW TRACKING SHOT

The camera is shooting forward at ground level, following the Doberman as it bounds along. The Doberman is dragging his chain and spike, which stretch into the foreground, bumping and scraping along the road.

Far ahead we can see Hi running, then turning down an intersecting street.

A second dog peels into the road to bound along with the Doberman.

TRACKING BEHIND HI
 

Running up a dark street. There is an oncoming pickup. Hi runs directly at it.

INT. PICKUP

The DRIVER screams and brakes – not quite in time.

Hi rolls onto the hood, and off, and gamely trots over to open the passenger door.

The Driver is leaning over to tell him:

DRIVER

Son, you got a panty on your head.

HI
Just drive fast...

He is displaying his gun as he starts to climb in.

HI

... and don't stop till I tell ya.

Before Hi can get his door shut the Driver is obediently peeling out.

Hi is reacting to an oncoming car. He peels the stocking off to look, and leans across the Driver's lap to bellow as Ed's car passes:

HI
... Honey!

Hi turns to look through the back window.

HIS POV

Ed's car is braking and spinning into a U-turn.

BACK TO HI
 

Leaning out the window.

HI

Mind the baby now!

Next to him, the Driver is screaming.

As Hi turns forward, the entire windshield explodes in.

THEIR POV

The pimply-faced Cashier from the 7-Eleven is standing in the middle of the road ahead, sighting down his .44 Magnum for another shot.

We are rushing in.

THE DRIVER

Still screaming.

THE CASHIER

Ready to fire and – THUMP – he is bowled over by the arriving Doberman, still trailing chain and spike, and now accompanied by three other dogs, all braying at the top of their lungs.

Still screaming, the Driver puts his body into a hard right turn to avoid the Cashier and hellhounds.

NEW STREET

Roaring up the new street, they are now directly in the path of the oncoming police car, its siren wailing, barreling straight at them.

Still screaming, the Driver leans into another hard right.

Wind is whistling in through where the windshield used to be.

Two wheels hop curb as the car skids into the new street, fishtails, and roars away.

ED'S CAR

She hears dogs, siren, squealing brakes on an adjacent street.

ED
Hold on Nathan, we'll take a shortcut.

She gives the wheel a hard right turn.

But there is no cross street. The car hops the curb and roars up someone's nicely tended front yard, heading for the gap between this house and the one next door.

POLICE CAR

Recovered and turned around from its near collision with the SCREAMING; Driver, the squad car is now squealing onto the street the Screamer swerved on to – resuming pursuit.

As the police car roars down the street, Ed's car appears from between two houses behind it, bounces down the front yard to the street and follows the police.

SCREAMER'S PICKUP

Raking two-shot of Hi and the Screamer. Hi is looking back over his shoulder at the pursuing police.

Desperately pleading:

SCREAMER
Can I stop now?

Hi looks forward.

HIS POV

They are rushing toward an imposing colonial house planted at the end of the dead-end street.

BACK TO HI
 

HI

Maybe you better.

CLOSE SHOT BRAKE PEDAL

Stepped on hard. The brakes scream.

EXT. CAR

As the car squeals to a halt Hi is catapulted through where the windshield used to be, tumbling over the hood onto the front lawn.

He rolls to his feet and, as he runs up the lawn, calls back over his shoulder:

HI

Thank you.

INTO THE HOUSE

We are tracking behind Hi as he runs up to the house and crashes through the screen door.

Still tracking behind him as he runs through the living room.

A middle-aged couple sits on the couch watching TV. They look up as Hi rushes by.

Hi plunges down a staircase. As he does so we hear: ka-chick ka-chock ka-chick ka-chock.

He emerges into a rec room where he and we rush past two kids playing ping-pong. He runs out the back door.

TRACKING WITH THE POLICENAN

As he runs into the house.

As he runs through the living room we catch a glimpse of the middle-aged couple gaping at him.

OFFICER STEENSMA plunges down the stairs.

TRACKING ON Hi

Outdoors now, running, crossing the street behind the house and entering the parking lot of a supermarket on the other side.

BACK TO THE HOUSE

As a pack of dogs thunders in. The lead Doberman with chain and spike has now picked up about a dozen neighborhood dogs.

