Black Screen.

People are talking in hushed tones.

Then titles over black screen.

Ernest Hemingway Goes on Trial :Nancy, France, October 6th 1944.

1. INT. HOTEL DINING ROOM/COURTROOM. DAY

The room – the hotel’s small oak panelled dining room – is crowded with various US ARMY PERSONNEL, including COLONEL LANHAM, who are talking to each other in hushed tones, plus a small group of CORRESPONDENTS who, for the most part, are silent (some are smoking) each one busy with their own thoughts. A tall, white helmeted US ARMY MP is standing in front of the door: no one comes or goes without his permission. Suddenly there’s a loud knock on the door and the MP allows COLONEL CLARENCE C. PARK to enter. The room becomes quiet as PARK walks to the far end of the room, moves around a large desk and sits facing the door. There is a large window behind PARK through which we can see the US Army and the local population going about their business. The assembled US ARMY PERSONNEL, and CORRESPONDENTS, go to their respective seats- with COL LANHAM taking a seat that will keep him within camera shot for most of the scene. Everyone looks toward the closed door. In the far distance we can hear artillery, and small arms fire. There is another knock on the door. The MP opens the door and allows ERNEST HEMINGWAY – who is accompanied by another MP – to enter. HEMINGWAY, who is wearing a grey tweed suite, white shirt and red tie, and carrying a briefcase, looks around the room, nodding to anyone he recognises, with
a special wide grin for LANHAM. When HEMINGWAY sees the assembled bunch of CORRESPONDENTS he stares at them hard, they avert their eyes. The MP then guides HEMINGWAY to a desk some twenty feet away from, but directly opposite, COLONEL PARK. In a relaxed fashion ERNEST HEMINGWAY sits down facing PARK, opens his briefcase and takes out several closely typed sheets of paper. All is silent except for distant gunfire..

(A US ARMY CAPTAIN, standing behind his desk, situated close to PARK, addresses the court.)

CAPTAIN: All rise.

(The CAPTAIN waits until everyone is standing.)

CAPTAIN: This military investigation and interrogation of Ernest
Hemingway, commencing this day, the 6th of October, 1944, in the
American occupied sector known as S.H-2, Nancy, North Eastern France,
and in the temporary HQ of the Inspector General, US Third Army (Rear),
is now in session, with Inspector General Colonel Clarence C. Park,
presiding. You may sit.

(The CAPTAIN sits down, as does everyone else.)

(PARK opens a file in front of him and reads to himself for a moment. PARK then gets up and moves to within a few feet of HEMINGWAY.)

PARK (TO HEMINGWAY): Please state your name, occupation and station.

HEMINGWAY: Ernest Hemingway, war correspondent, Collier’s Weekly, APO 887.

PARK: I am required to caution you with regard to your rights with
respect to the twenty-fourth Article of War. Which is as follows.

(PARK turns to the CAPTAIN.)

PARK: Captain would you please read out said Article for the benefit of
Mr Hemingway?

CAPTAIN (READING):

” Every person not belonging to the Army of the United States who, being
duly subpoenaed to appear as a witness before a court-martial, or before
an officer, military or civil, designated to take a deposition to be
read in evidence before a court-martial wilfully neglects or refuses to
appear or refuses to qualify as a witness or to testify or produce
documentary evidence which such persons may have been legally subpoenaed
to produce shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanour…”

(The camera cuts between the faces of HEMINGWAY and PARK.)

“…that no witness shall be compelled to incriminate himself or to answer
any question which may tend to incriminate or degrade him.”

PARK: Thank you, Captain. Do you understand you rights as a witness, Mr
Hemingway?

HEMINGWAY: I understand them.

PARK: Mr Hemingway, were you in (PARK consults his file) Rambouillet
about August 22nd to 25th just before the French Armoured Division
entered Paris?

HEMINGWAY: I was.

PARK: Will you state briefly what you were doing there?

HEMINGWAY: May I stand, Colonel?

PARK: You may.

(HEMINGWAY gets up slowly, and like an actor in rehearsal tries out various positions, and then, with the neatly typed papers in his right hand, addresses the court. HEMINGWAY only occasionally looks at his deposition.)

HEMINGWAY: On August 19th I stopped at the Command Post of the 22nd
Infantry Regiment of the First Division just outside of Maintenon, in my
capacity as war correspondent accredited to the Third Army, to ask for
any information on the fighting at the front. (HEMINGWAY pauses and
consults his papers). This regiment was in a holding position, and the
G-2 and G-3 of this regiment. Oh, and for those of you in this room who
don’t know what G-2, and G-3 mean – and I can see some of you looking a
little puzzled – well those are the guys who handle regimental
intelligence and operational details. Anyway these guys showed me the
disposition of their battalions and of their main advanced outpost,
which was at a point a short distance beyond Epernon, on the road to
Rambouillet, and was the Regimental Command Post.

(HEMINGWAY now looks at the CORRESPONDENTS).

Hopefully my fellow correspondents can follow what must be for
them, I realise, rather difficult technical language

(There is laughter from the court.)

PARK: Mr Hemingway I would ask that you do not address the court in such
a way, unless asked to do so.

(Camera cuts to LANHAM, who is smiling broadly.)

HEMINGWAY: Of course, Colonel, I just felt it might be helpful.

PARK (Very sharply): Mr Hemingway, please continue.

(HEMINGWAY now adopts a much more relaxed, conversational style.)

HEMINGWAY: Well, as I was saying, I was informed there was heavy
fighting in progress outside Rambouillet. I knew the country and the
roads around Epernon, Rambouillet, Trappes, and Versailles well as I had
bicycled, walked, and driven a car through this part of France for many
years, especially in the 1920s when I used to take Bumby, that’s my son
John – who’s now serving bravely with the OSS – on Picnics.¦

PARK: Perhaps we might stick with the matter in hand, Mr Hemingway, we
only have today to complete this investigation.

HEMINGWAY: My apologies, Colonel, but I just felt it might suggest how
well I know the area, unlike some people in this room today, and how
important I felt it was for me to share that knowledge with the military?

PARK: Of course. But if you would continue?

(HEMINGWAY looks at his papers.)

HEMINGWAY: At the official outpost of the 22nd Infantry Regiment I
encountered some French civilians who had just come in from Rambouillet
by bicycle. I was the only person at the outpost who spoke French.

(PARK intervenes.)

PARK: It is my understanding, Mr Hemingway, that at least one US soldier
at that Command Post at that time could speak French?

HEMINGWAY: Well, Colonel, he didn’t make himself known to me, and things
were pretty fluid manpower wise back then.

PARK: Continue.

HEMINGWAY: These civilians informed me the last of the Germans had left
Rambouillet at three o’clock that morning but that the roads into the
town were mined. They reported that contrary to the information given at
the Command Post of the 22nd there was no fighting in progress outside
of Rambouillet at all.

PARK: That is quite a contradiction. Could you not hear firing from the
vicinity of Rambouillet?

HEMINGWAY: Shooting could be heard, Colonel, but it was hard to
determine were it was coming from.

PARK: Continue.

HEMINGWAY: Well, I started to return to regimental headquarters with
this information which I thought should be placed in the hands of the
proper authorities as soon as possible. But I soon realised, after
driving a short way down the road back to Maintenon, it might be better
to return and get the French civilians and take them to the Regimental
Command Post so they themselves could be interrogated and give further
information.

PARK: Is that what you did, Mr Hemingway?

HEMINGWAY: Yes.

PARK: Please go on.

HEMINGWAY: When I reached the outpost again I encountered two cars full
of French guerrilla fighters.

PARK: The civilians had gone?

HEMINGWAY: Yes. I guess they wanted to get to some place of safety, and
who can blame them?

PARK: What happened then?

HEMINGWAY: As I said, I encountered these guerrilla fighters, most of
whom were naked to the waist. They were armed with pistols and Sten-guns.

PARK: Were you armed at this time, Mr Hemingway?

HEMINGWAY: No, sir!

(PARK is now on his feet. We can still hear the gunfire in the distance.)

PARK: Where did the guerrilla fighters obtain their arms?