The dogs thunder through the living room and down the stairs. As they hit the rec room the thunder of their feet turns into the clatter of nails on tile.

INT. SUPERMARKET

As Hi bursts in. Tracking on him as he runs down the broad front aisle, head whipping as he runs, looking up each perpendicular lane, searching for something.

He turns up one of the last lanes, races along it and grabs a carton of Huggies, still on the flat run.

He emerges into the broad back aisle and runs along it, but at the first perpendicular lane he hits, we see Officer Steensma, gun leveled, at the other end. He fires.

Hi keeps running.

The Policeman is running along the front aisle, keeping pace with Hi running along the back aisle. He squeezes off shots at Hi as each lane gives him the opportunity.

Hi abruptly stops between lanes and doubles back, losing the Policeman. He runs down the second lane he comes to toward the front of the store.

The pack of dogs appears at the end of the lane and thunders up toward Hi, braying at the top of their doggy lungs. The lead Doberman holds in his teeth a paper 7-Eleven cap.

Hi reverses again, and emerges into the back aisle.

BANG! A pyramid of cranberry juice explodes at his shoulder. The Policeman has been waiting at the end of the back aisle; he aims once again.

Hi plunges down the next lane but is brought up short as KA-BOOM! five jars of applesauce explode in front of him.

Hi looks.

Standing in the raised platform-cubicle at the front of the store is the Store Manager, a fat man in a white short-sleeved shirt with a lit cigarette dangling from his mouth.

The Manager cracks open his shotgun and inserts two more cartridges – thoonk thoonk – in the smoking chamber.

Hi doubles back once again toward the back aisle.

He is still several paces from the end of the lane when the Policeman appears there, squaring to face him.

The Policeman is in front of him. The MANAGER is blowing out groceries on the shelves behind him.

CLOSE ON POLICEMAN

As he coolly levels his police special and takes aim at Hi .

POLICEMAN'S POV

Still on the dead run, Hi is flinging the carton of Huggies.

The carton rockets straight at the camera.

BACK TO POLICEMAN

Futilely raising his gun to avoid-impact: The Huggies catch him square on the chest. The force makes him stumble one fatal step backwards – into the back aisle – where:

CRASH – He is hit broadside and bowled over by a rocketing shopping cart, propelled by an hysterically screaming SHOPPER.

TRACKING ON SHOPPER

Racing on down the back aisle, bellowing.

HER FEET

Tracking from in front. Beyond her we can see the pack of furiously barking dogs, nipping at her heels. They boil over the prostrate Officer Steensma, and this is the last we see of him in this movie.

EXT. STORE

As Hi emerges through the back door. Ed is just skidding around the corner.

Hi scrambles in the passenger side.

INT. CAR

Raking two-shot with Hi in the foreground. The car peels out of the lot.

HI
Thank you honey, you really didn't have to do this –

THWAK – Ed gives him a good hard slap and Hi's head rolls toward the camera.

ED

You son-of-a-bitch! You're actin' like a mad dog!

Rubbing his jaw:

HI

Turn left, honey.

Still at top speed, she leans into a hard left, tires squealing.

ED

What if me'n the baby'd been picked up? Nathan Jr. would a been accessory to armed robbery!

HI

Nawww honey, it ain't armed robbery if the gun ain't loaded –

ED

What kind of home life is this for a toddler?! You're supposed to be an example!

HI

Now honey, I never postured myself as the three-piece suit type – Tum left, dear.

ED

We got a child now, everything's changed!

HI

Well Nathan Jr. accepts me for what I am and I think you better had, too. You know, honey, I'm okay you're okay? That – there's what it is.

ED

I know, but honey –

HI

See I come from a long line of frontiersmen and – here it is, turn here dear – frontiersmen and outdoor types.

Hi's eyes are fixed on something in the road ahead.

ED
I'm not gonna live this way, Hi. It just ain't family life!

Hi's attention is still on the road. He is opening his door, even though the car is still racing along. He absently concedes:

HI

Well... It ain't Ozzie and Harriet.

LOW ANGLE THE STREET

In the extreme foreground sits the first carton of Huggies that Hi dropped in the middle of the road. The car is approaching.

As the car passes the carton, Hi's hand reaches from the passenger door and snags it.