HEMINGWAY: They told me the British had dropped them by parachute.

PARK: What kind of pistols were they, Mr Hemingway?

HEMINGWAY: Lugers.

PARK: Is it likely, Mr Hemingway, that the British would have dropped
German Luger pistols to Free French Fighters?

(There is some laughter from the CORRESPONDENTS in the courtroom.)

PARK: Well, Mr Hemingway?

HEMINGWAY: I have to say that crossed my mind at the time, but the
British are very devious, so I gave it little thought.

(More laughter from the courtroom.)

PARK: You say you were not carrying arms at this time?

HEMINGWAY: Correct.

PARK: So when did you start carrying arms?

HEMINGWAY: I did not, at any time, carry arms, Colonel Park.

(There is a commotion in courtroom, and we hear the word “liar” shouted out.)

PARK: Silence! I will not have such behaviour, or slanderous language,
in my courtroom. If it happens again the person responsible will be removed.

(There is a pause as the room becomes silent.)

PARK: Mr Hemingway, please continue with your story.

(HEMINGWAY again consults his typewritten pages.)

HEMINGWAY: After talking with the French guerrilla fighters it became
clear that what the civilians had told me was true. What I also soon
realised, by talking with the guerrillas, was that they possessed
additional information on the state of the roads, information I felt I
must get back to the proper authorities. Consequently I conducted them
back to the Regimental Command Post of the 22nd Infantry, where I
translated their information. I then returned to the outpost, in my
capacity as a war correspondent, to wait for the mine-clearing detail,
and a reconnaissance troop that were to rendezvous with these French
guerrillas.

PARK: This is the first we’ve heard of a mine-clearing detail, and a
reconnaissance troop, Mr Hemingway. When was all this organized?

HEMINGWAY: At the Regimental Command Post of the 22nd Infantry. The
guerrilla fighters explained, in fact confirmed what the civilians had
said, that the main road into Rambouillet was mined. I translated that
to the G-2 at the CP, sorry, Command Post, and he organized a
mine-clearing detail to get there as soon as possible.

PARK: Thank you for that clarification. Did the G-2 say how long that
might take?

HEMINGWAY: No.

PARK: One assumes there was a good deal of mine clearance work going on
at the time so the detail could have taken hours, even days to arrive?

HEMINGWAY: Hours, yes. Days? No. The road to Rambouillet was vital in
getting American troops, and the French, into Paris. I guess it would
have taken priority.

PARK: You guess?

HEMINGWAY: I’m no general, Colonel, but even I could see how important
that road, and the town of Rambouillet, was. The mines had to be
cleared, and fast. The G-2 at the Command Post knew that. Colonel
Lanham, as a brilliant field officer, would have known that too. And I guess Patton knew that?

PARK: I guess he probably did. Please continue.

(HEMINGWAY suddenly looks tired and then slumps into the chair at his desk.)

HEMINGWAY: I wonder if I might have a glass of water?

PARK: Of course. In fact we’ll take a short break. Fifteen minutes, Captain.

(The CAPTAIN stands.)

CAPTAIN: This interrogation is in recess for fifteen minutes.

(PARK beckons the CAPTAIN over.)

PARK: Captain, will you get Mr Hemingway a glass of water, or perhaps
you might prefer coffee, Mr Hemingway?

HEMINGWAY: No, water will be fine.

(PARK nods at the CAPTAIN who leaves the room to fetch water.)

HEMINGWAY (Calling after the CAPTAIN): I’ll be outside.

2. EXT. COURTYARD OF THE HOTEL. DAY.

HEMINGWAY is sitting on a bench talking with COL LANHAM, who is in battle dress and drinking water from a cut glass wine goblet. We can still hear the artillery fire in the distance.

LANHAM: I really shouldn’t be seen talking with you, Ernie. In fact I
shouldn’t be talking with you. Fancy some whiskey in that?

(HEMINGWAY nods his head, and LANHAM, taking a hip flask from a pocket,
pours a good helping of whiskey into HEMINGWAY’S glass.)

HEMINGWAY: Thanks, Buck. I shouldn’t really be drinking the stuff. The
Doc tells me my blood pressure’s up, way up, and that I should be taking
it easy. But he’s only an Army doctor so that doesn’t count a whole lot.
(Pause) I can’t tell you how pleased I was to see you this morning, Buck.

LANHAM; Think nothing of it. (Pause) The truth is I was ordered here.

HEMINGWAY: Hell! Who by?

LANHAM: Take one guess?

HEMINGWAY: Shit.

(LANHAM lights-up a Lucky Strike and inhales deeply. HEMINGWAY takes a
long drink.)

LANHAM: I think it’s the shit they want to keep you away from. In truth
I shouldn’t be in court as a potential witness, neither should those
damned journalists. Park is playing some clever game I can’t figure out;
damned lawyers. You’ll either end up in the pokey doing life, or go scot
free.

HEMINGWAY: Thanks, Buck, I’ll remember that when they throw away the key.

LANHAM: Be my guest.

(HEMINGWAY takes another drink.)

HEMINGWAY: Buck?

LANHAM: What?

HEMINGWAY: Sorry I got you into this mess.

LANHAM (Angrily): Mess? What the hell you talking about Ernie. The mess,
the real mess is out there. That’s my artillery you can hear. Men are
dying as we sit here, Americans and Germans, that’s where the mess is,
Ernie, not here in this two bit hotel acting out this charade. Hell, I’m
loosing a thousand men a day, and most of them ain’t men either, just 18
year-olds who should still be on the farm, or in the store, and making
their girls pregnant in the back of a 1929 Buick, not out here in a
country most of them had never heard of until now. They should be running
errands for their Ma, Ernie, not dying in some shell hole in a field
owned by some bastard who don’t give a damn.

(HEMINGWAY is shaking, shaking badly.)

LANHAM: Hey? You okay, Ernie?

HEMINGWAY: Yes, fine. I get the shakes every now and then, I guess it’s
the blood pressure thing.

LANHAM: When did they start?

HEMINGWAY: On and off for the last few months.

LANHAM: I’m no doc, Ernie but I’d say you’re suffering from shell shock.

HEMINGWAY: Crap, Buck.

LANHAM: We call it battle fatigue these days, but it ain’t changed any.
Oh, some guys get it real bad, can’t move for days, weeks. Some just get
a touch and keep going until one day they get unlucky and can’t move
quick enough, and wham, dead meat.

(HEMINGWAY is silent.)

LANHAM: Did you have it after your ass got kicked back in 1918?

HEMINGWAY: I used to get angry with folks. Couldn’t hold the tongue still.

LANHAM: Couldn’t settle?

HEMINGWAY: Couldn’t settle. Hell, you’re sounding like a doc now.

(HEMINGWAY’S shaking now eases off.)

LANHAM: Sorry, Ernie. Take my advice. When this pantomime of an
interrogation is over get out of here and back to Cuba, and take Mary
with you and make love to her till she begs you to stop, and then write
the best goddam war novel that’s ever been written, then make love again
until the two of you don’t want to move ever again, ever.

(LANHAM’S right hand is now shaking slightly. HEMINGWAY notices.)

HEMINGWAY: That’s your advice is it, doc?

LANHAM: That’s my advice.

HEMINGWAY: I’ll need a prescription so that Mary knows what to expect.

LANHAM: Consider it done, in triplicate.

(HEMINGWAY and LANHAM are now approached by the CAPTAIN.)¦

CAPTAIN: Gentlemen, you are both required back in the courtroom.

3. INT. HOTEL DINING ROOM/COURTROOM. DAY.

ERNEST HEMINGWAY is sitting at his desk, with COLONEL PARK sitting facing him at his desk. The court is hushed in expectation. PARK looks at his papers, then stands and walks around his desk. He approaches HEMINGWAY.

PARK: If I can recap, Mr Hemingway? My records state that you asked a
G-2 at the Regimental Command Post of the 22nd Infantry if he could
arrange for a mine clearing detail to go to the main road leading into
Rambouillet as quickly as possible?

HEMINGWAY: Yes.

PARK: Perhaps you would be good enough to tell us what happened then?

(HEMINGWAY remains seated.)

HEMINGWAY: After leaving the RCP of the 22nd I proceeded toward
Rambouillet as a war correspondent, and as an interpreter for the troops
which were to be sent on mine clearing and reconnaissance duties.

PARK: Had you been asked to act as an interpreter, and if so, by whom?

HEMINGWAY: I probably mentioned to the G-2 that I was a fluent French
speaker and could be of help translating.

PARK: And did the G-2 agree to this?

HEMINGWAY: I remember him saying something like, “yes sure”, I don’t
remember exactly.

(PARK makes some notes.)

PARK: Please continue.

HEMINGWAY: When I got back to the official outpost the French guerrilla
fighters were still there. I explained that mine clearing and
reconnaissance troops were on the way. We sat and waited and I remember
some of the French guys started playing boules, with the rest just
sitting around cleaning their guns, or smoking. I remember one guy was
even reading Proust. Anyway, after a couple of hours the troops still
hadn’t arrived and I could see the guerrillas were getting a bit
restless. We waited a little while longer, still no troops, and then one
of them came up to me and said he and his comrades had decided to place
themselves under my command. I told them that as a war correspondent I
could not command troops, and that they had a commander. They said he
was no good, and that they would sooner take their chances with me.

PARK: Was this the first time you had told them you could not, as a war
correspondent, command troops?

HEMINGWAY: Yes, there had been no reason to speak of such things earlier.

PARK: Good, carry on.

HEMINGWAY: Like I said they repeated they would sooner take their
chances with me than their existing commander.

PARK: Do you remember his name, Mr Hemingway?

HEMINGWAY: Who?

PARK: The commander of the French guerrillas. His name?

HEMINGWAY: No, I don’t.

PARK: His name was Marceau, Tahon Marceau.

HEMINGWAY: Is that right?

PARK: It is. I’m surprised you don’t remember.

HEMINGWAY: I don’t recall even speaking to him.

PARK: He remembers talking to you, remembers very well, and how he told
you himself about the mined road. (PARK looks through his papers) I have
his deposition here. Would you like to read it?

HEMINGWAY: No. I’ll take your word for it, Colonel. Perhaps I did speak
to him. And perhaps he didn’t make it clear to me who he was?

PARK: Perhaps. Continue.

HEMINGWAY: It soon became obvious I had to do something to keep these
guys from getting too restless, so I agreed to go with them to the mined
road so that they might establish a guard to prevent any American
vehicles from running into it.

PARK: You simply went along, you did not go as their commander?

HEMINGWAY: That is correct.

PARK: So far, Mr Hemingway, you have used the singular, suggesting you
were on your own when you first met these French guerrilla fighters.
Were you so on your own?

HEMINGWAY: No.

PARK: Who was with you?

HEMINGWAY: Private Archie Pelkey.

PARK: Known as “Red” I believe?

HEMINGWAY: Indeed. A good man. Do you have a deposition from him too
Colonel?

PARK: No, no I don’t. (PAUSE) Do you see Mr Pelkey in this room today?

(HEMINGWAY looks about him.)

HEMINGWAY: No I don’t, Colonel.

PARK: Do you know why that is?

HEMINGWAY: No.

PARK: Because he is in a military hospital, Mr Hemingway, suffering from
what the doctors describe as (PARK again refers to his notes)”…acute
anxiety disorder.” Have you ever heard of that condition?

HEMINGWAY: Can’t say I have, Colonel.

PARK: No, neither had I. But Mr Pelkey does seem to be suffering from
it, and although the term is fairly new, and is not an official
psychiatric diagnosis, the symptoms are invariably some kind of panic
disorder, usually a post-traumatic stress disorder.

HEMINGWAY: You mean Red is suffering some kind of mental exhaustion due
to the stressful life he’s been leading lately?

PARK: I was forgetting your father was a doctor, Mr Hemingway.

HEMINGWAY: Yes, and a damn good one too. But he was no shrink, just a
good doctor who could treat damn near anything, and talk to people.
(HEMINGWAY is suddenly very angry) Who blew his head off because he
couldn’t handle money, and didn’t want to be seen as a failure, which he
wasn’t, and suffered post-traumatic bitch disorder all his married life.

(HEMINGWAY suddenly gets up and grabs PARK by the lapels and slams him
hard down across the desk. The MPs come running and drag HEMINGWAY off
PARK.)

(There is consternation in the courtroom.)

HEMINGWAY (Now Screaming, and being restrained): And I’ll tell you
something else, Colonel Clarence C. Park, every goddam GI serving in the
goddam American Army is suffering some kind of damned post-traumatic
stress disorder, and who can blame them with jerks like you running the
outfit.

PARK: This hearing is adjourned.

CUT TO

4. INT. THE OFFICE OF GENERAL PATTON. DAY.

General Patton’s office is a small farm house in Belgium, and we see
the General standing, with his hands behind his back, looking out of a
bedroom window toward a Germany he can see not too far away. PATTON is
not wearing his jacket – which is hanging over the back of a chair – and
his braces are hanging down. PATTON is chewing on a cigar and drinking a
brandy. PATTON’S valet, JOHN, a black sergeant, enters the room. PATTON
turns and greets JOHN.

PATTON: Good morning, John. How are you this lousy morning?

JOHN: I’m fine, sir, and it don’t look too lousy to me. The sun is
shining, and the mighty Third is as ever triumphant.

PATTON: John, I’m going to make you a colonel at the first opportunity.
None of my officers ever have your optimism.

JOHN: Well, I’ll tell you something, general, all my pessimism was used
up a long while ago. What’ve I got left but optimism?

PATTON: You’re also a damned good philosopher.

JOHN: Who, unlike Socrates, has come to shave his general, and not
burden him with too much useless information before a battle.

(PATTON sits in a chair by his bedroom window. JOHN puts a towel around
PATTONâ€TMS shoulders and begins to shave the general.)

PATTON: You’re an educated man, John, did you go to college?

JOHN: Indeed, sir, Oberlin. Studied history, and played some damn good
football.

PATTON: What’s your favourite period, John?

JOHN: The English Civil War, general.

PATTON: Excellent. A period that should be of intense interest to
Americans, do you not think so?

JOHN: I do, sir. I believe that had Oliver Cromwell emigrated to America
as a young man, which he almost did, America might easily have become a
republic the sooner, and Cromwell its first president.

PATTON: I wholly agree, John. And perhaps we, you, would not have
endured the scourge of slavery?

JOHN: That is a possibility, sir, but then I would not have met you,
general.

PATTON: Maybe.

(PATTON takes another drink. JOHN shaves away happily.)

PATTON: How long have we been together now, John?

JOHN: Ten years, sir.

PATTON: Ten years, hell?

JOHN: Now and again, sir.

(PATTON bursts into explosions of laughter.)

PATTON: Ten years and I don’t even know where you come from.

JOHN: Columbia, South Carolina, sir. The old man was a baker, had his
own business, a good one too.

PATTON: Good. Had your father been a slave, John?

JOHN: Yes, sir. But he, and his Ma and Pa, were set free in 1866 and set
up this bakery in the front room of grandpa’s house and made some good
old fashioned bread, real gravy soaking stuff. Went pretty well, and
after grandpa and grandma died the old man bought a small outbuilding on
the side of a blacksmiths shop and folks used to come for miles to buy
his bread. And I remember one morning, middle of winter it was, these
three guys turned up and when they saw me helping with the flour they
started calling me a white nigger and the old man was having none of
that. Hell, he took a knife and went for those three guys, cut the ear
off one, and there am I looking on and not realising what was
happening. Then the three of them got the old man cornered, put his belt
around his neck and hanged him from a large old rusty meat hook in a
beam. I remember him hanging there, his legs jerking, and his feet
kicking out and this gurgling, rasping sound. And then he was still.

(PATTON is silent.)

(Before another word can be said PATTON’S Deputy Chief of Staff, PAUL
HAWKINS rushes into the room.)

HAWKINS: We’ve got trouble in Nancy, general. Hemingway has just tried
to beat-up Park.

Screen to BLACK.

To Be Continued…